After a career as a teacher, principal, and administrator with the Alberta Department of Education, John W. Chalmers joined the staff of the Faculty of Education in 1969 as associate professor of Educational Foundations. He also acted as the director of an intercultural program aimed at training teachers planning to work in northern native communities. He retired as Professor Emeritus in 1975. He was a prolific author of textbooks, poetry, and local histories, including a biography of educator Milton Ezra LaZerte. Chalmers passed away April 11, 1998 in Edmonton, Alberta.

"Niddrie was an acute observer of his surroundings. He gives us gems of description of life in the railway construction camps in the Rockies, the fledgling appearance of Winnipeg, Calgary, and Golden in the late 1880s, horseback trips into the Rockies and freighting by canoe into northern Manitoba....This volume, expertly produced with few typographical errors, is welcome in part because it adds materially to the literature on Methodist missons to the First Peoples, which is far less extensive than that on Anglican or Catholic missions. As the publicity sheet indicates, the book is also valuable as a document for anyone fascinated by the lively social dynamics of Canada's formative years." British Journal of Canadian Studies