Jensen Collection

The Jensen Collection holds 553 books from the 19th to mid-20th century with a particular strength in botany and gardening. Other books include novels, plays, poetry, short stories, children's books, biographies and books on religion, history, music, art, travel, animal husbandry and agriculture.

Key items in the collection

The collection comprises 553 books acquired by the Jensen family between circa 1870 and 1943, kept at The Cottage, Exeter. Most are British, American, and Australian imprints, with a few translations of European writers.

Most of the books are British, American and Australian imprints, including a few translations of European writers. The earliest work is Thomas Green, The Universal Herbal (1823) and the collection has a particular strength in works on botany and gardening. Other books include:

novels
plays
poetry
short stories
children’s books
biographies
books on religion
history
music
art
travel
animal husbandry
agriculture.

There are a few titles relating to Denmark.

Among the disparate authors represented in the collection are:

RM Ballantyne
RD Blackmore
Thomas Carlyle
Marie Corelli
Charles Darwin
Charles Dickens
George Eliot
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Elizabeth Gaskell
GA Henty
John Lindley
Edward Lytton
HV Morton
Walter Scott
William Shakespeare
Alfred Wallace
Edgar Wallace
Francis Brett Young

There are also music albums of Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Gounod, Handel and other composers that were acquired by Annie Roberts before her marriage. Most of the Australian books are on botanical subjects, but there are also popular works by:

EJ Banfield
Rolf Boldrewood
Ion Idriess
Bernard O’Reilly
EV Timms.

Many of the books are signed and dated by members of the Jensen family and some are inscribed. A copy of Charles Moore, Handbook of the Flora of New South Wales (1893) is inscribed to F Liisberg-Jensen by GH Reid, the New South Wales Premier, in September 1895.

About Fritz Liisberg-Jensen

Fritz Liisberg-Jensen (d. 1926) was born in Aarhus, Denmark. He worked as a draftsman in the Department of Lands in Sydney, where he met and married Annie Roberts, a music teacher from Bangor, Wales. Roberts had previously taught the children of Lord Carrington, Governor of New South Wales.

Life in Exeter and the nursery

In 1894, the Jensens built a house in Exeter, near Moss Vale, where they cleared land and established an orchard. Fritz imported bulbs from Holland to develop a specialist nursery. After his death, Annie and their two sons, Erik and Derek, continued running the nursery, which became well known in the Southern Highlands. The brothers sold the property in 1985.

The Cottage and its collection

The interior of The Cottage remained largely unchanged for 90 years. It included a Steinway piano, a canteen of silver and ivory cutlery gifted to Annie by Lady Carrington, and the family’s collection of books.

Background to the collection

The Jensen Collection was donated by Erik and Derek Jensen in 1977. The Library considered the collection a good example of a private library of a farming family in the early 20th century.

The Jensen Collection has been retained as a formed collection. The call numbers have the prefix JEN.

This guide was prepared using these references: