Original Findings: D. K. MacDonald
D. K. MacDonald was the Canada Lands Surveyor who collected this marker. He arrived in Halifax on the evening of Sunday June 20th 1965; he stayed at the Nova Scotian Hotel, right by the train station.[1] The train station is a quick ten-minute drive from Point Pleasant Park. The team stayed in Halifax for a few months evidently, working throughout the city and on September 15th 1965 they “located the boundaries of Martello Tower site at Point Pleasant Park. Also searched for old monuments along park body.”[2] According to the survey map he drew, the W.D. marker number 6 was replaced because it was damaged. In fact “surveyors are forbidden to erect a second boundary monument at a corner which they find already marked on the ground unless they are authorized to destroy the monument found.”[3]
In addition to the survey plan, D. K. MacDonald’s survey was complemented by an aerial photography of Point Pleasant Park. On the back of the photography are the markings “P. C. P” 1 through 8; these are “Photography Control Points” and they are also indicated on the survey map. These coordinates mark the waterfront of the Park.
Following his career as a Canada Lands Surveyor, D. K. MacDonald worked as a Nova Scotian Land Surveyor. MacDonald sat as the chairman of many committees of the Association of Nova Scotia Land Surveyors including the complaints committee and the metric conversion committee.[4]