Cowlishaw Collection

The Cowlishaw Collection includes over 1800 books and serials on gardening, horticulture, botany and agriculture, published in Australia, Europe and America.

Key items in the collection

The collection comprises 1809 books and serials, published in Australia, Europe and America, relating to gardening, horticulture, botany and agriculture.

Early works include:

Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella, Of husbandry (1745)
Josiah Conder, Landscape gardening in Japan (1893)
Adam Dickson, A treatise of agriculture (1765)
William J Hooker, Icones Plantarum (1837)
John Lindley, Paxton’s flower garden (1882–84)
Henry Kames, The gentleman farmer (1776)
Mrs Loudon, The ladies flower garden of ornamental bulbous plants (184?)
Philip Miller, The gardeners dictionary (1731).

Among the serials are:

The gardener’s magazine (1828–43)
The cottage gardener (1849–61)
The gardener’s chronicle (1847–1937)
The garden (1876–1904)
Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales (1877–1915)
Journal of the Royal Horticultural Society (1889–1949)
My garden (1934–47)
Australian garden lover (1935–55)
Orchid review (1936–82).

About George Cowlishaw

Background and personal life

George Keith Cowlishaw (1901–1983) was born in Sydney, the son of wealthy parents. His father owned extensive properties in the Darling Downs and his mother belonged to the Rabone family of Mosman. A non-practising lawyer, Cowlishaw owned about 30 properties. He served as an alderman in the city of Mosman for 14 years and was Mayor from 1941 to 1945. He lived at Telopea, a mansion on Military Road, Mosman, built in 1885. Cowlishaw had a strong interest in gardening, experimented with orchid growing, and wrote a book and articles on palms. In later years, he lived in St Ives.

Collecting interests

Cowlishaw’s father had been a collector, and from childhood Cowlishaw was an enthusiastic collector of stamps, coins, books and paintings. His fine collection of colonial paintings and books was sold by Sotheby’s in October 1984. The collection included works by:

John Glover
Augustus Earle
Conrad Martens
ST Gill
George Evans
Eugene von Guerard
Nicolas Chevalier
WC Piguenit
Frederick Garling

Background to the collection

Eileen Cowlishaw, the widow of GK Cowlishaw, donated his collection of gardening books under the Taxation Incentives for the Arts Scheme in 1986.

The books and journals have been integrated into the Australian, Rare Books and general collections. The Library produced a GK Cowlishaw bookplate, which was placed in each volume. A number of duplicates were transferred to the Fisher Library at the University of Sydney.

This guide was prepared using these references: