William McIvor was born in 1824 in the small village of Dollar at the foot of the Ochil hills, the boundary between lowland and highland Scotland. The Duke of Argyll’s southern seat was called Castle Campbell and it sits on the heights, looming over the settlement below. Dollar’s name derives from the Gaelic and is said to mean “dark” or “gloomy”. William’s father had taken up employment nearby, establishing a nursery at Crieff.
(Picture: William McIvor with spade).
McIvor was one of the first pupils to attend the prestigious Dollar Academy. Founded by Rev Andrew Milne, a leading educationalist and the first rector, it was established to instruct the children of the parish.
The Academy gardens being very extensive, greatly diversified, and well kept, were a great source of attraction to the pupils. Lying close to the base of the hills, with a fine southern exposure, and still protected from the north winds by a high wall about half a mile in extent, they yielded ample crops of flowers, fruits, and vegetables. Besides the produce, a very considerable trade was done in shrubs and young trees, which helped replenish the school funds. The boys and girls had four years learning gardening and propagation while also studying the finer points of Botany. A bequest had been left in the will of Captain John MacNabb, a local worthy, who had been born into a poor family. It is recorded that John nearly lost his life as a boy when he fell through ice on a local pond. The quick-thinking actions of a friend who inched his way out over the ice and managed to haul him from the water saved young John that day from drowning. It is said that when he reached “terra firma” he danced a jig in his wet clothes as he was overjoyed, he was still alive. He made his fortune at sea in the 18thC, working his way up from deckhand to Captain by splendid behaviour, steady application, and scholarship. Later he progressed to purchasing his own vessels and eventually leased out several of his own ships to others. He died a wealthy man in 1802 and had specified that half of his estate was to be used to provide a charity or school for the parish of Dollar, where he was born.
William Playfair, a top architect was commissioned to design and build the impressive doric classical building that is situated at the centre of the village. Delays meant the school was not opened until 1818. Eventually it came to be run by an independent board of governors. Our four children were fortunate to be educated at Dollar, many years later.
When William left school, he continued his training in horticulture and arboriculture hoping to follow his own father in his career. Shortly after, Kew Gardens in London were transferred from Crown ownership to the Government. William was employed to work in the expanded arboretum at the site. While at Kew he developed an interest in bryophytes (mosses, liverworts, and hornworts).
In 1847 McIvor published a pocket herbarium of British Hepatics. (Pictured).
He had earned a good reputation while working at the gardens and, when the Government decided to open a similar facility to Kew from scratch in India, his name came up. It needed an enthusiastic young horticulturist to establish a new garden at Ootacamund and transform what was a patch of jungle into seed beds, lawns, and clipped hedging. In due course he introduced British plants, fruit, and vegetables as well as the exotic plants of the east. He would try to grow anything that would thrive in the hill country of Nilgiris near Madras, in India.
(Pictured: Nilgiris near Madras, in India).
McIvor carefully planted seeds and saplings taken from home as well as locating and buying plants from all over the world. He successfully grew apples, apricot, cape plum, almonds, cherries, filberts, figs, guava, grape vine, granadilla, breadfruit, lemon, loquat, mango, mulberry, medlar, orange, peach, pear, nectarine, plum, pineapple, quince, currents, and many types of berries. A thriving business was then set up selling the produce to the mainly European settlers. As well as introducing fruits and flowers from other countries he exported many varieties to other colonies with similar climates.
In 1850 he married Anne, the eldest daughter of Col Edwards of Iscoed in Denbighshire.
(Picture: Anne McIvor Memorial Tablet).
Later he asked Clements Markham to bring him the cinchona plant from South America. He had some difficulty initially propagating the plant and having it flourish in the conditions prevalent at Ootacamund. However, MacIvor discovered that removing strips of bark and allowing the plant to heal by covering them in moss improved their sustainability.
Following this success, he was appointed as the Superintendent of an extensive new Cinchona plantation by the Indian colonial government. McIvor was probably the first person to treat the quinine plant in such a way as to extract from it the greatest quantity of its invaluable properties with the least possible harm to the plant itself.
His success led him to amass a considerable fortune and it is said he never ceased to donate a liberal amount to the deserving poor of his native parish. William died on the eighth of June 1876 and was buried nearby at St Stephen’s church cemetery. His ornate tomb is carved out of fine marble and features prominently a relief carving of the cinchona plant. It was erected, it says on the memorial by his “little wife” and engraved on the front is the biblical text. “I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me”. His spouse, Anne passed away in India in 1903 and a memorial tablet was commissioned to the memory of William’s “little wife”.
(Picture: William Graham McIvor- Tomb Chest).
Evidently there are now over three million people who visit the breathtakingly beautiful Ootacamund gardens every year. McIvor is credited with introducing Horticulture and Botany to the Nilgiris and every year his exemplary contribution to India is remembered and wreaths are placed at his tomb. The Garden Administrators hope to install a plaque in William McIvor’s memory at the entrance to what was his life’s main work shortly.
It is not surprising that the cinchona plant was propagated widely as quinine, a bitter compound, could be extracted from the bark of the tree. Quinine was mainly developed as a medicine to treat malaria. However, it is also used as a flavour component in tonic water, bitter lemon, and some alcoholic drinks.
McIvor’s main contribution to Scotland though is undoubtedly “due to the fact” that quinine is one of the secret ingredients said to flavour the country's “other national drink”. The flavoursome “Irn Bru”, it is said, is made “from girders” due to the carbonated tonic's burnt orange colour.
WILLIAM GRAHAM McIVOR – TOMB CHEST (HINDU – VISITORS)