Daniel Miner Gordon was born on January 30, 1845, in Pictou, Nova Scotia.

He was a Presbyterian minister, author, and educator. He attended Pictou Academy, the University of Glasgow (M.A., 1863, B.D., 1866, D.D., 1895), and Berlin University. He was ordained a Presbyterian minister in 1866 and was called to St Andrew’s, the oldest Protestant church in Ottawa, in 1867. In 1879, he became part of a team sent to examine the land from Port Simpson through the Rockies to the prairies, to gather further information about the proposed route of the Canadian Pacific Railway. In 1880, he published “Mountain and Prairie: A Journey from Victoria to Winnipeg via Peace River Pass” based on his experiences. He returned to Winnipeg in the autumn of 1883 to serve as pastor of Knox Presbyterian Church. During the 1885 North West Rebellion, he was Chaplain of the 90th Battalion Winnipeg Rifles, earning the Imperial war medal for his service. Failing health prompted a move to St. Andrew’s Church, Halifax, in 1887. In 1894, he became the chair of systematic theology and apologetics at the Presbyterian College in Halifax, and in 1902, he became the 8th principal of Queen’s College in Kingston, Ontario. He was instrumental in bringing about Queen's separation from the Presbyterian church in order to receive the government and private funding needed to run a modern university.

In 1869, he married Eliza Simona MacLennan (1846–1910). He died on August 31, 1925, in Kingston, Ontario.