JDH writes to Otto Stapf regarding the distribution of copies of an article being reprinted. JDH would like to know which institutions receive the reprint, also who received copies of his illustrations of Impatiens from the ICONES [PLANANTARUM]. JDH wants Indo Chinese specimens from Stapf as soon as possible so he can revise his articles on Indian Balsams. JDH is also keen for Miss [Matilda] Smith to complete the drawings of the Balsams for ICONES. Letter has additional notes attached regarding the questions of distribution JDH asks. These notes are written in the hand of Otto Stapf & John Aikman. Known recipients of the Icones illustrations are listed in the notes as Fischer v. Waldheim, Matsumura & Arnoldi as well as 'all those who lent material to Sir Joseph'. The notes also asks about returning copies of Swedish & Danish periodicals which they already have in the RBG Kew library.
Transcript
Dr. Stapf*4
The list was compiled at the Herbarium and returned there with a few surplus copies of the reprint. I am afraid I can't give a detailed list of the recipients but all who lent material to Sir Joseph received copies.
J.A.
Jan[ua]ry 26 1909
THE CAMP,
NEAR SUNNINGDALE.
My dear Stapf*1
I shall be really glad that the reprints of the article in the N. Archives should be distributed by the Kew authorities in the interest of it's[sic] Herbarium. One copy is enough for me. I assume that the Institutions which supplied so many of the species described would have a first claim were it not that the most of them are sure to have the "Archives". I shall be glad to know to whom the reprints go. Hemsley*2 did not
send me a list of those to whom the "Icones"*2a part went -- if the list is accessable[sic] I should be glad to have a copy.
The sooner I get the Indo Chinese specimens the better, for I must soon turn to the revision for press of my several articles on the Indian Balsams.
I hope that Miss Smith*2b will get on speedily with the Balsam drawings for the "Icones" &c. of which the "Icones" the Director has kindly given me a 2d[?] Part.
Ever sincerely y[our]s | J.D. Hooker [signature]
*3
Wrote:
Fischer v. Waldheim } rec[eive]d copies of Icones
Matsumura } 2 Nov. 1908 direct from Herb.
Arnoldi }
No list of the recipients of the other copies found. Will ask Hemsley. Advised of desp[atch]. of Indochin. Balsams and 1 copy of reprint. Provided list of recipients of other reprints. Asked whether the 3 Swedish and Danish volumes of periodicals, rec[eive]d recently and already in library, are to go back.
27.1.9 O[tto]. S[tapf].
Dr. Stapf*4
The list was compiled at the Herbarium and returned there with a few surplus copies of the reprint. I am afraid I can't give a detailed list of the recipients but all who lent material to Sir Joseph received copies.
J.A.
*5
Mr. Aikman.*6
I hear that you distributed Sir Joseph Hooker's reprints of his illustrations of Impatiens in the last part of the Icones. Can you let me have a list of those who got them?
27.1.09 O[tto]. S[tapf].
1. Otto Stapf (1857--1933). Austrian botanist and taxonomist, the son of Joseph Stapf, who worked in the Hallstatt salt-mines. He published the archaeological plant remains from the Late Bronze and Iron Age mines that had been uncovered by his father. Stapf moved to Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in 1890. He was keeper of the Herbarium from 1909 to 1920 and became British citizen in 1905. He was awarded the Linnean Medal in 1927. In 1908 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.
2. William Botting Hemsley (1843--1924).Trained in horticulture and botany at Kew, where he became Herbarium clerk in 1865 and assisted Bentham with Flora Australiensis. After a period of ill health, he worked independently on Central American, Mexican, African and Chinese botany. He returned to Kew in 1889 as part-time, then principal assistant for India; from 1888 to 1908 he was Keeper of the Herbarium. He was elected to the Linnean Society in 1878 and to the Royal Society in 1889, when he was also made an honorary member of the Horticultural Society of Mexico. The Royal Horticultural Society awarded him a Victoria Medal in 1909.
2a. Icones Plantarum Or, Figures, with Brief Descriptive Characters and Remarks of New or Rare Plants. Icones Plantarum was initiated by Sir William Jackson Hooker. The illustrations are drawn from specimens in Hooker's herbarium, and subsequently the herbarium of Kew Gardens. W. Hooker was the author of the first ten volumes, produced 1837--1854, Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker, was responsible for Volumes X-XIX (most of Series III). Daniel Oliver was the editor of Volumes XX-XXIV. His successor was William Turner Thiselton-Dyer. The series now comprises forty volumes.
2b. Matilda Smith (1854--1926). Botanical illustrator. Smith was the second cousin of Joseph Dalton Hooker, who arranged for her training in botanical illustration at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. She contributed plates to Curtis's Botanical Magazine from 1878, becoming one of its key illustrators. She also provided illustrations for Hooker's work Icones Plantarum and in 1898 became Kew's first official artist. She retired from Kew in 1921 and in the same year was made a Fellow of the Linnean Society, only the second woman to gain the honour.
3. This page is written in the hand of Otto Stapf.
4. This attached note addressed to Stapf is written in the hand of J.A. [John Aikman], an employee of Kew.
5. This page is written in the hand of Otto Stapf.
6. John Aikman (1867--1938). Gardener at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew from 1888 and later assistant in the herbarium and Director's Office (1891--1932).
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