The influence of Sir Joseph Banks

The most significant development at Kew during this period was not the addition of land and new buildings. At this point in the Garden's history came the gaining of a formidable international significance under the guidance of Sir Joseph Banks. He was instrumental in changing the direction of Kew from the simple collecting and showing of exotics to serious scientific and economic botanical purposes.

Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820) was a wealthy entrepreneur and natural history enthusiast. He went on several collecting expeditions including, between 1768-71, James Cook's round the world expedition in the Endeavour. He paid for his own passage and those of eight companions, including botanists, artists and a secretary. During the voyage he gathered considerable anthropological, scientific and botanical material. On his return he was widely acclaimed and gained an audience with George III; a meeting that was to prove instrumental in shaping the Gardens' future.

From 1773 Banks became established at Kew, taking on, in his words, "a kind of superintendence" to promote the Gardens and without his guidance, it is doubtful if Kew would have evolved into the internationally respected institution it is today. He was elected President of the Royal Society in 1778 and held the post for 41 years.

George III and Joseph Banks enjoyed a close relationship and their desire to develop economic uses for exotic and native plants set the course for the Gardens' development. Over the coming years Banks instigated collecting campaigns in South Africa, India, Abyssinia, China and Australia, and plants and materials were shipped from the Gardens to the colonies and vice versa. For example, in 1793 over 800 pots were transferred from HMS Providence to Kew Gardens after her voyages in the southern hemisphere.

A key example of Banks' role in the colonial economy was his delayed translocation in 1793 of breadfruit seedlings from their native Tahiti to the West Indies, in order to feed plantation slaves better. This had been attempted two years earlier, on a ship named the Bounty, captained by William Bligh. The infamous mutiny had caused the delay.

By the early 1800s Kew Garden's reputation and influence had grown to such an extent that virtually no ship left India or any other colony without some living or preserved specimen for the Botanic Gardens. Through Banks, the Botanic Gardens established an international reputation for plant collecting and competed vigorously to be the first European garden to display any new specimen.

More importantly, under Banks' benign "kind of superintendence", the Botanic Gardens at Kew became not simply a collecting house for botanical specimens, but the British centre for economic botany with a direct practical relevance to both Britain and her colonies. In recognition of this vital contribution that Banks made to the history of Kew, the Sir Joseph Banks Centre for Economic Botany building was named in his honour in 1990.

Banks' death in 1820 coincided with that of George III. The loss of these two driving forces in the Kew's development almost led to the disestablishment of the Gardens.

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