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George Hamilton McDonald was born in Hoople, North Dakota in 1896. His mother was Mary Jane McDonald and his father was Malcolm Loch McDonald. His family moved to Canada, eventually settling in Vancouver where George worked as a clerk. He was 5 ft and 7inchs tall, with blue eyes and brown hair. In 1916, at the age of 19, he enlisted in the military and went overseas to France. After the war he was able to use the government program that helped veterans attain farm land, and so he ended up with a farm in Alder Grove in 1919/1920. He married Isabella Smith, who was from Ontario. George did not make much money farming, and so he got a job as logger in Surrey. He used to take the train to his logging camp, only coming back on the weekends. He would leave the farm behind and in 1926 he became the Post Master for Alder Grove. He did enlist during the Second World War, joining the postal core and leaving his wife and two other women to run the post office in Alder Grove from 1942 until 1945. He was the longest serving postmaster for Alder Grove, serving from 1926 until 1963. His house was beside the Post Office until the new building was built in 1950, and then he lived in an apartment above the Post Office. He had at least two sons, Les McDonald and Russel McDonald. He died in 1973.