[Source - Tim Maggs for FHYA, 2020: I was born in 1941 in Pretoria, of British ancestry. After World War 2 we moved to Johannesburg where I attended school to age 12. Holidays saw us travel widely in South Africa, including various farm visits, which must have stimulated my appreciation of the countryside. With the second National Party election victory in 1953 our parents became concerned about the increasingly racist regime in South Africa and moved us three siblings to the UK to complete our education. Having finished school returned to SA and started a BA in history and geography at the University of Cape Town. This wasn't really leading anywhere until I became hooked on archaeology through meeting and going on expeditions to record rock paintings with the pioneers, Townley Johnson, Hym Rabinowitz and Percy Sieff. This led to Hons. in archaeology, followed by a PhD on the precolonial farmers of the Free State, which took nearly a decade. By now married and with small children, we moved to Pietermaritzburg, where I took up the first-ever archaeological post in Natal and continued research into early farming communities. Over the years I began also to work on the more public aspects of archaeology and heritage conservation - contributions to textbooks, school visits, efforts to protect archaeological sites and service on a variety of heritage-related committees. I was the first chair of the KwaZulu Monuments Council and later served on the National Monuments Council. From small beginnings, the Archaeology Department of the Natal (now KwaZulu-Natal) Museum has grown (much of it after I retired) to include specialists in the Stone Age and rock art as well as early farmers. Now deep into retirement I still (2020) do some research, notably on the terraced settlements of the Mpumalanga escarpment.]
