John Thomas Bulmer was born in 1845 or 1846 in Nappan, Nova Scotia.

He was a lawyer, librarian, bibliophile, and social reformer. He graduated from Amherst Academy, Massachusetts and in 1871, he came to Halifax, where he articled to lawyer Howard Maclean. In 1871, he was called to the bar and he practised law in Halifax for the rest of his life, achieving a considerable reputation as counsel for defendants in criminal trials. He was also an enthusiastic promoter of efficient and scientific librarianship. He served as librarian of the Nova Scotia Historical Society and edited the first volume of its Collections (1878). In 1879, he was appointed a provincial librarian. He would leave behind him a library of over 25,000 volumes, including many rare books and an invaluable array of old Nova Scotian periodicals. When the Dalhousie law school opened its doors in 1883, Bulmer was the logical choice as a librarian. As a social reformer, he was passionately attached to the temperance cause. In 1888, he founded a weekly magazine, the Canadian Voice (Halifax), to promote his agenda, e.g., female suffrage, equal pay for men and women, a fairer distribution of wealth and the black communities’ rights.

In 1877, he married Eleanor Jane McHeffey. He died on February 9, 1901, in Halifax, Nova Scotia.