author
N. A. (Noah A.) McDonald
A Presbyterian missionary and writer, he left behind a vivid firsthand account of life in 19th-century Siam. His work blends travel observation, religious history, and everyday detail in a way that still feels immediate.
1 Audiobook
Siam: Its Government, Manners, Customs, &c.
by N. A. (Noah A.) McDonald
About the author
Born in Pennsylvania in 1830, Noah A. McDonald trained at Jefferson College and Western Theological Seminary before being appointed a missionary by the Presbyterian Church in 1860. He traveled to Siam, now Thailand, where he spent about a decade in mission work and later served the First Presbyterian Church in Bangkok.
McDonald is best known for Siam: Its Government, Manners, Customs, &c. (1871), a book drawn from his years in the country. It offers a firsthand look at Thai society, religion, and public life as seen by an American missionary, and later appeared in a reprint titled A Missionary in Siam (1860-1870).
Sources available in this search also note that he worked on revising Christian texts in Siamese and that his family took part in mission education and Sabbath school work. He died in 1897.