James Hector, Explorer, Scientist, Leader

anniversary of Hector's appointment as head of the New Zealand Geological Survey.However, Hector had a still larger place in nineteenth-century New Zealand science; his responsibilities at times spanned from the Colonial Museum, to the Colonial Botanical Gardens, to the Colonial Observatory and to weather forecasting.Nathan's stated aim was to write a 'relatively short, illustrated biography concentrating on the main events in Hector's life and his place in nineteenth century New Zealand' (12).In this regard, he has succeeded admirably and in 264 pages manages to weave together some not unfamiliar threads of Hector's career with other episodes, including his early life in Edinburgh, his time in Canada on the Palliser expedition (typically acknowledged in accounts of Hector's life but here given attention beyond mention of Kicking Horse Pass) and his family life.Nathan also assesses changing views of Hector as a scientist and scientific manager.Written as a series of essentially chronological chapters, Nathan reconstructs and interprets Hector's time as Otago Provincial Geologist (1862-1865).He was the organiser of government science through the 1860s and 1870s founding and consolidation phases, an establishment figure of the 1880s and 1890s, and of declining influence in the 1890s and early 1900s.The biography makes clear the breadth of Hector's interests and expertise, considerable, even in nineteenth-century terms where disciplinary boundaries were more fluid and easily crossed.The main text is skilfully supplemented with some text boxes and a selection of sketches, maps, photographs and cartoons, and includes some of Hector's own sketches of landscapes and specimens.Reproduction of period photographs strikingly highlight the rawness of the environment, even of colonial Wellington in the 1870s when Hector was engaged in his major scientific work.Two of Hector's own geological maps, of Otago and New Zealand, are reproduced and are themselves important artefacts of nineteenth-century scientific inquiry in New Zealand.Nathan notes that although some of Hector's specific roles, for instance in the geological survey, have been written about, the understanding of his professional responsibilities has been somewhat 'siloed'.If anything, as a geologist himself, Nathan has pared back his discussion of Hector's geological work to a minimum.Accordingly, the biography is especially useful in exploring the way in which Hector created a number of interlocking agencies from the 1860s to1880s, and indeed how he was able to use the web of budgetary cross subsidisation to prevent retrenchment.Reading James Hector, Explorer, Scientist, Leader prompted me to return to Michael Hoare's Cook lectures from 1976, 'Beyond the filial Piety' and 'Reform in New Zealand Science 1880-1926'.In the first of these, Hoare writes of 'Hectorian centralism circa 1865-1905' and 'Hector's hegemony' where he seems to equate hegemony with dominance, while making the point that a 'profound study of Hector and his organisation' was badly needed. 1 In 'Reform in New Zealand Science 1880-1926' Hoare again has recourse to use the term 'Hector's hegemony' and discusses in some detail G.M. Thomson's efforts to reform science in New Zealand, to overcome what Hoare sees as somewhat complacent centralism. 2 Hoare's phrase 'Hector's hegemony' is one that has tended to shape my view of Hector, yet on my rereading of Hoare's lectures, I would now argue that the lack of a biography actually helped Hoare to reduce Hector to a shadowy but controlling background figure.Nathan's biography provides a somewhat different periodisation of Hector's career than does Hoare and is able to delve rather further into the manner in which Hector's responsibilities were both accumulated

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.