Théodore Macdonald
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Théodore Harney MacDonald (25 November 1933 – 2011) was a Canadian polymath, professor of mathematics and health, and human rights defender.[1][2]
MacDonald was raised in Montreal, Quebec, as one of six children. His father was Cuthbert Goodridge MacDonald (1897-1967), editor of The Montreal Herald and a poet.[3][4] Cuthbert's mother was the writer, Elizabeth Roberts MacDonald.[5]
Reports differ as to his early childhood. One account says that his mother left the family when he was ten and that the children were largely raised by the oldest daughter, then aged thirteen.[2] Another says that he ran away from home, repelled by his father,[6] but this seems unlikely because he gave praise for his father in a book preface.[4] All agree that he was largely educated by Jesuits and that his precocious talents led to him finishing school curriculum several years early. All obituaries also report he obtained a Licentiate in Music (L.Mus) by the age of twelve.[7] After this, he taught music before completing a second degree in mathematics and epidemiology from McGill University at the age of seventeen.
He then worked in the Canadian Wildlife Service and (possibly) served for Canada in the Korean War. One obituary says that he was captured by North Korea but defected to them at the end of the war in 1953, aged twenty, travelling by ship with East German allies and settling there to complete a medical degree. He remained a socialist for the rest of his life. He also had a C. Psychol., possibly an MA or MSc from Columbia University, and PhD, possibly two (institution and discipline unknown, possibly medicine or biology and one source suggests from Glasgow and Delaware[8]).
In 1960, MacDonald participated in organized, nonviolent protest against racial segregation in the US southern states led by Martin Luther King Jr. and was eventually exiled from the US (he may later have studied at Columbia and Santa Clara),[9] probably because he also began visiting Cuba and was known to authorities as a communist.[2] MacDonald was in Perth, at the University of Western Australia, 1961-1963, and again in the 1970s, working at Monash University and the University of Newcastle,[10] and had a Chair at the relatively young University of the South Pacific in 1972 and 1973 before being banned from entering Fiji on the grounds of 'political activity' in 1973.[11] In all he spent over a decade in Australia, then relocated to London in the early 1980s, eventually settling in Littlehampton, on England's south coast, where he completed several books after retirement.
He was married to Elizabeth Scammell (1936-2016) between 1962 and 1980 and adopted her two daughters, Lynda and Anne, from her previous marriage and was legal parent to her son Ross, but was estranged from him from the mid-1980s. Elizabeth and Theo had two children, a daughter Sara and son Gareth (1968-1988). MacDonald was subsequently married to Chris and had one child, Matthew, with another adopted, nine grandchildren, and one great-grandson by 2011. One son, Matthew, was sentenced during the May Day riots in London in 2000, later establishing the Cambridge Anti-Capitalist Action Society while at the university and being expelled for various pro-poor actions.[12][13][14]
Career
MacDonald worked a doctor, consultant, and as an academic in several disciplines. Positions known:
- Six years in Cuba
- WHO and UNESCO officer and consultant with work in Jamaica (1969), the Solomon Islands. With WHO in Eastern Mediterranean.[15]
- Chair in Mathematics, Monash University, Australia, 1970s and probably 1980s[2]
- Professor of Mathematics and Education, University of the South Pacific, Fiji (197?-1973)
- University of Newcastle, Australia (c1986)[10]
- Professor of Global Health Rights, Research Institute of Human Rights and Social Justice, London Metropolitan University, UK (?-1991)[16]
- Professor and Director of Postgraduate Studies in Health at the West London Institute of Higher Education and at Brunel University, c. 1991-2002.
- UNESCO Chair
Positions not confirmed:
- Whether he practiced medicine. Possible MD degree either from East Germany or Mexico
- Whether he served in the Canadian army.
- Whether he practiced research in biology for a short time
