HISTORY Journal of the Australian Garden History Society Australian Garden History is the official journal of the Australian Garden History Society and is published six times a year. ENQUIRIES Toll Free 1800 678 446 Ph (03) 9650 5043 Fax (03) 9650 8470 AGHS Office Royal Botanic Gardens Birdwood Avenue South Yarra Victoria 3141 aghs@vicnet.net.au SUBSCRIPTIONS For 1 year membership: Single $47 Family $61 Corporate $73 Youth (25 and under) $20 ADVERTISING RATES GST inclusive 1/8 page $132 (2+ issues $121) 1/4 page $220 (2+ issues S198) 1/2 page $330 (2+ issues S275) Full page $550 (2+ issues $495) Inserts $440 per page EDITOR Trisha Dixon Bobundara, Cooma. NSW 2630 Ph (02) 6453 5578 Fax (02) 6453 5557 e- mail:trisha@snowy. net.au JOURNAL DEADLINE FOR COPY AND ADVERTISING September/October 2000 15 July 2000 Cemeteries and Graveyards November/December 2000 15 September 2000 Mazes and Follies DESIGN Andrew Kankinc Design Associates Ph (02) 6292 7819 www.arda.net.au PRINTING Goanna Print. Canberra ISSN 1033-3673 FRONT COVER Brachychiton acerifolius by Mary Gregory (see page 22) GUEST EDITORIAL by Katie Holmes I n 1900 die journal Australian Womens Sphere published an ardcle which called upon Australian women to take up horticulture as an occupation. Landscape gardening in particular, the Sphere believed, was especially suitable for women, who were naturally more artistic than men, and better administrators. These skills should be put to use ‘in designing and maintaining paries and gardens, and making artistic oases in the deserts of crowded cities and suburbs.’ One hundred years later we are in a position to assess the significance of some ol the contributions the women who took up horticulture have made to the history of gardening in Australia. This special edition of Australian Garden History looks at a number of women gardeners and designers — some well known others less well recognised — and highlights the range of their skills, the often difficult nature of their working conditions, and the importance of their legacy. One of the striking themes to emerge from the lives of the women discussed here, is the extent to which they recognised the beauty of the Australian native flora and gardened with it. Ivee Strazzabosco created her Nirvana Park in Victoria’s Gippsland, with a mixture of natives and exotics; Olive Mellor was using native plants in her designs as early as November 1938 and was a foundation member of the Society for Growing Native Plants. As Joy Rayner writes, however, finding information about the propagation and cultivation of Australian natives even in the late 1950s was difficult. It would be many years before the general public recognised the beauty and value of our own indigenous plants. Other themes emerge from these narratives. Olive Mellor was one of the first women graduates from Burnley Horticultural College, and the first to work there as an instructor. We can see from her experiences that while gardening or Landscape Design may have been seen as suitable work for women, that did not mean their entry into the horticultural professions was uncontested. We might also note that balancing die demands of work and family, especially as a widow and single mother, was stressful. Lilian Fraser’s solution to the demands of a busy life was the creation of a garden which was self sustaining and self preserving. Her garden is now being maintained by the Friends of the Fraser Garden, and offers a haven from the roar of traffic and the urban sprawl of Sydney’s Pennant Hills. For the handful of women gardeners discussed here, there were thousands of others for whom the garden offered a chance to escape from the demands of childcare, housework or paid work and an opportunity to express their creativity. As one garden writer for Australian Home Beautiful noted in 1928, she sought to create a ‘secret garden’, a place where she could ‘sit and read, or dream, or work by myself, not seen by everyone who comes in the gate’. Whatever the motivations behind women’s gardening and designing, we know that women have played a significant part in transforming barren urban landscapes, and bringing to rural properties oases of fertility and beauty. In doing so, they have had to adapt to their environments, making do with shortages of water, extremes of climate, and the vagaries of specific local conditions. For many women, the garden has played a crucial part in an on-going accommodation with the land, a means by which they established a sense of permanence and belonging. Women too were settlers, and colonisers, and through their gardening and designing we see them working with their surroundings, planting and tending, leaving their own marks upon the land. In creating and claiming a space for themselves, they in turn helped shape and create an Australian sense of place. As we tend our gardens, we follow their legacy. Katie Holmes became interested in women's gardens dunng her research on women's diaries. Since then she has been looking at women and gardens in twentieth century Australia, and is also working, with her colleague Sue Martin, on a project titled The Culture of Gardens: public and private gardens in nineteenth and twentieth century Australia. Katie teaches History and Women’s Studies at LaTrobe University and is author of Spaces in Her Day: Australian Women's Diaries of the 1920s and 1930s (Allen & Unwin 1995). 2 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 CONTENTS GARDENERS, DESIGNERS AND WRITERS 4 Nirvana Park: A special place for people NINA CRONE rediscovers the creation of gardener, Ivee Strazzabosco 7 Olive Mellor SANDI PULLMAN documents the career of Olive Mellor 11 The Ladies Companion JOY RAYNER recounts a personal odyssey on the trail of Jane Loudon 13 The Garden of Dr Lilian Fraser - Scientist CHRISTINE LEES looks at the creation of this Sydney garden 16 How I became an Edna Walling Publisher Bibliophile, VICTOR CRITTENDEN relates his absorption with the writings of Edna Walling 19 Rainmaker — John Stevens MARGARET HENDRY portrays the career of the first landscape architect to receive the Order of Australia. 21 Botanical snippets .., 23 Calendar of Events 24 The Back Page: Robert Dale Panaramic View of King Georges Sound MARY EAGLE details a portion of this vast panoramic sketch Thanks to Nina Crone, Di Ellerton, Elizabeth Wright, Georgina Whitehead. Cate McKern, John and Beverley Joyce, Laura Lewis, Beryl Black, Kaye and Mike Stokes and Jackie Courmadias for packing the last issue of the Journal. © Australian Garden History Society 1999. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form for commercial purposes wholly or in part (other than the circumstances outlined in any agreement between the author/artist/photographer/illustrator and the Society) without the prior written permission of the publisher. Permission may be granted subject to an acknowledgment being made. Copying for private and educational purposes is permitted provided acknowledgment is made in any report, thesis or other document which has used information contained in this publication. NATIONAL MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE PATRON Margaret Darling CHAIRMAN Peter Watts VICE CHAIRMAN Richard Heathcote TREASURER Elizabeth Walker SECRETARY Helen Page EXECUTIVE OFFICER Jackie Courmadias ELECTED MEMBERS Virginia Berger Nicky Downer Jan Gluskie Katie Holmes Colleen Morris STATE REPRESENTATIVES Gabrielle Tryon (ACT) Nick Bray (NSW) Miriam Hansman (SA) Deirdre Pearson (Tas) Helen Page (Vic) Anne Willox (WA) Richard Jones (Q’ld) BRANCHES ACT/MONARO/ RIVERINA BRANCH Gabrielle Tryon 4 Anstey Street, Pearce, ACT 2607 Ph: (02) 6286 4585 QUEENSLAND BRANCH Richard Jones 35 Fernbourne Road, Wellington Point, Queensland 4160 Ph: (07) 3207 4018 SOUTH AUSTRALIAN BRANCH Miriam Hansman 66 Alexandra Ave, Rose Park, SA 5067 Ph: (08) 8333 0043 SOUTHERN HIGHLANDS BRANCH Nicholas Bray PO Box 323 Moss Vale, NSW 2577 Ph: (02) 4868 3376 Email: noodle@tpgi.com.au SYDNEY AND NORTHERN NSW BRANCH Colleen Morris 33-35 Ilka Street. Lilyfield. NSW 2040 Ph: (02) 9660 0573 TASMANIAN BRANCH Mrs Deirdre Pearson 15 Ellington Road, Sandy Bay, Tas 7005 Ph: (03) 6225 3084 VICTORIAN BRANCH Helen Page C/- Royal Botanic Gardens Birdwood Avenue South Yarra, Vic 3141 Ph/Fax: (03) 9650 5043 WEST AUSTRALIAN BRANCH Ann Willox 75 Circe Circle, Dalkeith, WA 6009 Ph: (08) 9386 8716 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No I July/August 2000 3 NIRVANA PARK ace for peopl Nirvana Park. c. 1980 by Nina Crone AMONG LITTLE KNOWN WOMEN garden makers are those who simply work in a garden for the joy of it. T hey often develop a garden whose individual character owes nothing to the tastes and trends of its time. Rarely does the garden maker articulate a design, rationale or inspiration for her work. Ivee Strazzabosco, nee Mentha (1907-1993) was such a gardener. Dr Mary Ellis considers Nirvana Park at Koonwarra, 130 kilometres south-east of Melbourne ‘the expression of one woman’s pleasure in a beautiful environment’. 1 That environment is the forest of South Gippsland although, since Ivee first came to the area in 1915, much of the forest has been cleared for grazing. However there remains enough to conjure up the impression it made on an desperately poor eight-year-old girl from the city. Ivee’s father, Frank Mentha was born in Talbot, Victoria, in 1879. His family appears to have been part of that Swiss/Italian migration to Victoria following the goldrushes. He married Ethel Keir, an Irish girl in 1908. Life in the city was precarious for the couple and their three children so Frank sought a wood-cutting job at Koonwarra in South Gippsland in 1915. To the young Ivee the dray journey from Koonwarra railway station was ‘such an adventure, especially when we got bogged’. 2 Their accommodation turned out to be an old shed but Frank set to building a ‘tent house’ and Ivee described her new home as ‘wonderful and happy in a beautiful, peaceful setting among tall timber. Gum trees, blackwoods, wattles, old man ferns and other native shrubs made an ideal sanctuary for the large population of birds and animals which frequented it.’ 1 Ethel Mentha’s deteriorating health necessitated a return to Melbourne for surgery and the luckless family suffered more setbacks 4 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 before Ethel died in 1919. A year later Frank Mentha was offered a job at the Koonwarra brickworks so he returned and the children knew a more settled life and some schooling. Ivee left school at 14. A solitary and thoughtful child, ‘more alone than lonely’ 4 she roamed the bush revelling in its beauty and wrote to penfriends in Australia and overseas. Then the brickworks closed, the boys left home for farm work and Ivee and her father scraped a meagre existence from rabbit trapping. They tried share-farming onions but it returned less than the rabbiting. As funds no longer met the rent, Ivee and Frank set up another tent house opposite where Nirvana Park now stands. In the mid 1930s when the Great Depression was at its worst, Ivee and her father moved to Echuca to the farm of Ivee’s last penfriend. She had given up writing to the others because she could not afford the stamps. She found the landscape alien and spoke of ‘a seemingly endless barren land - a desolation devoid of the beautiful gum trees and hills of South Gippsland.’’ In 1939 Ivee married Martin Strazzabosco. He brought her and her father back to Leongatha and gave Ivee a seven acre block of land at Koonwarra. Here, throughout the 1940s, the batders worked assiduously digging out stumps, tussocks and beginning to plant trees and shrubs. The dream house was never built. Frank Mentha died in 1951. Martin Strazzabosco died in 1963. Ivee continued planting and caring for her little paradise. In 1966 die garden was opened to the public and the local shire asked Ivee to suggest two names. Nirvana was the one chosen. To-day in the park there are remnants of the native vegetation - Messmates, Swamp Gums and Narrow-leafed Peppermints, ( Eucalyptus obliqua, E. ovata and E. radiata) but most of the understorey has been replaced by Banksia, Callistemon, Casuarina, Grevillea, Hakea, Lagunaria, Melaleuca and Tristania species. There is a selection of conifers - die Dawn Redwood, Metasequoia glyptostroboides, Bhutan, Italian and Monterey Cypress, Cupressus torulosa , C. sempervirens and C. macrocarpa, White and Slender Cypress Pine, Callitris columellaris and C. preisii, Indian Cedar, Cedrus deodars Junipers, Juniperus communis , Mountain Plum Pine, Podocarpus biwrencei and Norfolk Island and Bunya Pines, Araucaria heterophylla and A. bidwillii. Deciduous trees include Silver birch, Betula pendula , a Flame Tree, Bracbychiton acerifolius , Lombardy poplar, Popidus nigra, Rhus, Rhus succedanea and Willows, Salix babylonica as well as several fruit trees (Ivee had planned an orchard around her house). Odier interesting plantings are the Spear Lily, Doryanthes excelsa, Cordylines, New Zealand Flax, a Yucca and a Chinese Fan Palm. In November 1985 Ivee Scrazzabosco received a Shire Council award for her outstanding work in the restoration and beautification of Nirvana Park. The Shire President assured her the Park would always be preserved - ‘that the area is beyond price and must be retained for future generations.’ 6 By 1990 the park was subject to vandalism. The adobe shelter built under a Community Employment Scheme at the height of the 1980s recession was smashed, shrubs were uprooted and statues’ were broken. Ivee complained ‘It seems like no-one cares whether the park is there or not. I’ve tried to create a special place for people and animals.’ 7 On January 29, 1993, Ivee died in Nirvana Park, ‘the haven she created with 40 years of love - every tree a monument of love to her memory’. 8 The following year die load newspaper reported that ‘ Woorayl Shire is about to appoint a committee of management for Nirvana Park’.' 1 Ivee’s son Peter, a resident of Queensland, visited the park in early April 1996. He was appalled at its deterioration describing it as ‘.a mess, a fire hazard .(needing) urgent maintenance.’ 10 The newly formed shire of above left: Ivee, with a new 'Statue', on the block. 1962. above: Alan Mentha (Ivee's brother) with Ivee's children (Peter and Gloria) and husband Marty Strazzabosco. 'The First Start'. 1947. FOOTNOTES 1. Ellis, Mary - Nirvana Park The Australian Garden Journal Vol. 10, No. 3 Feb/Mar 1991 pp 119-121 2. Scarrabosco, Ivee - Reminiscences of Life at Koonwarra 1915-1940 Gippsland Heritage Journal No.7 3. Ibid 4. Ibid 5. Ellis, Mary: Op. Cit. p 121 6. The Star, Leongatha, November 12 1985, 7. The Star, May 22 1990, 8. The Star, February 2 1993, 9. The Star, November 18 1994, 10. The Star, April 7 1996. NOTE All Photographs from the Nirvana Park Collection, courtesy of The Leongatha and District Historical Society, Victoria. Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 5 South Gippsland (an amalgamation of five former shires) commissioned a Management Plan (1996-2001) from consultant Andrew Paget. However, it has been difficult for the small group of volunteers to maintain management particularly during the past three years of severe local drought. Victorian Australian Garden History Society members visited Nirvana Park in March 2000 and were impressed with the variety of planting. They were moved by the remnants of Ivees embellishments - a rusting water-pump, a languishing planter decorated with broken crockery mosaic work, and two chipped bird 'statues’. This patch of endeavour by a true Aussie battler deserves greater care and attention. above: Ivee Strazzabosco at Niivana Park 1979. right Ivee Strazzabosco at Nirvana Park 1964. Nina Crone graduated in History, French and Education and is an accredited freelance journalist. She worked for ten years as a producer and director in radio and television at the ABC before becoming Principal of Melbourne Girls Grammar School. Nina now lives in South Gippsland and is endeavouring to research as many of the old South Gippsland gardens as possible. Nina ‘chanced 1 upon Nin/ana Park one day as she drove to Leongatha and later included the Park in the Gippsland Discovery Weekend at the end of March. Its rather neglected state Nina believes highlights the problem of small public parks in large rural shires. 6 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 OLIVE MELLOR (1891-1978) made an important contribution to the developing role of women in horticulture in the first half of the twentieth century. by Sandi Pullman O live Mellor graduated from the School of Horticulture at Burnley College in 1915 and went on to succeed in many areas of horticulture that were not previously open to women. She also pioneered new areas of horticulture that had not been used before such as the popular press of the day. She wrote extensively for The Australian Home Beautiful. This magazine had enormous influence on its readers, especially after the Second World War. She also contributed to three gardening books and had her own gardening radio program that specialised in giving practical advice to her listeners. Her considerable achievements should be better recognised as she created new and exciting opportunities in horticulture. Olive was born on March 14, 1891, in the village of Linton near Cambridge, England, to Richard and Mary-FJlcn Holttum nee Fenton. Richard moved to Linton, when his brother Thomas left the family grocer/hardwarc and drapery village store. Olive had two sisters Eva Elizabeth (who died of consumption in 1911) and Marjorie. Olives mother Mary-Ellen died in 1891, just after Olive was born. Her father re-married a friend of Mary- Ellen’s, Florence Bradley, in 1894. They had three children, Richard Eric, know as Eric, who was the Director of the Singapore Botanic Garden from 1925-1942, Harold Bradley and Dorothy. Florence was a keen amateur botanist and organised family walks in the country, where flowers were meticulously identified. Eric and Olive acquired their love of gardening from Florence and the family gardener. ' The three Holttum sisters went to school in Birmingham where their stepmothers sister Hannah had a day and boarding school. Apparently Olive taught at the school before she came to Australia. In October 1909, Olive was sent to Australia as a governess because Eva had consumption. She came out on the ship SS Runic and stayed with Mrs. Annie Preston in Melbourne. 2 She liked Australia so much that she stayed and enrolled at the Burnley School of Horticulture. Olive Mellor was a notable landscape architect: it is claimed that she paved the way for women to study full-time at Burnley College. In 1912 Olive enrolled at the School of Horticulture and was Olive relaxing in the garden with her dog. awarded the Certificate of Competency in 1913 receiving an overall mark of 90%.’ According to Olive, women were only able to attend lectures and weren’t allowed to do the practical side of the course, though there seems to be some confusion on this point. 4 The official Burnley College history How Green Grows Our Garden, by A.P. Winzenried states that women were studying full¬ time by 1903-04 and there is photographic evidence that women were participating in practical work. As there are no records available from the Burnley College Archives to substantiate FOOTNOTES 1. Old Scholar's Association Annual Report, 1990, Richard Eric Holttum and Harold Bradley Holttum, Friends School. Saffron. Walden 2. Hicks, R, 2000, Notes re The Early Years of the Holttum Family 3. Institute of Land and Food Resources, Burnley College Archives, Certificate Book 4. The Australian Home Beautiful, November 1970 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 7 A Garden on the Murray River, published in The Australian Home Beautiful November 2. 1936 FOOTNOTES 4. The Australian Home Beautiful, November 1970 5. Personal communication with Margaret Watson 6. Winzenried, A.R, 1991, Green Grows our Garden, Hyland House Publishing Pty. Ltd., South Yarra, Melbourne 7. Mel lor, O. 1970, The Australian Home Beautiful 8. Shepherd, J. 1988, Six Landscape Designers, all Women, Final Project for the Bachelor of Applied Science in Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Environmental Design and Construction, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Swanston Street, Melbourne 9, Shepherd 1988, Six Landscape Designers, all Women, Final Project for the Bachelor of Applied Science in Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Environmental Design and Construction, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Swanston Street, Melbourne 10. Watts R Edna Walling and Her Gardens, Second Edition, 1991, Florilegium, Balmain III 942, Australian Women's Land Army 22nd June 1942 - 21 st December 1945, Margaret Mellor's Private Collection, Newspaper Cuttings and photo's of Australian Women's Land Army. In Private Possession of Margaret Watson 12. Shepherd, J„ 1988, Six Melbourne Landscape Designers, All Women, Final Project for the Bachelor of applied Science in Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Environmental Design and Construction, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Swanston Street, Melbourne either claim, we will never really know. Olive was determined to complete the full certificate of Competency, but to do this she needed permission from the Minister for Agriculture. The story goes that she heard that the Minister of Agriculture, Mr. W. Hutchison was going on holidays, so she bailed him up at Spencer Street Station in Melbourne and demanded to be allowed to study full-time. He was so taken aback that he gave his permission and said ‘Go away and dig’. When she returned to Burnley and told the staff, they said ‘Very well then’ and without much interest gave her a wheelbarrow full of tools, a plot of land and left her to it. 5 Olive went onto complete the Diploma of Horticulture, which was an extra two years study. In How Green Grows our Garden, A.P. Winzenried states that the regulations were waived in Olives favour, but it is not clear what regulations he is referring to. Perhaps he is referring to Olive being the first woman allowed to study the Diploma or perhaps he is referring to the fact that she was allowed to study full-time. Olive was one of the first students and probably the first woman to gain the Diploma of Horticulture. She graduated in 1915, but at the time there weren’t any certificates available, so the principal E.E. Pescott signed the back of her Certificate of Competency. 6 After Olive graduated, she returned as the first female instructress in 1917, when women were officially admitted to full-time study. 7 This was a major achievement at a time when very few women were professionally employed. Olive stopped teaching in 1919, when she married Alan Robert Mellor, who was an orchardist in Wandin. Olive met Alan when she was visiting a sick friend, who told her to go next door and ask ‘His Royal Highness’ to come over and help with the horses. Alan and Olive had one child, a daughter, Margaret Holttum Mellor, born on August 5, 1920. Sadly, Alan suddenly died of a heart attack just before Margaret was born, leaving Olive a widow and single mother. In the early 1920s Olive worked as a Matron at a convalescent home in Cheltenham. It seems that the grief of losing Alan and strain of being a single mother became too much and she had a breakdown. In 1922, Olive returned to England, but did not stay long, returning to Australia by 1923. By the mid 1920s, Olive had started her own garden maintenance business and by the late 1920s was head gardener at a large Toorak home. 8 Olive’s design career began in the 1930s from her contact with a nurseryman from Ormond Plant Farm who suggested she sell plants on commission. Olive’s clients were mostly domestic gardeners and her business gradually evolved as they asked her ‘for a bit of a layout’. She began supplying them with plants and by the end of the 1930s, Olive was established as a design/ contractor, employing a team of workmen. 7 Olive’s garden designs always included a formal front garden, driveway, tradesmen’s entrance and patio/outdoor living area where she believed the family ‘seeks its privacy and enjoyment’. The rear of the house contained a lawn area, rose garden, perennial bed and the utilities area, which consisted of the clothesline, vegetable patch, incinerator and orchard. Some of Olive’s favourite exotic plants were Jacaranda mimosifolia, Cupressus torulosa, Phlox decussates, Lavandida nana atropurpurea, Lagerstroemia eavesii and Crataegus pubescens syn. C. mexicana. Olive began writing for The Australian Home Beautiful i n 1934 - an association that was to last 36 years. Peter Watts states in his book Edna Walling and Her Gardens that Olive Mellor was employed because the editor of The Australian Home Beautiful could no longer stand Edna’s eccentricities. 10 The Australian Home Beautifid was a modern magazine for the new home owner with the latest ideas on building, gardening, furniture and cooking. Olive’s practical style 8 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 suited the new ‘How to do it’ philosophy of the magazine. This applied even more so after the Second World War when there was a huge shortage of labour and materials. Her first articles were ‘Remodelling an Old Garden’ April 1934, ‘Lawns and their Management’ October 1934 and ‘The Garden for the Small House’ December 1934. At first her articles were irregular but by the late 1930s Olive was a regular contributor. During the 1930s and 1940s, Olive wrote many articles on garden design, using reader’s gardens as examples. For example, Mr. and Mrs Allan Hailes’s country property in Marysville was featured in February 1937. She designed gardens in many parts of Australia, such as Queensland, South Australia, in country areas of New South Wales along the Murray River and in Geelong and Mt. Martha in Victoria. In 1948 she went to New Zealand and wrote about her trip in the February issue. She visited Mr. Douglas Chitty’s home in Epsom, Auckland and described the climate as similar to Melbourne. By the 1960s she very rarely wrote about garden design. Instead she concentrated on all practical aspects of horticulture such as pruning, spraying, propagation, annuals, roses, looking after native plants and many other topics. Olive always promoted native plants where she could. She wrote about and designed native gardens as early as November 1938. She believed we had a wonderful field to draw upon and using natives was only limited by their availability. It was not profitable to grow natives because the public did not demand them, so the nurserymen did not produce them. Slowly Australian indigenous plants became more popular. A botanist friend, Arthur Swaly organised and formed the Society for Growing Australian Plants in 1957. Olive was a foundation member and she and Arthur would go on enjoyable field trips collecting seeds that they later propagated. Some of her favourites were Callistemon lanceolatus, Eugenia smithii, Corymbia ficifolia syn. Eucalyptus ficifolia and Acacia alata. Olive was also involved in the publication of three books. The first book The Garden Lovers’ Logwtts written during the Second World War to raise money for the Red Cross. The log was organised and inspired by Mrs. Joseph Levi and the book was dedicated to the men of the A.I.F. of 1914 and 1940. The book was aimed at the amateur gardener and designed as a diary. At the end of each week there was a helpful hint by people such as Miss Hilda Kirkhope, Instructress of Horticulture, School of Horticulture, Burnley or Olive Mellor. It was so popular that a second edition was printed. Her next involvement widt publishing was a book called Australian Gardening of Today Illustrated published sometime in die 1940s by The Sun News Pictorial It was written by leading authorities of the day and arranged and edited by the editor of The Australian Home Beautifid A.B. Shum. It was divided into two sections, die first consisting of articles by leading horticulturists such as Professor E.G. Waterhouse, Edna Walling, J.L. Provan, Olive Mellor, R.T.M. Pescott, E.E. Pescott and many others. The second section was a Garden Encyclopaedia originally prepared under the direction of Mr. Richard Sudell, R.R.H.S., London for English conditions. Olive Mellor edited it for Australian conditions. It covered a broad range of plants and their descriptions. Her third and more important publication, The Complete Australian Gardener was published Olive Mellor plan for a country garden for Mr and Mrs Allan Hailes, Marysville, published in The Australian Home Beautiful February 1937. BIBLIOGRAPHY The Australian Home Beautiful: Journal for the Home Builder, 1934-1970, United Press, Melbourne Dixon, T and Churchill, J. The Vision of Edna Walling, 1998 Bloomings Books, Hawthorn, Victoria Hicks, R Notes re The Early Years of the Holttum Family, 2000, 12 Appian Close, Kings Heath, Birmingham, England Mellor, O. The Garden Lovers' Log, 1940, Robertson & Mullens, Ltd, Melbourne Mellor, O. Australian Gardening of Today Illustrated, I940(?), The Sun News Pictorial, Melbourne Mellor, O. Complete Australian Gardener, 1952, Colorgravure Publications, The Herald Weekly Times, Melbourne Old Scholar's Association Annual Report, 1990, Richard Eric Holttum. Fnends School, Saffron, Walden, England Old Scholar's Association Annual Report, 1990, Harold Bradley Holttum, Friends School. Saffron, Walden, England Shepherd, J. Six Melbourne Landscape Designers, All Women, 1988, Final Project for the Bachelor of applied Science in Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Environmental Design and Construction, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Swanston Street, Melbourne Watts, R 1991, Edna Walling and Her Gardens, Second Edition, Florilegium, NSW Winzenried, A.R, 1991, Green Grows Our Garden, Hyland House Publishing Pty Ltd, Melbourne Telephone Directory Melbourne, 1936, 1939, 1947, 1948, 1950, 1951, 1956 La Tnobe Library, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne Alphabetical Telephone Directory, 1959 La Trobe Library, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne Melbourne Telephone Directory, 1964, 1968, La Trobe Library, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne Sands and McDougall’s Directory 1912-1939 GMF98, Sands and Australian Garden History Vol 11 No 5 March/April 2000 9 in 1952. This book, written entirely by Olive, covered all aspects of gardening from laying out a new garden to cacti care. Some of her early articles from The Australian Home Beautiful were re¬ printed in this book. During the Second World War, Olive and her daughter Margaret joined the Australian Women’s Land Army, yet still managed to contribute to The Australian Home Beautiful Olive recognised the shortage of labour and even before the AWLA was formed, Olive took a group of girls to Riddells Creek to work in the flax fields. Olive was the first volunteer in the land army and supervisor of the 1st School, No. 1 Instruct¬ ional Depot, Mont Park, Victoria. The AWLA was formed to fill labour shortages and give the women the skills they needed to perform agricultural work. The women learnt how to milk cows, harvest crops, harness horses for ploughing and read a vaporimeter at the Werribee Research Farm." After the war, Olive stayed on at Mont Park as a nursery worker for a few years and continued writing for The Australian Home Beautiful. Olive’s career in radio on 3DB began sometime in the 1950s or 60s when she started the first radio gardening program in Australia. This helped her achieve her goal of making gardening accessible to everyone. Her format was to start the program with a talk about a particular topic and follow with answering list¬ ener’s queries from letters they had written to the program. Analysing Olive’s work is a complex issue. There is so little material avail¬ able and her work has always been totally overshadowed by Edna Walling. Olives designs were simpler and her garden plans were not as detailed. When Olive began writing for The Australian Home Beautifiil she used simple planting plans, however by the 1940s had altered her style to perspective plans. Unfortunately these perspective drawings had a cartoon-like quality to them and did her an injustice, as in reality she had a great skill in placing the plants in the right position. Comparison of drawing style between Edna and Olive may have resulted in Olive being taken less seriously than other designers. The only surviving known work of Olive’s is the garden of St. Andrew’s Church of England, Rosanna and Karen Owens garden steps in Toorak. The suggested Garden Planting Scheme for St. Andrews Church shows her position of the Smoke Bush, Cotinus eoggygria syn. Rhus cotinus to be cleverly positioned near the entrance to the church to hide the unsightly metal railing. The Cotinus eoggygria flowers in November, close to St. Andrew’s Day, a special day for the church. From surviving plans, it seems Edna designed large gardens for wealthy clients, creating areas of space by using trees. Olive used space in a simpler manner, clothing the boundaries with trees and shrubs, creating smaller garden rooms. Olive’s designs were most effective and particularly suitable for the home gardener on the average size suburban block, in the new suburbs thar were springing up after the war. Olive’s significant contribution to horticulture have been largely overlooked. A trailblazer throughout her horticultural career, she paved the way for women to work towards higher education, full-time study and satisfying full-time employment at a time when attitudes towards working women were difficult and looked down upon. Olive created new avenues for horticulture through the popular press ol the day, making horticulture accessible to everyone. Magazines like The Australian Horne Beautiful reached a wide audience and had an enormous influence on the trends of the day. Her early radio gardening shows on 3DB pioneered the way for today’s home/garden/lifestyle television and radio programs. Olive was generous in spirit and liked to help people build their own garden. She is quoted as saying she wasn’t in it for the money. 12 It is a pity there is so little of Olives work left, as it makes it hard to assess her contribution to the emergence of Australia’s horticultural industry. Sadly, the work of many earlier designers has been lost, and without the preservation of such work, it is not possible to assess a true reflection of the gardens from the 1930s to the 1960s. BIBLIOGRAPHY CONTINUED McDougall's Microfiche, La Trobe Library, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne Australian Electoral Rolls 1935, 1937-1940, 1943, 1945-1947, 1949-1953, 1955, 1957, 1959, 1961-1965, 1967, 1968-1969 Victoria GMF I, Microfiche, La Trobe Library, State Library ofVictona. Melbourne Australian Women's Land Army 22nd June 1942 - 21 st December 1945, Margaret Mellor's Private Collection, Newspaper Cuttings and photo's of the Australian Women's Land Army. In Private Possession of Margaret Watson Personal Communication with Margaret VWtson from Tenby Point Victoria: Peter Shepherd from Burnley College. Richmond: Lindsay Sine from North Balwyn, Melbourne: Peggy Hicks from Kings Heath, Birmingham. England; Karen Owens from Toorak, Melbourne; Thomas Kneen, Principal of Burnley School of Horticulture 1946-1967; Eric Littlejohn, Principal of Burnley School of Horticulture 1967-1977 and Gillian Chambers, St. Andrew's Church of England, Rosanna, Melbourne. right: Olive Mellor at the 75th Anniversary of Burnley College in 1966. below: The steps in the Toorak garden of Karen Owens featured in the March 1968 issue of The Australian Home Beautiful. Sandi Pullman runs her own horticultural business in Melbourne and is returning to Burnley College to study the Bachelor of Applied Science (Hort). Sandra has always been interested in history and began researching Olive Mellor, when ask to write an article for Australian Garden History. 10 Australian Garden History Vol 12 No 1 July/August 2000 LADIES COMPANION by Joy Rayner -4 j Of r f /. r //&'.' f a’ 4v.'/','.v/ _ ■/, J./Vtu/