George Fraser (born 25 October 1854 in Lossiemouth, Moray, Scotland, and died in 1944 in Ucluelet, British Columbia, Canada) was one of the world's leading hybridizers, especially of rhododendrons.
Fraser began his gardening career at the age of seventeen at Christies Nursery in Fochabers, Moray. He was then apprenticed at Gordon Castle, Fochabers. On completion of his apprenticeship, he spent the next four years studying horticulture in Edinburgh funding this by working on a local estate.
From there he worked in Mollance in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, then at Hartfield House in Renfrewshire. While still in his twenties Fraser took on the post of head gardener at Craigflower, Fife. His last position in Scotland was as head gardener at the large country estate of Auchmore, Killin, Perthshire.
In 1883, Fraser along with his sister emigrated to Canada and worked for the Canadian Pacific Railway for a time. He started a commercial greenhouse in Winnipeg but the cold winters made him move to the more temperate regions further west and settled in Victoria, British Columbia in 1885 where he established a successful fruit and vegetable garden. Then, in 1889, the city of Victoria commissioned John Blair, a landscape architect, and also a Scot, to design and produce Beacon Hill Park. Blair, knowing Fraser's reputation as a plantsman immediately hired him to be the foreman for the entire project.
In 1894, Fraser left Victoria for the remote fishing village of Ucluelet where he had bought 236 acres (0.96 km2) for $236 two years before. At that time the village was only accessible by sea. Singlehandedly, he cleared enough of his land to establish his nursery. Hybridizing was his passion and this he did with honeysuckle, gooseberries, cranberries, roses and many more besides. His technique was to use the wild form of the plant and cross it with a domesticated version. His renown among hybridizers, however, was in producing rhododendrons crosses. His work was recognised internationally and recorded in the Gardener's Chronicle of London. Plant explorers and botanists corresponded with him, as did The Royal Botanic Garden, Kew and the Arnold Arboretum, Boston.
In 1919 he sent a specimen to the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew, England. Kew named the plant Rhododendron fraseri.
He became Vice-president of the Pacific Coast Association of Nurserymen in 1928 and in 1936, the first Life Member of the Vancouver Island Horticultural Association. In 1991, the American Rhododendron Society presented him with the posthumous award of "Pioneers Achievement Award", a rarely given honour. Ucluelet produced a marble memorial in his honour and celebrate an annual George Fraser Day in May each year. The City of Victoria also recognised his contribution to the making of the beautiful Beacon Hill Park by installing a commemorative stone in his honour.
Walter Hood Fitch was a botanical illustrator, born in Glasgow, Scotland, who executed some 10,000 drawings for various publications. His work in colour lithograph, including 2700 illustrations for Curtis's Botanical Magazine, produced up to 200 plates per year.
The Loddiges family managed one of the most notable of the eighteenth and nineteenth century plant nurseries that traded in and introduced exotic plants, trees, shrubs, ferns, palms and orchids into European gardens.
Frederick William Thomas Burbidge (1847–1905) was a British explorer who collected many rare tropical plants for the famous Veitch Nurseries.
Charles Fraser or Frazer or Frazier was Colonial Botanist of New South Wales from 1821 to 1831. He collected and catalogued numerous Australian plant species, and participated in a number of exploring expeditions. He was a member of the Stirling expedition of 1827, and his report on the quality of the soil was instrumental in the decision to establish the Swan River Colony.
James Drummond was an Australian botanist and naturalist who was an early settler in Western Australia.
Ernest Henry "Chinese" Wilson, better known as E. H. Wilson, was a notable British plant collector and explorer who introduced a large range of about 2000 Asian plant species to the West; some sixty bear his name.
The Victoria Medal of Honour (VMH) is awarded to British horticulturists resident in the United Kingdom whom the Royal Horticultural Society Council considers deserving of special honour by the Society.
Sir Harry James Veitch was an eminent English horticulturist in the nineteenth century, who was the head of the family nursery business, James Veitch & Sons, based in Chelsea, London. He was instrumental in establishing the Chelsea Flower Show, which led to him being knighted for services to horticulture.
William Baxter was an English gardener who collected in Australia on behalf of English nurserymen and private individuals. He had developed his horticultural reputation as gardener to the Comtesse de Vandes in Bayswater, London, many of the plants he had nurtured being used for illustrations in Curtis's Botanical Magazine. He was the first privately financed plant collector to be sent to Australia, his mission being to collect seeds and roots for the London seedsman F. Henchman.
Tony Kirkham MBE VMH is the former Head of Arboretum, Gardens & Horticulture Services, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
John Fraser, FLS, F.R.H.S., was a Scottish botanist who collected plant specimens around the world, from North America and the West Indies to Russia and points between, with his primary career activity from 1780 to 1810. Fraser was a commissioned plant collector for Catherine, Czar of Russia in 1795, Paul I of Russia in 1798, and for the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna in 1806; he issued nursery catalogues c. 1790 and 1796, and had an important herbarium that was eventually sold to the Linnean Society.
James Herbert Veitch F.L.S., F.R.H.S., was a member of the Veitch family who were distinguished horticulturists and nursery-men for over a century.
Charles Maries was an English botanist and plant collector who was sent by James Veitch & Sons of Chelsea, London to search for new hardy plants in Japan, China and Taiwan between 1877 and 1879; there he discovered over 500 new species, which Veitch introduced to England. Amongst his finds, several bear his name, including Abies mariesii, Davallia mariesii, Hydrangea macrophylla "Mariesii", Platycodon grandiflorus "Mariesii" and Viburnum plicatum "Mariesii".
Charles Curtis was an English botanist who was sent by James Veitch & Sons to search for new plant species in Madagascar, Borneo, Sumatra, Java and the Moluccas, before settling in Penang, where he became the first superintendent of the Penang Botanic Gardens.
George Forrest was a Scottish botanist, who became one of the first western explorers of China's then remote southwestern province of Yunnan, generally regarded as the most biodiverse province in the country.
George Nicholson, was an English botanist and horticulturist, amongst 60 awarded the Victoria Medal of Honour by the Royal Horticultural Society in 1897 for their contributions to horticulture. He is noted for having edited "The Illustrated Dictionary of Gardening", produced as an eight-part alphabetical series between 1884 and 1888 with a supplement, and published by L. Upcott Gill of London. It was also published in New York in 1889 by The American Agriculturist in 4 Volumes.
William Rickatson Dykes was an English amateur botanist who became an expert in the field of iris breeding and wrote several influential books on the subject. He was also interested in tulips, amaryllis, and other plants.
Sir Frederick William Moore, was President of the Royal Horticultural Society of Ireland, and Keeper of the Royal Botanical Gardens, Dublin in the period 1879-1922.
Frederick George Preston was a British gardener, the Superintendent at Cambridge University Botanic Garden from 1919 to 1947.