Margaret E. "Peggy" Leshikar-Denton is anarchaeologist specialising inunderwater archaeology, and director of theCayman Islands National Museum.^[1]

Leshikar-Denton has a B.F.A. and an M.A. from theUniversity of Texas at Austin^[2] and aPh.D. fromTexas A&M University where her thesis was on theWreck of the Ten Sail, a 1794 shipwreck off Cayman.^[3] Her thesis title was "The 1794 Wreck of the Ten Sail, Cayman Islands, British West Indies: A Historical Study and Archaeological Survey".^[4]

Leshikar-Denton was appointed as director of theCayman Islands National Museum in 2011, having first been appointed to a post in the museum in 1986. She has worked on archaeological sites in countries includingMexico,Spain,Jamaica,Turks and Caicos andTurkey.^[3][2] She is a research associate of theInstitute of Nautical Archaeology (INA) atTexas A&M University.^[5]

She contributed the chapter "Caribbean Maritime Archaeology" to theOxford Handbook of Maritime Archaeology.

In 1998 and 1999, she was the UNESCO representative at meetings of the Latin American and Caribbean Technical Commission on Underwater Cultural Heritage, and in 2001, she worked on theUNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage as a member of theInternational Council on Monuments and Sites delegation.^[3]

She is a past secretary of the International Committee on Underwater Cultural Heritage (ICUCH) of theInternational Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), and represents the Cayman Islands on the committee.^[6][2]

In 2016 she was awarded theSociety for Historical Archaeology's award of merit for her work on the protection of underwater cultural heritage.^[7][8]

She has lived in theCayman Islands since 1986, having first visited in 1980 with a team from theInstitute of Nautical Archaeology (INA) atTexas A&M University.^[3][5]

• Leshikar-Denton, Margaret E. (2020).Cayman's 1794 Wreck of the Ten Sail : peace, war, and peril in the Caribbean. Tuscaloosa.ISBN 9780817359652.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)^[9][10]
• Leshikar-Denton, Margaret E.;Luna Erreguerena, Pilar, eds. (2016).Underwater and maritime archaeology in Latin American and the Caribbean. London: Taylor & Francis.ISBN 9781315416083.^[11]
• Leshikar-Denton, Margaret (2014). "Caribbean Maritime Archaeology". In Ford, Ben; Hamilton, Donny L.; Catsambis, Alexis (eds.).The Oxford handbook of maritime archaeology. New York.ISBN 9780199705153.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

• Living people
• Caymanian educators
• Women museum directors
• Texas A&M University alumni
• University of Texas at Austin alumni
• American women archaeologists
• Underwater archaeologists
• Caymanian women

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from May 2022
• CS1 maint: location missing publisher
• Year of birth missing (living people)