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COLLECTION Identifier: Herbaria Special Collections Neal

Florence N. Andrews Neal pressed ferns collected on the island of Maui

Scope and Contents

This collection includes sixty-four pressed ferns that were collected on the island of Maui, Hawaii, by Florence N. Andrews Neal in 1875. The ferns were exhibited at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876 and were awarded a bronze medal. The ferns are mounted on individual sheets and include typed labels with family, genus, and species names. The specimens were collected under her maiden name, Florence N. Andrews.

In 1925 determinations were made by an unknown individual with the initials G.E.H. In 2019, staff from Wellesley College identified G.E.H. as Grace Elizabeth Howard, P.h.D, Instructor in Botany and Custodian of the Cryptogamic Herbarium at Wellesley.

The collection also includes an exhibit sign that was likely made at Wellesley College. The sign reads “Hawaiian Ferns Etc. Collected on the island of Maui in 1875 by Florence Andrews Neil. Awarded Bronze Medal at Centennial Exposition, Philadelphia 1876". The sign misspells Neal's last name as Neil.

Dates

  • Creation: circa 1875

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Restricted: Material extremely fragile. Please contact botref@oeb.harvard.edu for additional information.

Extent

0.8 linear feet (5 flat oversize boxes) ; 64 sheets: sheets measure 39.5 cm x 30 cm; 1 exhibit sign

Biographical / Historical

Florence N. Andrews Neal was born in Hawaii on July 30, 1860. Her father, the Reverend Claudius Buchannan Andrews (1817-1877), was a missionary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (A.B.C.F.M.) to the Hawaiian islands for more than 30 years. He married Florence’s mother Annie Seward Gilson (d. 1862) in 1850. Florence was the youngest of seven children.

Like many of her siblings, Florence attended the University of Michigan. She attended as a non-degree student from 1881-1882, where she met Robert Johnson Neal of Kent, Pennsylvania, who was studying at the school of medicine. Florence and Robert married in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on July 5, 1882 in a double wedding with her sister Fanny and Robert’s friend Dr. Fred Douglas Shepard. Two months later, both couples were deployed as missionaries under the A.B.C.F.M. and departed New York. Florence and Robert spent a year in Vienna to receive additional medical training. They moved to Beirut where Robert taught at the Syrian Protestant College for a year. Finally, they moved to Aintab, Turkey in 1884 to assist the Shepards. Robert contracted diphtheria a month after they arrived and died shortly after. Florence, who had not been well for 3 years, was attended to by her brother Lorrin A. Andrews of Hawaii, and her sister Lucy Caroline Andrews, who resigned from her post at Wellesley College to care for her. Florence died in 1885—just nine months after her husband. They were both buried in Turkey and left their estate to the Medical College of Aintab and Makawao Seminary in Maui.

References:

Amerikan Bord Heyeti (American Board), Istanbul. 2004. Memorial records for Florence N.A. Neal. Digital Library for International Research Archive. Website ( http://www.dlir.org/archive/items/show/17297). Accessed 4 Jun 2020.

—. 2004. Memorial records for Robert J. Neal. Digital Library for International Research Archive. Website (http://www.dlir.org/archive/items/show/17298). Accessed 4 Jun 2020.

Ancestry Seeker. 2008. Rev Claudius Buchannan Andrews. Find a Grave. Website (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/24411004/claudius-buchannan-andrews). Accessed 4 Jun 2020.

Hawaiian Mission Children's Society. 1886. Annual Report of the Hawaiian Mission Children's Society. 34, Hawaiian Gazette Publishing Co., Honolulu, HI.

University of Michigan. 1902. General Catalog of Officers and Students: 1837-1901. The University, Ann Arbor, MI.

Arrangement

Sheets are organized alphabetically by family and then genus and species.

Provenance

The original provenance of this collection is not documented. It is likely that Lucy Caroline Andrews, a Wellesley staff member and Florence N. Andrews Neal's sister, donated the collection. The collection was probably donated to Wellesley before 1925 because Grace Elizabeth Howard, another Wellesley staff member, made determinations of the ferns in that year. The ferns are mounted on board and include typed labels with the scientific names. In 2013, Wellesley College staff made an item level inventory of the collection with accession numbers that start with 2013.03. That information is kept on a spreadsheet in the repository, some of the Wellesely accession labels are filed with the ferns.

In 2019, the Florence N. Andrews Neal collection was donated to the Harvard University Herbaria by Wellesley College. Two other collections were donated at the same time: Alice Mills Hadley watercolors of native fungi from Chelsea, Vermont and Wellesley, Massachusetts and Elizabeth Eaton Morse collection of photographs of Pacific Coast states fungi.

All of the donated collections were mounted in glass double-sided frames and displayed in the old biology building of Wellesley College.

Creator

Source

Title
Neal, Florence N. Andrews, 1860-1885. Florence N. Andrews Neal pressed ferns collected on the island of Maui, circa 1875: A Guide.
Author
Botany Libraries, Gray Herbarium Library, Harvard University
Date
2020 April
Description rules
dacs
Language of description
eng
EAD ID
gra00087

Repository Details

Part of the Botany Libraries, Gray Herbarium Library, Harvard University Repository

The Harvard University Herbaria houses five research libraries that are managed collectively as the Botany Libraries. The Gray Herbarium Library specializes in the identification and classification of New World plants with emphasis on North American plants. The Archives of the Gray Herbarium houses unique resources including personal papers, institutional records, field notes and plant lists, expedition records, photographs, original artwork, and objects from faculty, curators, staff, and affiliates of the Gray Herbarium.

Contact:
Harvard University Herbaria
22 Divinity Ave
Cambridge MA 02138 USA
(617) 495-2366