Dr. Henri-March Ami (1858-1931)

Henri-March Ami
Dr. Henri-Marc Ami was born in Belle-Rivière, Québec in 1858 and died in Menton, France in 1931.  He studied geology at McGill University with John William Dawson and joined the Geological Survey of Canada in 1882, retiring in 1911.  Following his retirement, he devoted himself to archaeology, conducting several excavations in southern France, especially, but not exclusively in the Dordogne region.  Much of that extensive collection is currently permanently housed at the Canadian Museum of Civilization, but additional artifacts can also be found in the collections of the Redpath Museum at McGill University in Montréal, the University of Toronto and the Perth Museum in Perth, Ontario.

Before retiring from the Geological Survey of Canada, he took an interest in archaeology.  In fact, an early collection of human remains from Aylmer Island were gathered by Ami and it is Henri-Marc Ami who also brought into the GSC's collections, what we now recognize as roughly 2000 year old Middle Woodland ceramic sherds found at an archaeological site near Casselman, Ontario.
Photo of Dr. Henri-Marc Ami taken by William Topley in October, 1897.
Library and Archives Canada, E74403 (negative E002505157)