Department of Geography
Memorial University of Newfoundland
St. John's, NL
A1B 3X9

Office: SN 2024
Phone: 864-8992
Fax: 864-3119
E mail: jmacpher[at]mun[dot]ca

Professor emeritus
BSc & MSc University of London
PhD McGill University

Teaching Interests

Before retiring in 1994 I had taught at Memorial University since 1966.

Courses taught included Physical Geography, Geomorphology, Quaternary Geography, and Field Studies.

Research Interests

I have used pollen analysis of lake, bog and marine sediments to reconstruct past vegetation, climate, sea levels and human activity, mainly on the island of Newfoundland, but also in the province of Quebec and in highland Scotland.

Selected Publications

• Macpherson, J.B. 2005. The vegetational history of St. John’s. In Macpherson, A.G. ed. Four centuries and the City: perspectives on the historical geography of St. John’s. Department of Geography, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 19-36.
• Bell, T., Macpherson, J.B., and Renouf, M.A.P. 2005, Late Prehistoric human impact on Bass Pond, Port au Choix. Newfoundland and Labrador Studies, 20: 107-129.
• Rosenberg, S. M., Walker, I.R., and Macpherson, J.B. 2005. Environmental changes at Port au Choix as reconstructed from fossil midges. Newfoundland and Labrador Studies, 20: 57-73.
• Bell, T., Macpherson, J.B. and Renouf, M.A.P. 2003. “Wish you were here…” a thumbnail portrait of the Great Northern Peninsula Environment 1000 AD. In Lewis-Simpson, S.M. ed. Vinland Revisited: The Norse World at the turn of the First Millenium. Selected Papers from the Viking Millenium International Symposium 15-24 September 2000, Newfoundland and Labrador, St. John’s, Newfoundland: Historic Sites Association of Newfoundland and Labrador, pp 203-218.
• Macpherson, J.B., 1996. Delayed deglaciation by downwasting of the northeast Avalon Peninsula, Newfoundland: an application of the early postglacial pollen record. Geographie physique et Quaternaire, 50(2): 201-220.
• Macpherson, J.B., 1995. A 6 ka BP reconstruction for the island of Newfoundland from a synthesis of Holocene lake-sediment pollen records. Geographie physique et Quaternaire 49: 163-182 (invited paper for a special issue of Géographie physique et Quaternaire on Paleogeography and paleoecology of 6000 yr BP in Canada).
• Macpherson, J.B., 1994. The vegetational history of the central Avalon Peninsula from pollen analysis of lake and bog sediments. In Liverman, D. and J. Hall (eds.) The Salmonier drainage basin: a focus for Terramon environmental monitoring and research, Terramon Report Series 3, St. John's: Centre for Earth Resources Research, 52-61.
• Anderson, T.W. and Macpherson, J.B., 1994. Wisconsinan Lateglacial environmental change in Newfoundland: a regional review. Journal of Quaternary Science, 9: 171-178.