GHS News 83 Spring 2009
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T H E G A R DEN NEWS HISTO R Y SOCIETY SPRING 2009 83 events conservation agenda forum contents from the Chairman from the Chairman 2 In the last issue I omitted to thank the outgoing news 3 Chairman! I would like to express my gratitude GHS events 4 to Dr Colin Treen who has worked extremely hard to ensure the ongoing smooth running of the in memoriam 10 Society. conservation notes: England 11 It has been a particular pleasure to me to conservation notes: Scotland 16 work with Colin, as it was with him as my agenda 19 Tutor at Leeds some thirty years ago that I forum 28 � rst encountered the subject of garden history. new members 31 Colin also opened my eyes to the possibility that principal offi cers 31 there is both history and excitement in what I GHS events diary 32 might otherwise have overlooked in my quest for obviously big shiny examples. His subjects, the Florists’ Gardens in Leeds and the American Gardens at Meanwood, cannot be more than a mile or so from his own front door; but for me, he transported both to a rank of equal interest with any Brown or Repton site. He has contributed his quiet but determined authority, gained from years of dealing with stroppy students and a stint as Dean, and left the Society in a healthy state for me to come back and take the credit. Thank you Colin. contact us Greenwich Park and the Equestrian Events, [email protected] Olympics 2012 www.gardenhistorysociety.org I did speak too soon! LOCOG are clearly not The Garden History Society Head Office listening to any objections and The Royal Parks 70 Cowcross Street, London EC1M 6EJ have decided to “work with them” to ensure phone: 020 7608 2409 fax: 020 7490 2974 minimum damage and full restoration after the event. The GHS retains its stance that the decision The Garden History Society in Scotland to hold the event in this internationally important The Glasite Meeting House, designed landscape is wrong, and undermines the 33 Barony Street, Edinburgh, EH3 6NX principles of conservation and good practice. phone/fax: 0131 557 5717 email: scotland@)gardenhistorysociety.org NEWS Editor Membership: applications to Finally, thanks to outgoing Editor Pat Huff , for The Garden History Society, 47 Water Street, enthusiastically taking on the task for the last six Lavenham, Sudbury, Suffolk, CO10 9RN years, to the incoming Editor Charles Boot, for phone: 01787 249 286 volunteering to edit the NEWS for now, and email: [email protected] to Tim Richardson in his role as Chair of the Education and Publications Committee for This issue of GHS NEWS is supported by co-ordinating the transition. Dominic Cole London January 2009 Front cover: Orchard on the Carse of Gowrie, Perth and Kinross; Forestry Commission Scotland news volunteer opportunity Want to be more involved? Do you have time to spare? GHS Essay Prize 2009 Volunteer invited to help with our annual Winter Lecture series. The �fth annual Garden History Society Essay You will be asked to assist us with: Prize is under way, with entries to be submitted • updating the press database by 30 March. The prize is open to any student • sending out press releases at a university or institute of higher education. • issuing tickets Essays must be 5000 to 6000 words and the only • attending as many as possible of the lectures restriction on subject matter is that it must be of to help coordinate them relevance to garden history. Visits to the office in Cowcross Street, The prize was established to encourage vibrant, London, at times between September and scholarly research and writing, which it certainly March, will be necessary. Some computer has done; previous prize-winning essays have literacy required. encompassed an explanation of Wilton’s Rainbow In exchange you will get networking Fountain, an examination of the garden in a opportunities, a chance to develop transferable seventeenth century masque, the exposition of a skills and, of course, free attendance at the lost eighteenth-century Royal garden and the role lectures. of gardens in the nineteenth-century treatment of If you would like to �nd out more, please mental illness. contact the GHS office, phone: 020 7608 2409, The prize includes a cheque for £250, to be or email: [email protected] presented at the annual garden party in June, free membership of the Society for a year and consideration for publication in the peer-reviewed, scholarly Journal Garden History. it seems. We understand these Journals have now All previous winners have been accepted for been replaced/sent out again where we have had publication and often the best of the non-winning complaints but if you have received a damaged entries are invited to submit to the Journal; several copy please contact the printers for a replacement. entries from last year’s competition are currently in It is a mystery how they came to be wet, but we preparation for publication in forthcoming issues. hope it was a one-off. If it happens again we may Previous winners are also making waves in the have to consider using a different kind of bag. �eld of garden history; 2007 winner Paige Johnson Barbara Simms went on to receive a coveted Robert Adam travel Editor, Garden History bursary to further her research on the Art Deco garden, while 2005 winner Dr Clare Hickman Back issues of Garden History & JSTOR is now working as a research fellow at Bristol University where she is administering Dr Tim Once again all of Garden History will soon be Mowl’s Leverhulme Trust funded project to chart back in print. Thanks to some of the bene�ts of England’s historic gardens and landscapes. modern technology, and our relationship with An entry form and the rules for submission can JSTOR, whose very high quality scans we have be found on our website or by mail from our been able to make use of, it is now possible to London office, please enclose an SAE. produce very small batches of those issues that Katie Campbell we have run out of. We aim to maintain stocks of all issues, especially the themed ones, and they Wet Journals continue to sell on paper, at the maintained price of £15 (UK only) including postage and packing, We apologise that the last Journal, Garden History overseas pricing on demand. 36:2 (Winter 2008), apparently arrived in a wet and It is becoming apparent however that many soggy state for many people; quite large numbers readers of our Journal now do so online. Thanks GHS NEWS 83 Spring 2009 3 to JSTOR’s 5282 www.gardenhistorysociety.org institutional members, nearly all of our 1,348 You will have noticed published articles have now that our website has not been at least looked at since been functioning as well we went on-line in 2005, with as it might have been in some 122,888 individual article recent months. It has now viewings, some 45,344 of them been replaced with a new, then being printed off. much more interactive one, We still maintain our three-year cut which should make the process off, so that to read the very latest articles of navigating it, and keeping it up date, you do have to be a member, but we feel much simpler both for the Society’s our presence in JSTOR is considerably enhancing officers and its users. our educational role. If JSTOR did not exist, We are indebted to Stuart Clode, husband of our we would �nd it much more difficult to reach webmaster Kristina, for his hard work in making the ever expanding student body, and, thanks to the necessary changes, and the time he has taken Google, students in other disciplines are becoming with the officers in showing them how to upgrade aware of garden history. Incidentally the fee raised the new site. by our JSTOR membership is ploughed back This is now the third version of the website that into the Society’s publications budget, as well as a we have created and we have high hopes for it; proportion going to support the JSTOR mission. have a look and let us have your comments. New The most read article remains Ancient content will continue to be added in the coming Mesopotamian Gardens and the Identification of the months. Hanging Gardens of Babylon Resolved by Stephanie Following on from this, we should have news of Dalley (21:1, Summer 1993), which 1,624 people the revived Register of Research in the next edition have looked at, presumably not all of them in the of GHS NEWS, possibly even in the next GHS US military... micro-news. Ed & Pub Ed & Pub GHS events 2009 People and Places: Sustaining the Value GHSS AGM of World Heritage Cultural Landscapes Kirknewton House Susan Denyer 11am, Saturday 18 April The Gallery at Cowcross Street, EC1M 6EJ 6.30pm, Wednesday 11 March The Garden History Society in Scotland will hold its AGM at Kirknewton House, West Lothian. Susan Denyer, FSA, World Heritage Adviser, After the business of the day, and a sandwich ICOMOS, & Secretary, ICOMOS-UK, considers lunch, there will be an opportunity to examine the examples of World Heritage cultural landscapes external history of the house, which was reworked from around the world and shows how these sites by Playfair, and to explore the grounds. could provide approaches that are relevant for All GHS members are welcomed to GHSS other landscapes, both rural and urban, in the UK. events. Please contact Sue Hewer by email: The Gallery, 70 Cowcross Street (nearest tube [email protected], phone: 01575 560 station Farringdon), doors open at 6pm.