Beverley McLachlin, PC (born 7 September 1943) is the 17th and current Chief Justice of Canada, the first woman to hold this position. She also serves as a Deputy of the Governor General of Canada.

Born Beverley Gietz in Pincher Creek, Alberta, the eldest child of Ernest Gietz and Eleanora Kruschell, she received a B.A. and a M.A. degree in philosophy and an LL.B. degree (winning the gold medal as top student and serving as Editor-in-Chief of the Alberta Law Review) from the University of Alberta. She was called to the Bar of Alberta in 1969 and to the Bar of British Columbia in 1971. She practised law from 1969 until 1975. From 1974 until 1981 she was an Associate Professor and Professor with tenure at the University of British Columbia.

She has one son from her first marriage to Roderick McLachlin. Her first husband died in 1988 and she remarried in 1992 to Frank McArdle.

In 1981 she was appointed to the County Court of Vancouver and then to the Supreme Court of British Columbia. In 1985 she was appointed to the British Columbia Court of Appeal and in 1988 was appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of British Columbia.. She was appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada on 30 March 1989 and was made Chief Justice of Canada on 7 January 2000.

Coordinates: 53°50′42″N 0°25′37″W / 53.845°N 0.427°W / 53.845; -0.427

Beverley is a market town, civil parish and the county town of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, located between the River Hull and the Westwood. The town is noted for Beverley Minster and architecturally-significant religious buildings along New Walk and other areas, as well as the Beverley Racecourse and the market place; the town itself is around 1,300 years old. It is also home to the oldest grammar school in the country, Beverley Grammar School.

The town was originally known as Inderawuda and was founded by Saint John of Beverley during the time of the Anglian kingdom of Northumbria. After a period of Viking control, it passed to the Cerdic dynasty, a period during which it gained prominence in terms of religious importance in Great Britain. It continued to grow especially under the Normans when its trading industry was first established. A place of pilgrimage throughout the Middle Ages due to its founder, Beverley eventually became a notable wool-trading town. Beverley was once the tenth-largest town in England, as well as one of the richest, because of its wool, and the pilgrims who came to venerate its founding saint, John of Beverley. But after the Reformation, the regional stature of Beverley was much reduced.