Arthur Kilpin Bulley (10 January 1861 – 3 May 1942) was a British cotton merchant and creator of the

Ness Botanic Gardens Ness Botanic Gardens are near the cities of Liverpool and Chester on the English-Welsh border in the Wirral Peninsula. They occupy a site of 64 acres overlooking the Dee Estuary. The Ness Botanic Gardens were created by Arthur Kilpin Bulley (1861 ...

. He stood for

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

as a

women's suffrage Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant women the right to vot ...

candidate in 1910.

Personal life

Bulley was one of the 14 children of Samuel Marshall and Mary (née Raffles). He was born in New Brighton in 1861. He married Harriet Agnes Whishaw in 1890. They were both committed

teetotallers Teetotalism is the practice or promotion of total personal abstinence from the psychoactive drug alcohol, specifically in alcoholic drinks. A person who practices (and possibly advocates) teetotalism is called a teetotaler or teetotaller, or is ...

and politically active. They had two children together, Agnes Lois Bulley (1901–1995) and Alfred Wishaw Bulley (born 1905). Bulley's sisters included Amy Bulley and Ella Sophia Armitage, who unusually had a university education.

Career

After leaving school he joined his family's cotton trading business, often travelling overseas where he developed an interest in uncommon plants. Bulley purchased 60 acres of land near

Ness Ness or NESS may refer to: Places Australia * Ness, Wapengo, a heritage-listed natural coastal area in New South Wales United Kingdom * Ness, Cheshire, England, a village * Ness, Lewis, the most northerly area on Lewis, Scotland, UK * Cuspate ...

in Cheshire in 1898, in which he built a house and a plant nursery, opening parts of the garden for free to villagers. Bulley commissioned plant collectors and botanists such as George Forrest,

Augustine Henry Augustine Henry (2 July 1857 – 23 March 1930) was a British-born Irish plantsman and sinologist. He is best known for sending over 15,000 dry specimens and seeds and 500 plant samples to Kew Gardens in the United Kingdom. By 1930, he was a rec ...

, and

Frank Kingdon-Ward Francis Kingdon-Ward, born Francis Kingdon Ward OBE, (6 November 1885 in Manchester – 8 April 1958) was an English botanist, explorer, plant collector and author. He published most of his books as Frank Kingdon-Ward and this hyphenated form ...

to obtain plants from countries including

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, and

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

to place in his gardens. In 1903 Bulley opened a nursery, Bees Nursery (later Bees Ltd), at Ness where he sold plants grown from seeds originating in Europe and Asia. In 1910 Bulley stood as the Women's Suffrage candidate in the 1910 election. He received the fewest votes but stated his aim was not to win but to ensure visibility of the suffrage cause. He subsequently stood unsuccessfully as a

Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

candidate in November 1910. Bulley later campaigned in 1921 to open an Alpine garden on

Snowdon Snowdon () or (), is the highest mountain in Wales, at an elevation of above sea level, and the highest point in the British Isles outside the Scottish Highlands. It is located in Snowdonia National Park (') in Gwynedd (historic ...

, receiving criticism from those concerned about introducing foreign plants to the mountain, leading to his abandonment of the plan soon after. The species ''

Primula bulleyana ''Primula bulleyana'' is a species of flowering plant in the family Primulaceae, native to hillsides in China. Description ''Primula bulleyana'' is one of a group known as candelabra primulas, so called because of the tiered arrangement of thei ...

'' and the orchid genus ''Bulleya'' Schlechter are named after Bulley.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bulley, Arthur 1861 births 1942 deaths Plant collectors People from Cheshire