William Jackson Hooker

(1785-1865)

Sir William Jackson Hooker was born at Norwich in 1785. He showed an early interest in botany, and made an expedition to Iceland in 1809 through the encouragement of Sir Joseph Banks. He married the daughter of Dawson Turner, a brewer and botanist, in 1815. The Hookers settled down in Halesworth, Suffolk.

During this time he laid the foundation of his herbarium, which later formed the basis of the Herbarium at Kew. He was appointed Regis Professor of Botany at the University of Glasgow in 1820. He proved to be a popular lecturer, and took the time to increase his collections. He became the editor of Curtis’s Botanical Magazine by 1826, and was knighted in 1836.

He always had great belief that the Royal Garden at Kew had the potential to be the centre of botanical science for the British Empire. He was appointed Kew’s first official Director in 1841. The Palm House, Museums of Economic Botany, Herbarium and Library, admission of the public to Kew Gardens on weekdays and the publication of an official guidebook were only some of the innovations brought to Kew by Sir William.

Hooker’s description of Imantophyllum aitonii seems to be based on a drawing of the plant at Syon House, requested by the head gardener, Mr Forest, a drawing and specimens of the fruit from Kew, supplied by William Aiton, and possibly a small piece of a leaf Bowie gave to Hooker. With this he ingeniously put together a drawing to publish with his naming of the plant in Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, Vol 55 of 1828. It seems that Hooker never saw the plant that flowered at Syon House. (Van der Linde, John, Clivia 5, 2003:94).

Hooker’s extensive foreign correspondence and his excellent relationships with institutions such as the Foreign and Colonial Offices, the Admiralty and the East India Company established Kew’s position at the forefront of science.

©2003 American Clivia Society