| Administrative History | Thomas Milne carried on a business as nurseryman in the Sunnyside district of Aberdeen, between 1839 and 1863. By 1878 the company had moved to the Rubislaw area of the city, and by 1902 it appears to have ceased operating.
Born in 1893, Henry Marshall Steven was educated at Edinburgh University and graduated in Forestry in 1915. He was awarded a Carnegie Research Scholarship and then a Carnegie Research Fellowship, and in 1917 was appointed a Forest Statistics Officer in the Timber Supply Department. He completed his Ph.D. at Edinburgh in 1921, by which time he was a research officer in the Forestry Commission in Scotland where he stayed until 1924 and then worked in England until 1930. From 1926 to 1946 he was editor of the newly established journal ‘Forestry’, the journal of the Society of Foresters of Great Britain, of which he was elected President in 1951. Continuing his work for the Forestry Commission he moved to Aberdeen in 1933 to manage the East Scotland Division of the Commission until 1938 when he was appointed to the Chair of Forestry at the University of Aberdeen. During the Second World War he organised timber supply, and after the war became Curator of the University Library. He was awarded the CBE in 1959 and continued to participate in committee work and to undertake research on forestry until 1965. He died in Aberdeen in 1969. |
| Custodial History | Records of Thomas Milne donated to the Forestry Department Library in 1964, by Chris Milne, great grand-daughter of Thomas Milne. |
| Description | Ledger of Thomas Milne, nurseryman, Sunnyside, Aberdeenshire, containing accounts of seeds and seedlings supplied to individuals and estates in Aberdeen and district, 1839 - 1863. The contents of the volume make interesting reading, and provide useful source material on the creation of plantations and landscaping of grounds and gardens, which had become fashionable at this time. Examples of entries include the Trustees of Craigievar estate, Aberdeenshire, who purchased 5500 thorns for hedging, 1250 2-year beech, 1700 Elms, and 1600 Ash, in Mar 1851; and the Trustees of Fintra estate, Aberdeenshire, who purchased more than 70,000 seedlings for Logie plantation during 1849 and 1850.
Steven's abstract of entries relating to forestry in the Old Statistical Account of Scotland, 1963. |