Samuel Henry Drew (17 November 1844 – 18 December 1901) was a New Zealand jeweller, watchmaker, and amateur naturalist. Samuel Henry Drew was born in

Maidenhead Maidenhead is a market town in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in the county of Berkshire, England, on the southwestern bank of the River Thames. It had an estimated population of 70,374 and forms part of the border with southern Bu ...

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; in the 17th century sometimes spelt phonetically as Barkeshire; abbreviated Berks.) is a historic county in South East England. One of the home counties, Berkshire was recognised by Queen Elizabeth II as the Royal County of Berk ...

, England on 17 November 1844. His parents emigrated to

Tasmania ) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdi ...

, Australia, where he grew up. He was sent to England to learn his father's trade of watchmaking. Shortly after his return to Tasmania, the family emigrated to

Nelson, New Zealand (Let him, who has earned it, bear the palm) , image_map = Nelson CC.PNG , mapsize = 200px , map_caption = , coordinates = , coor_pinpoint = , coordinates_footnotes = ...

. There, he married Catherine Alice Beatson, the daughter of the architect William Beatson, on 8 May 1872. He moved with his wife to

Wanganui Whanganui (; ), also spelled Wanganui, is a city in the Manawatū-Whanganui region of New Zealand. The city is located on the west coast of the North Island at the mouth of the Whanganui River, New Zealand's longest navigable waterway. Whangan ...

. He was a significant collector of

mollusc Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is esti ...

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...

s, and

beetle Beetles are insects that form the order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Endopterygota. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 400,000 describ ...

s, and exchanged specimens with

Julius von Haast Sir Johann Franz Julius von Haast (1 May 1822 – 16 August 1887) was a German-born New Zealand explorer, geologist, and founder of the Canterbury Museum in Christchurch. Early life Johann Franz Julius Haast was born on 1 May 1822 in Bo ...

Andreas Reischek Andreas Reischek (15 September 1845 – 3 April 1902) was an Austrian taxidermist, naturalist, ornithologist and grave robber notable for his extensive natural history collecting expeditions throughout New Zealand as well as being notorious for ...

helped him classify his collections on occasions, which were displayed at his family house in Wanganui. When the visiting public put too much pressure on the family, Drew agreed to have his collection given away, and it formed the nucleus of the Wanganui Public Museum, which opened on 24 March 1895. Drew became honorary curator of the museum, but died of a heart attack on 18 December 1901, aged 57. He had health problems before his death. The museum, which is still in public ownership, is now known as the

Whanganui Regional Museum The Whanganui Regional Museum in Whanganui, New Zealand, has an extensive collection of natural and human-history objects. The emphasis is on items from the Manawatu-Wanganui region, but the collection also includes objects of national and inter ...

and is located in Drews Avenue, Whanganui.

References

1844 births 1901 deaths Watchmakers (people) New Zealand jewellers British emigrants to New Zealand English jewellers People from Whanganui Fellows of the Linnean Society of London New Zealand naturalists {{NewZealand-bio-stub