Adeline May Cowan (1892–1981) was a Scottish botanist. She was active in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

and was mainly interested in

Spermatophytes A spermatophyte (; ), also known as phanerogam (taxon Phanerogamae) or phaenogam (taxon Phaenogamae), is any plant that produces seeds, hence the alternative name seed plant. Spermatophytes are a subset of the embryophytes or land plants. They inc ...

Life

Born Adeline May Organe in

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

in 1892, she was the youngest daughter of the missionary Stephen Walker Organe. She studied Botany at

Somerville College, Oxford Somerville College, a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England, was founded in 1879 as Somerville Hall, one of its first two women's colleges. Among its alumnae have been Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Dorothy Hodgkin, Ir ...

, from 1912 until 1915, after her secondary education at

Walthamstow Hall Walthamstow Hall is an independent day school for girls in the centre of Sevenoaks, Kent, England. History Walthamstow Hall was founded in 1838 and is one of the oldest all-girl independent schools in the country. It was founded as an inter-d ...

. She was unable to take her degree until the University of Oxford awarded degrees to women in 1920. From 1915 to 1919 she taught science subjects at

Sherborne School for Girls Sherborne Girls, formally known as Sherborne School for Girls, is an independent day and boarding school for girls, located in Sherborne, North Dorset, England. There were 485 pupils attending in 2019–2020, with over 90 per cent of them livin ...

and at Polam Hall School. In 1919 she sailed for India and married the botanist

John Macqueen Cowan John Macqueen Cowan FRSE CBE (1891–1960) was a prominent Scottish botanist in the mid 20th century. He is especially remembered for the recording and classification of trees on the Indian sub-continent. He was also an expert on Spermatophytes. ...

the day after she arrived in

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...

. For the next two years she and her husband collected and classified plants and caught elephants. Afterwards they settled in

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

, where she was a member of the

Federation of University Women Graduate Women International (GWI), originally named the International Federation of University Women (IFUW), is an international organisation for women university graduates. IFUW was founded in 1919 following the First World War by both British and ...

. Later she worked at

Inverewe Garden Inverewe Garden is a botanical garden in the Scottish Highlands. It is located just to the north of Poolewe in Wester Ross, and is noted for the breadth of its collection. The garden was created from barren land in 1862 by Osgood Mackenzie on t ...

, of which she was appointed curator by the

National Trust for Scotland The National Trust for Scotland for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, commonly known as the National Trust for Scotland ( gd, Urras Nàiseanta na h-Alba), is a Scottish conservation organisation. It is the largest membership organ ...

when her husband died in 1960, but she retired a year later as she found Inverewe lonely. Aged 87, she wrote an unpublished monograph called ''The Forests of Bengal. Life with my husband in the Indian Forest Service''. She is the mother of biochemist

Pauline Harrison Pauline May Harrison (née Cowan) (born 24 August 1926) is a British protein crystallographer and professor emeritus at the University of Sheffield. She gained her chemistry degree from Somerville College, Oxford in 1948, followed by a DPhil i ...

, who also went up to Somerville College.

Publications

* 1929. ''The trees of northern Bengal: including shrubs, woody climbers, bamboos, palms and tree ferns.''

Government of West Bengal The Government of West Bengal also known as the West Bengal Government, is the subnational government of the Indian state of West Bengal , created by the National Constitution as the state's legislative, executive and judicial authority. The ...

, 178 pp. * 1964. ''Inverewe. A Garden in the North-West Highlands''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cowan, Adeline May Alumni of Somerville College, Oxford 1892 births 1981 deaths British women botanists Scottish botanists People from Chennai People educated at Walthamstow Hall 20th-century British botanists