James Macfarlane was born on September 2, 1819, in Gettysburg, Adams, Pennsylvania.

He was an American civil engineer, lawyer, geologist, and author. He studied civil engineering at Pennsylvania College and in 1837, he joined the corps of civil engineers of the North Branch canal, with headquarters at Towanda. In 1845, he was admitted to the bar and practised law, serving three years as District Attorney in New Bloomfield, Perry County. In 1851, he returned to Bradford County to practice law at Towanda and was elected its District Attorney (1852-1859). He served as General Superintendent of the Barclay Coal Company (1859-1865) and then became General Sales Agent of the Associated Blossburg Coal Company at Rochester, Syracuse, and Elmira, New York. In 1872, Pennsylvania College conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. In 1874, he was appointed one of ten Commissioners for the Second Geological Survey. He became a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1880 and fellow in 1882. In 1883, he was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society. He wrote "The Coal Regions of America, Their Topography, Geology and Development" (1873), regarded by scientists everywhere as the standard work on the subject. He was also the author of "Geologists' Traveling Hand Book: an American Geological Railway Guide" (1879). He contributed numerous geological articles to the American Encyclopedia and was a frequent contributor to well-known scientific periodicals Science and American Geologist.

In 1847, he married Mary Eliza Overton (1823–1888). He died on October 12, 1885, in Towanda, Bradford, Pennsylvania.

Duncan MacFarlane was born in Auchingray, Scotland. He was educated for the Anglican church at the University of Glasgow (D.D. 1806). From 1824 until his death, he was Principal of Glasgow University and minister of the High Church, Glasgow.

David MacFarlane was born in Saskatchewan. He earned his B.S.A. and M.Sc. degrees from the University of Saskatchewan; and his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1942. From 1938 to 1942 he was professor of agriculture at the University of Kentucky. During the war he worked for the U.S. government, and later for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. Appointed Professor of agricultural economics at Macdonald College in 1947, he served as Chairman of the department from 1949 until his retirement as Emeritus Professor in 1974. One of his areas of specialisation was agricultural development in the Third World and he conducted consultative research in Mali, Afghanistan and Brazil.

Alexander Ramsay Macduff was born on January 26, 1846, in Chelsea, London, England.

He was a clergyman. He lived in Montreal, Quebec around 1860. He left for England in the early 1870s. He returned to Canada in 1895 and lived in Ashcroft, B.C. Around 1900, he resided in Phelps, Ontario County, New York.

In 1873, he married Elizabeth Farrer (1839-1874). He died on November 7, 1906, in Montecito, Santa Barbara, California.