William Jackson Hooker and John Torrey correspondence, 1821-1857

Related Titles

Related/Analytical: New York Botanical Garden Archives

Series: John Torrey papers, series 1, correspondence

By

Hooker, William Jackson, Sir, 1785-1865

Type

Collection

Material

Archival material

Publication info

Notes

Correspondence from Sir William Jackson Hooker to John Torrey, dated 1821-1857. Hooker's early letters to Torrey, nearly all written from Glasgow, Scotland, are full of encouragement and professional discussion. Specimens and books are sent regularly back and forth across the Atlantic, and Hooker frequently comments on the schedules of ships coming up the Clyde. After Torrey's 1833 trip to Europe and their first meeting in person, Hooker takes to addressing Torrey as "My dear friend." He refers often to his sons William and Joseph, telling Torrey of their activities and his hopes for their future. "Should insects be collected," he writes in 1836, "I shall not be unwilling to take a portion of them (for Joseph) particularly Beetles." In several instances Hooker refers Torrey to acquaintances who are visiting or emigrating to the States, including a man named George MacDonald who is involved with the colony in Liberia. Hooker notes the deaths of colleagues (Croom off the coast of North Carolina, Douglas in the Sandwich Islands, and Gardner in Ceylon, among others), of his eldest son William in Jamaica, and later his daughter Mary and his own father. (Several letters are written on mourning stationary.) Hooker keeps Torrey up to date on the professional accomplishments of his remaining son Joseph Dalton Hooker, who he refers to respectfully in later years as "Dr. Hooker." Now living at Kew and overseeing the new Botanic Garden there ("It is really a noble place & boasts some noble Houses & very very many fine plants..."), Hooker writes more personally-- marriages, family trips, the births of grandchildren. Twice Hooker mentions Torrey's brother Lewis, who visits the Hookers on Christmas Day, 1843. Toward the end of the collection he describes in detail the new incarnation of the Crystal Palace at Sydenham in London, and the 1855 Exposition Universelle des produits de l'Agriculture, de l'Industrie et des Beaux-Arts in Paris. The collection also includes a fragment of a

In English.

Subjects

Aesculus , Agardh, C. A. (Carl Adolf), 1785-1859 , Asarum canadense , Bachman, John, 1790-1874 , Balfour, John Hutton, 1808-1884 , Barratt, Joseph, 1796-1882 , Barton, William P. C. (William Paul Crillon), 1786 , Beck, Lewis C. (Lewis Caleb), 1798-1853 , Bedford, John Russell, Duke of, 1766-1839 , Beechey, Frederick William, 1796-1856 , Bentham, George, 1800-1884 , Bigelow, Jacob, 1786-1879 , Boott, Francis, 1792-1863 , Botanical specimens , Brackenridge, William D. (William Dunlop), 1810-18 , Bromfield, William Arnold, 1801-1851 , Brown, Robert, 1773-1858 , Candolle, Augustin Pyramus de, 1778-1841 , Carex , Conostylis , Correspondence , Crawe, I. B. (Ithamar Bingham), 1792-1847 , Crystal Palace (Sydenham, London, England) , Cyathea , Don, George, 1798-1856 , Douglas, David, 1799-1834 , Drummond, Thomas, -1835 , Eaton, Amos, 1776-1842 , Elliott, Stephen, 1771-1830 , Exposition universelle de Paris en 1855 , Fielding, H. B. (Henry Barron), 1805-1851 , Filices , Franklin, John, 1786-1847 , Frémont, John Charles, 1813-1890 , Gardner, George, 1812-1849 , Geyer, Karl Andreas, 1809-1853 , Gillies, John, 1792-1834 , Goldie, John, 1793-1886 , Gordon, Alexander, 1813-1873 , Graham, Robert, 1786-1845 , Gray, Asa, 1810-1888 , Greene, B. D. (Benjamin Daniel), 1793-1862 , Harvey, William H. (William Henry), 1811-1866 , Hooker, Joseph Dalton, 1817-1911 , Hooker, William Dawson , Hooker, William Jackson, Sir, 1785-1865 , Knieskern, Peter D., 1798-1871 , Kunze, Gustav, 1793-1851 , Lambert, Aylmer Bourke, 1761-1842 , Lindheimer, Ferdinand, 1802-1879 , Lindley, John, 1799-1865 , Linnean Society of London , Lyceum of Natural History (New York, N.Y.) , McNab, William, 1780-1848 , Musci , Nees von Esenbeck, C. G. (Christian Gottfried), 17 , Nelumbo , North America , Nuttall, Thomas, 1786-1859 , Parker, Charles Sandbach, -1869 , Parry, William Edward, Sir, 1790-1855 , Pickering, Charles, 1805-1878 , Plants , Prior, R. C. Alexander (Richard Chandler Alexander , Richardson, John, Sir, 1787-1865 , Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew , Salix , Schweinitz, Lewis David von, 1780-1834 , Sequoiadendron giganteum , Shaw, Henry, 1800-1889 , Silliman, Benjamin, 1779-1864 , Sphaerocarpos , Sprengel, Kurt Polycarp Joachim, 1766-1833 , Sullivant, William Starling, 1803-1873 , Taxus , Thomson, Thomas, 1817-1878 , Torrey, John, 1796-1873 , Torreya , Trevelyan, Walter Calverley, Sir, 1797-1879 , Trinius, Carl Bernhard, 1778-1844 , United States and Mexican Boundary Survey , United States Exploring Expedition (1838-1842) , United States Pacific Railroad Expeditions and Sur , Van Rensselaer, Stephen, 1764-1839 , Vogel, Theodore, 1812-1841 , Walker-Arnott, George Arnott, 1799-1868 , Ward, N. B. (Nathaniel Bagshaw), 1791-1868 , Webb, Philip Barker, 1793-1854 , Wiley & Putnam , Woodsia , Wyeth, Nathaniel J. (Nathaniel Jarvis), 1802-1856

BHL Collections

John Torrey Papers

Language

English

Identifiers

OCLC: 1019880539
Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q51418186