Mary Beever
{{Short description|British artist and botanist (1802–1883)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Use British English|date=July 2023}}
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| name = Mary Beever
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| birth_date = 1802
| birth_place = Ardwick, Greater Manchester, England
| death_date = 31 December {{death year and age|1883|1802}}
| death_place = Coniston, Cumbria, England
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Mary Beever (1802 – 31 December 1883) was a British artist and botanist. She and her sister were close friends with their neighbour John Ruskin in the Lake District. Plants collected by Beever are in several museum collections. She was an elected member of the Botanical Society of London.
Life
Beever was born in Ardwick, in Manchester. Her father, William Beever, was a Manchester businessman and their mother, Nanny, died while she was young.
File:Birdsgrove_House_near_Ashbourne_postcard.jpg
They lived in Birdsgrove House near Ashbourne in Derbyshire before moving to The Thwaite in Coniston in Cumbria in 1827.
Mary was a keen botanist and her collections are in several museums, including collections in Edinburgh, at the Hancock Museum in Newcastle, and at Oxford.{{cite book|author=Ray Desmond|title=Dictionary Of British And Irish Botantists And Horticulturalists Including plant collectors, flower painters and garden designers|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=thmPzIltAV8C&pg=PA61|date=25 February 1994|publisher=CRC Press|isbn=978-0-85066-843-8|pages=61–}} She corresponded with botanist John Gilbert Baker, and sent Gentiana pneumonanthe specimens to William Baxter, curator at Oxford Botanic Garden. She was elected a member of the Botanical Society of London between 1839 and 1841.{{Cite Q|Q113958660}} Her father died in 1831. Her brother John installed water power for a family printing press and a pond was created where he experimented with different fish foods.{{Cite web |title=Ruskin Linen and Lace |url=https://ruskinmuseum.com/who-was-john-ruskin-1819-1900/ruskin-linen-and-lace/ |access-date=2023-07-04 |website=Ruskin Museum |language=en-GB}} Her sister Anne died in 1858 and her brother, John, died the following year. She shared the house with her sister Susan after their sister Margaret died in 1874.
Mary and her sister Susanna were skilled botanical artists and they found themselves in John Ruskin's circle after they first met him in 1873. Ruskin lived on the other side of Coniston and he would write them letters although a short walk or a row in a boat would enable a visit. Ruskin was closest to "Susie" and in 1875 he allowed her to create an abridged version of his book Modern Painters.{{Cite book |last=Cook |first=Edward Tyas |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-ghF9kYfIPwC&dq=%22susan+beever%22&pg=PA286 |title=The Life of John Ruskin: Volume 2, 1860-1900 |date=April 2010 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-108-00972-0 |language=en}}
Beever died at their home in Coniston in 1883.Jane Garnett, ‘Women artists in Ruskin's circle (act. 1850s–1900s)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, October 2005 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/73637, accessed 19 November 2015]
References
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Category:Artists from Manchester
Category:British women artists
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