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.

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.

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.

Roderick Ross MacFarlane was born in the outer Hebrides Islands, off the coast of Scotland, in 1833. He joined the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) as an apprentice clerk in 1852, when he was nineteen years old. He was sent overseas, travelling by ship to the Hudson Bay, and then overland and by river routes to the Great Slave Lake area where he was put in charge of a trading post at Fort Rae and later at Fort Resolution. In 1854 he went further north to Fort Good Hope, and ran that post until 1861. That year he was assigned to manage the Fort Anderson trading post, which he had been put in charge of building while still managing the Fort Good Hope post.
MacFarlane had high regard for the Inuvialuit who traded at Fort Anderson. In one report, he described them as “tall and well formed, active in their movements, lively in their conversation, good-humoured, with smiling open countenances” (MacFarlane 1890-91:34). He in turn appears to have been respected by the Inuvialuit, who called him 'Mitchi Paloum' (Mr. MacFarlane).

MacFarlane was an ardent collector of cultural and natural history specimens for the Smithsonian Institution. He received inspiration and training from Robert Kennicott, a naturalist working for the Smithsonian who travelled to northwestern Canada to acquire cultural and natural history specimens. MacFarlane encouraged Inuvialuit to bring artifacts and other specimens to the post, and he went on a lengthy collecting trip - with eggs as a major objective - each year from 1862 through 1865. He spent the long winters at Fort Anderson packing the collection and writing notes. The following spring the collections were shipped out through Fort Good Hope to catch the fur shipments going south, eventually reaching up the Mackenzie River system to Methye Portage and then to the Red River and the railhead at St. Paul for forwarding to Spencer Baird at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
MacFarlane argued unsuccessfully against the closure of Fort Anderson, and was concerned for the fate of the Inuvialuit who had come to rely on the goods they could obtain there. He remained in the north for some years as Superintendent for the Mackenzie District, later moving to other places and positions for the HBC. He retired to Winnipeg, Manitoba in 1894 and died there in 1920.

Thomas MacFarlane, born near Glasgow, Scotland, was educated in Glasgow and at the Royal Mining School, Freiburg, Germany. He worked briefly in Norway before coming to Canada in 1860. MacFarlane was employed in various mining projects, and discovered the famous Silver Islet mine on Lake Superior. He was chief analyst to the Department of Inland Revenue, Ottawa from 1886 until his death.