Macarthur, William (1800 - 1882)

Summary

William Macarthur was a horticulturist and agriculturalist with a keen interest in botany. He studied in England from 1809 to 1817, then returned to Australia where he worked for thirty years worked at improving the family property, at the end of which he had won awards for his wines and brandies. He was a member of the New South Wales Legislative Council from 1849 to 1855, and then was appointed Commissioner for the forthcoming Paris Exhibition. He joined the committee of the Australian Museum in 1836 and was a Trustee from 1853. He was the first vice-president of the Acclimatisation Society of New South Wales 1860-.

Details

Chronology

1849 - 1855

Career position - Member of the New South Wales Legislative Council

1853 - ?

Career position - Trustee, Australian Museum

1855 - 1856

Career position - Commissioner for the Paris Exhibition

1856

Award - Knighthood from Queen Victoria

1856?

Award - Decorated with the Legion of Honour by the French Emperor

1860

Career position - Vice-President, Acclimatisation Society of New South Wales

1860 - 1880

Career position - Member of the Senate, University of Sydney

1864 - 1882

Career position - Member of the Legislative Council, New South Wales

1874 - 1878

Career position - Member of Council, Linnean Society of New South Wales

1879

Career position - President, Agricultural Society of New South Wales

1899

Taxonomy event - Eucalyptus macarthurii Deane & Maiden was named in his honour. Macarthur had collected syntype material for the Paris Exhibition

Related entries

Archival resources

Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science

• Australian Botanists - Biographies, MS 064; Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science. Details

Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales

• William Macarthur - Records, 1817 - 1884, A2933-53; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details

Published resources

Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation Exhibitions

• McCarthy, Gavan; Smith, Ailie; Moje, Christine; Rigby, Rebecca, The Study of Australian Eucalypts, eScholarship Research Centre, 2013, http://www.eoas.info/eucalypts/index.html. Details

Book Sections

• Atkinson, Alan, 'Sir William Macarthur, 1800-1882' in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Details
• Teale, Ruth, 'Macarthur, Sir William (1800 - 1882), landowner' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 5: 1851 - 1890 K-Q, Douglas Pike, ed. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1974), pp. 124-5. http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/macarthur-sir-william-4061. Details

Journal Articles

• Fulton, G. R.; and Milne, J., 'Letters from Thomas Reedy to Sir William Macarthur, during the Chevert expedition of 1875', Cunninghamia, 19 (2019), 29-32. http://doi.10.7751/cunnnghamia.2019.19.003. Details
• Russell, H.C., 'Astronomical and Meteorological Workers in New South Wales, 1778-1860', Report of the first meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, 1 (1888), 45-94, https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/15813133. Details

Resources

• Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q8014978. Details
• VIAF - Virtual International Authority File, OCLC, https://viaf.org/viaf/92060182. Details
• 'Macarthur, William (18001201-18821029)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-498929. Details

See also

• Hall, Norman, Botanists of the Eucalypts: short biographies of people who have named eucalypts, whose names have been given to species or who have collected type material (Melbourne: CSIRO, 1978), 101 pp. Details
• Maiden, J. H., 'Records of Australian botanists:- (a) general; (b) New South Wales', Journal and Proceedings of The Royal Society of New South Wales, 42 (1908), 60-132. Details