Marion Adams Macpherson

Her father was a second-generation Scottish Canadian whose parents left their home in the Outer Hebrides (South Uist, Northern Isles) to settle in the Moosomin area of south east Saskatchewan.

Her mother was from the same Hebridean region but had attended the University of Glasgow, from which she received a Master of Arts degree in the early 20th century before continuing on to a teaching career.

), Macpherson joined the Department of External Affairs of the Government of Canada.

Initially, she worked in Washington, D.C., Ottawa and New York City before accepting a post as Third Secretary to the Canadian Permanent Mission to the United Nations from 1963–1968, High Commissioner to Sri Lanka from 1973 to 1976, Ambassador to Denmark from 1979 to 1983, Deputy Commandant of the National Defense College from 1983 to 1985, and High Commissioner to Zambia from 1985 to 1987.

She was among the first women to take the examination for the Canadian foreign service, in the mid- to late- 1940s, and the first woman to pass and gain entrance to External Affairs on the basis of merit.