Eben Gowrie Waterhouse
Starting out as an innovative teacher of languages, he became one of Australia's most prominent Germanists when classical German culture still commanded worldwide respect.
Finally, in his long retirement he brought about, as scholar and plant-breeder, an international revival of interest in the genus Camellia.
[3] It was so successful he was quickly taken on to the faculty of the Sydney Teachers' Training College, where his pupils disseminated the method in New South Wales schools.
The peak of his career as a Germanist came in 1932 when he delivered the address in the Great Hall of the University of Sydney on the centenary of Goethe's death.
[11] In this he was like his English friend and fellow camellia enthusiast Sir Henry Price, co-founder of the Royal Institute of International Affairs at that time for parallel reasons.
[12][13] Travelling in Europe shortly after the Night of the Long Knives, Waterhouse had the prestige, standing and fluency to gain interviews with Hitler and Mussolini.
[17] On 1 October 1912 Waterhouse married Janet Frew Kellie, a Scotswoman he had met studying languages in Paris in 1907.
Gordon Gowrie Waterhouse (1913–1986) was a horticulturalist who, with his father, established Camellia Grove Nursery in St Ives in 1939.
[17] Between 1913 and 1936 Waterhouse had built on half an acre (0.2 hectares) of land at 17 McIntosh Street, Gordon a house and garden called Eryldene after his wife's birthplace in Scotland.
"[23] Waterhouse felt that shrubs, camellias especially, lent "great personality" to a garden in a way which had been neglected in Australia.
[3] Eventually his garden came to contain over 700 camellia varieties — the largest private collection in Sydney — completely altering its original character.
[19] At a time of enormous expansion of gardens and housing on the North Shore, Eryldene and its plantings were imitated all over Sydney (and in many issues of The Home, until the magazine's attention was drawn in the Thirties to Spanish cloisters and Modernist sundecks).
Nearly a century later, the suburbs of Gordon, Killara, Pymble and Turramurra between May and August present an exceptional display of camellias in every form.
Eryldene became a lively centre between the Wars for leaders of opinion and taste, especially those connected to Sydney Ure Smith's The Home: Ure Smith himself, Hardy Wilson, Alfred and Jocelyn Brown,[23] Adrian Feint, Paul Jones,[28] Harold Cazneaux,[29] John Moore[30] and Leslie Wilkinson.
Another group were University linguists, most importantly Christopher Brennan, whom Waterhouse regarded as a great poet.
Garden rooms formed by walls and hedges should be provided with the "furniture" of pots and geometrical shrubs — juniper, hydrangea and camellia.
[34] Roses, the definitive plant of the Arts and Crafts garden,[37] were severely devalued as "too scraggy" for a Waterhouse design.
By 1943 the only rose bush he recommends for Sydney is 'Cramoisi Supérieur' for its combination of bright colour and firmly rounded form.
Starting at Eryldene, many of his landscape designs were marked by formal rows of poplars — often closely planted as a screen.
[43] Waterhouse was also responsible for planting what became the well-loved and iconic Jacaranda tree in the University of Sydney Quadrangle.
When the State Governor moved to Canberra as Governor-General of Australia, Waterhouse spent many hours at Yarralumla discussing the landscaping with Lady Gowrie.
[17] Western interest in camellias as luxury flowers had waxed 1840–1880 then waned as they lost favour to orchids.
From 1914 Waterhouse's writing and breeding eventually brought about a renewal of interest 1930–1960 in camellias (even in Japan), now as warm-climate woodland trees.
[3][46] His influence thus preceded by many years that of Sacheverell Sitwell's 1936 book Old Fashioned Flowers, often named as starting the revival.
[19][47] Waterhouse early formed the opinion that the rich and well watered soils of the North Shore were ideally suited to plants found in forest glades, most notably Japanese azaleas and camellias.
[50] Among these were camellias originally imported to colonial New South Wales or raised there by Sir William Macarthur of Camden Park 1820–61.
[52][53][54] In 1970 Waterhouse assembled a national collection of camellias on two hectares in the Sutherland Shire (at Caringbah), Sydney.
[55] Growing many camellias led to discovering natural seedlings and sports, as well as propagating known varieties and making deliberate crosses — starting with 'Plantation Pink' in 1942.
[115] Contemporary photos of the interior of Eryldene show the walls covered in Chinese art and watercolours of camellias.
The initial stage in French by the direct method : a handbook for teachers containing detailed lesson-notes for fifty-two lessons.
