Ferguson was born in Wahroonga, the fourth child of Eustace William Ferguson and Jessie Perry. He married Helen McVicar, veterinarian (born 1925 in Manly, NSW) in 1946 and they had five children, Deborah, Maggie Ferguson, Kate, John and Angus. They lived at West Pennant Hills in North-western Sydney, moving to Canberra in 1974 and eventually Newcastle in 2008, where he died in 2011.
1968: officer-in-charge of the CSIRO Division of Animal physiology at Prospect, NSW
1973: chairman of the Animal Research Laboratories
1978 until retirement in 1986: director of the CSIRO Institute of Animal and Food Sciences. Ferguson was also one of the founders of the Endocrine Society of Australia, and was its president from 1972 to 1974.
Work with Dr Jim Watts, originator of soft rolling skin merino selection process.
Scientific archive
Unusually, his experimental scientific career is well documented. The extensive records and effects have been bequeathed to the National Library of Australia. The NLA index entry is [1].