Research Catalog

Title

Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker : traveller and plant collector / Ray Desmond ; preface by Sir Ghillean Prance.

Author

Desmond, Ray

Publication

Woodbridge, Suffolk : Antique Collectors' Club ; Kew [England] : Royal Botanic Gardens, 1999.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Additional Authors

• Antique Collectors' Club
• Prance, Ghillean T., 1937-
• Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

Description

286 p. : ill. (some col.), maps (some col.); 28 cm.

Summary

"Sir Joseph Hooker is remembered as an eminent Victorian botanist and one of Charles Darwin's closest collaborators. Many gardeners and lovers of rhododendrons know of his plant collecting expedition in the Himalayas, but few are aware of his participation in Sir James Clark Ross's epic voyage to Antarctica in 1839-43, of his visits to Syria and Lebanon in 1860, to the Atlas Mountains in Morocco in 1871 and to the Rockies and California in 1877. At some risk to his own safety and health (he came close to drowning in the Antarctic Ocean and was imprisoned by the Rajah of Sikkim), he discovered many new species of plants and introduced a number of attractive flowers into British gardens. Extracts from his letters home and his published Himalayan Journals testify to his narrative skills, his constant curiosity and careful observation which combined to make him an outstanding scientific traveller."--Jacket.

Subject

• 1800-1899
• Botanical illustration > History > 19th century
• Botanists > Great Britain > Travel
• Botanists > Travel > Great Britain
• Botany
• Expeditions > history
• Hooker, Joseph Dalton, 1817-1911 > Travel

Genre/Form

Biographies.

Note

• Col. map on front lining paper.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 275-278) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

1. Formative years -- 2. Antarctic exploration and the start of Hooker's travels -- 3. Voyage into Antarctica -- 4. The search for the southern continent -- 5. An interlude -- 6. Once more on his travels -- 7. Arrival at Darjeeling -- 8. A tour of East Nepal -- 9. Exploration of Sikkim -- 10. Assam -- 11. Publications based on his Indian travels -- 12. An uncertain future -- 13. Visit to the Middle East -- 14. Morocco -- 15. Presidency of the Royal Society and a knighthood -- 16. A pioneer plant geographer -- 17. An active retirement.

ISBN

1851493050

OCLC

40609558

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library