THE CAMBRIDGE HORTICULTURIST

Graham Stuart Thomas, who had a rose named after him by David Austin Snr, was born in Cambridge on April 9th, 1909 and became one of the leading horticulturists.

The David Austin rose, which Graham had selected to bear his name, is an English Rose that was bred by Austin's by crossing an unnamed seedling with the pollen of (Charles Austin x an Iceberg seedling). It produces rich deep yellow flowers that have an intensive fragrance. It is one of the few roses with links to my home town of Cambridge that we don't have. Something that one day, I will have to put right.

The son of William Richard Thomas, who was a Cambridge University Syndicate and a keen gardener, Graham and his family's home in Cambridge being Bemerton, 169 Hills Road. Opposite the eastern gate of the Cambridge University Botanic Garden, where Graham at the age of seventeen went to further his education in horticulture and botany, their former house since 1974 formed part of the Helen's Hotel. At the age of seventeen he went to work at the Cambridge Botanic Garden to continue his education into horticulture and botany, having decided at an early age to make a career of gardening. His family being keen amateur gardeners. After four years at the Botanic Garden, he moved to Stevenage, before 12 months later becoming the foreman of the 300 acre nursery of T. Hilling and Co in Cobham, Surrey. After 24 years working for Hilling's, he moved to Windlesham to become the Manager of the Sunningdale Nursery and was later a partner in the nursery. Also an author, he became the Garden Advisor for the National Trust and in the 1970s he helped laid out the rose garden in the old kitchen garden of Mottisfield Abbey near Ramsey in Hampshire, which today houses one of the comprehensive collection of roses in the UK.

He was responsible for introducing two roses to the rose world:

Bobby James - a hybrid wichurana rambler that has strongly fragrant white flowers and was awarded in 1993 an Award of Merit by the Royal Horticultural Society.

Heather Muir - is a species rose that was introduced in 1957.

Awarded an OBE in 1975 and the Dean Hole Medal by the Royal National Rose Society in 1976, Graham Stuart Thomas died in Worthing aged 94 on April 17th, 2003.