Ruth Lane-Poole: A Woman of Influence by CMAG

Canberra Museum and Gallery acknowledges the traditional custodians of the Canberra region: the Ngunnawal, Ngunawal and Ngambri peoples. We respect and celebrate your continuing culture and the contribution you make to our community and our understanding of the country that surrounds and nurtures us.

10 JULY ~ 02 OCTOBER 2021

First published in association with the exhibition

RUTH LANE-POOLE : A WOMAN OF INFLUENCE at Canberra Museum and Gallery, 10 July to 2 October 2021

An exhibition presented by Canberra Museum & Gallery Curator: Margaret Betteridge Design: Cate Furey Contributors: Dr Sarah Schmidt, Director, Canberra Museum & Gallery Rowan Henderson, Assistant Director, Exhibitions & Collections CMAG (project management) Sharon Bulkeley, Senior Curator, Social History CMAG Photography: Rob Little RLDI Printing: CanPrint, Canberra Please note the following acronyms appear throughout this publication: Australian National University

ANU

Canberra Museum and Gallery

CMAG

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation

CSIRO

State Library of NSW

SLNSW

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be produced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or information retrieval systems without prior permission in writing from the publisher. ©CMAG Copyright in this publication is held by CMAG, the artists and the authors.

ISBN 978-0-9875455-3-4 CANBERRA MUSEUM AND GALLERY Cnr London Circuit and Civic Square, Canberra City ACT www.cmag.com.au Canberra Museum and Gallery is part of the Cultural Facilities Corporation, an ACT Government enterprise.

Presented in partnership with

C ontents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................................................................... 06 FOREWORD: HARRIET ELVIN AM, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, CULTURAL FACILITIES CORPORATION ................................................................................. 07 ESSAY: INTRODUCTION DR SARAH SCHMIDT, DIRECTOR, CANBERRA MUSEUM & GALLERY .............................................................................................................. 11 ESSAY: A WOMAN OF INFLUENCE MARGARET BETTERIDGE, CURATOR .............................................................................................. 15 ESSAY: CHAMPIONS OF AUSTRALIA’S TIMBERS: THE MUNRO FERGUSON TIMBER LIBRARY JENNIFER SANDERS, CHAIR THE AUSTRALIANA FUND ................................................................................................................................................... 45 TIMELINE...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 52

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Canberra Museum and Gallery, and curator Margaret Betteridge, have many people to thank for their support of this exhibition. We are grateful for the trust that so many have placed in us through lending works to this exhibition, people including Ruth Lane-Poole’s granddaughters, Susie Murdoch and Caroline Hassing; the Office of the Official Secretary to the Governor-General; The Australiana Fund; The Department of Prime Minister & Cabinet; CSIRO; the National Library of Australia; the National Museum of Australia; the National Gallery of Australia; the State Library of Victoria; Australian National University Archives; Fenner School of Environment and Society, ANU College of Science, The Australian National University and ACT Historic Places. Thank you also to those who have provided advice and assistance including Dr John Dargavel; the National Archives of Australia; the ACT Heritage Library; Lynette Mace and Dr Matthew Brookhouse, ANU. It has been a great pleasure to work with Cate Furey on the exhibition and catalogue design, and with photographers Rob and Sandie Little. Special thanks must be given to Harriet Elvin AM, CEO of the Cultural Facilities Corporation, for generously providing funds toward the production of this catalogue. A final thank you to our colleagues and families for supporting us on this journey.

F oreword

HARRIET ELVIN AM CEO, CULTURAL FACILITIES CORPORATION

Ruth Lane-Poole : A Woman of Influence explores the life and career of a remarkable woman whose work had a profound impact on Australian home furnishing and interior design, and who left an important legacy, especially to Canberra. Ruth rose to national prominence in 1926 when she was appointed as an interior ‘furnisher’ for the two official residences in Canberra that would house the GovernorGeneral and the Prime Minister, following the relocation of Federal Parliament to Canberra. She was chosen for this role as a result of her contribution to home furnishing in Australia during the mid-1920s, through articles she wrote for popular magazines. Ruth’s helpful advice and her practical, yet elegant, design philosophy, encouraged amateur home decorators to create tasteful domestic environments even on modest budgets. Born in Ireland in 1885, Ruth grew up as part of the famed literary and artistic Yeats family that was associated with the Celtic Revival and Arts and Crafts movements, and which included her cousin, the renowned poet and playwright William Butler Yeats. It was Yeats who gave Ruth away at her wedding in 1911 to Charles Lane Poole, who went on to become Australia’s chief forester. That role led to them both moving to Canberra, where Charles was Head of the Australian Forestry School and where they set up home at Westridge House, Yarralumla. Their three daughters attended the Girls Grammar School and their lives were interwoven with Canberra society

through charity and war work, and the ski club that Charles helped establish. Ruth’s main legacy is the collection of furniture and household furnishing that survives in ‘The Lodge’ and Government House, together with the collection of her designs for the furniture that was commissioned for the residences. A major theme of the exhibition is to reflect on the beauty of Australian timbers, by exploring Ruth’s commitment to showcasing the individual properties of specific Australian woods in her designs, and by discussing the work of her husband, Charles, and his far-reaching impact on the development of the Australian forestry industry. I congratulate distinguished guest curator Margaret Betteridge for creating such a rich and insightful exhibition. In this task, Margaret has been ably assisted by Rowan Henderson, Assistant Director, Exhibitions and Collections at Canberra Museum and Gallery (CMAG), as project manager for the exhibition, and by the entire staff of CMAG, under the leadership of Director Sarah Schmidt. The exhibition has been developed in close partnership with The Australiana Fund, which was established in 1978 as an independent fundraising body to acquire a national collection of works of art to enhance the four Official Residences of the Governor-General and Prime Minister of Australia, and to ensure these works represent the highest quality in Australian art and design. A feature work in the

exhibition is the timber ‘library’ made by Frederick Tod for presentation to then Governor-General Sir Ronald Munro Ferguson, and recently acquired by the Fund. As a Councillor of the Fund, as well as head of the Cultural Facilities Corporation, which manages CMAG, I am delighted that CMAG is able to present this exhibition in collaboration with the Fund. I thank Chair of the Fund Jennifer Sanders, Fine Arts Advisor to the Fund, Sonya Abbey, and Fund Councillors, for their enthusiasm and support for the exhibition. Many other institutions and individuals have generously loaned works for the exhibition, especially the National Library of Australia, and we are extremely grateful for their support. I trust you will enjoy discovering the enduring legacy and influence of Ruth Lane-Poole through this fine exhibition. HARRIET ELVIN AM Chief Executive Officer Cultural Facilities Corporation

RIGHT Walter Burley and Marion Mahony Griffin proposed prominent locations for the residences for the Governor-General and Prime Minister, flanking a Capitol building at the apex of a parliamentary triangle, 1911. Collection, NAA: A710, 36

TOP Design for couch and chair, 1926. BOTTOM Design for office desk, 1926

National Library of Australia, PIC Drawer 3264 #R10354/1-2/ National Library of Australia, PIC Drawer 3264 #R10354

I ntroduction This exhibition is a timely portrayal of Ruth Lane-Poole (1885-1974) whose contribution and role in Australian history has not been widely acknowledged, despite her work having a lasting presence at ‘The Lodge’ and Government House. The significance of her work is twofold, as a measure of taste in Australia in the 1920s; and because Lane-Poole was the inaugural decorator-designer, working, under the title ‘furniture specialist’, on Australia’s very first official residences for the Prime Minister and Governor-General. This task occupied Lane-Poole for almost a year and a half. A tour through Government House today is testament to the classic design and fine craftsmanship that Lane-Poole presided over; the continuing presence of her work still largely characterises the interior, almost a century beyond when she was engaged by the Federal Capital Commission. The accessibility to the public, such as school groups being able to tour the ground floor of Government House where many of the furniture items designed by Lane-Poole are located, is something I celebrate as a public gallery/museum director, who is concerned with equitable access to all; it is a worthy gesture on behalf of our government and the office of the Governor-General that this is encouraged, and a small but important token of democratic principle. Ruth Lane-Poole’s design commissions for the interiors of these official residences, are mostly in the style of the arts and crafts movement. Her drawings for these commissions are appealing in their own right, such as furniture designs (‘Design for Couch and Chair’ and ‘Design for Desk’ see p.10). The drawings evidence her informal training but also show a linear style that is charming, striking, accomplished, and seems imbued with a palpable sense of the designer’s devotion to her task; this is visible in the studied and

DR SARAH SCHMIDT, DIRECTOR, CANBERRA MUSEUM AND GALLERY attentive work, and its consistency across copious quantities of hand drawn furniture designs in the large folios of her drawings that can be viewed at the National Library of Australia.1 In a computerised age these freehand drawings have a special resonance for their human touch, especially as they have a style that contrasts with more technical drafting. Lane-Poole found skilled Australian craftsmen to transform Australian timbers into beautiful furniture, albeit well anchored in traditional English design. ‘In the matter of the furniture there is not one piece in the whole house made of imported timber. Certainly to carry out the ideal of using only Australian timbers in this house was a problem of great interest and attraction,’2 said Ruth Lane-Poole, describing fundamental terms of her commission. It was an excellent inspiration on the part of the curator of this exhibition, Margaret Betteridge, to engage academic Dr. Matthew Brookhouse to advise on timbers used in some of the furniture displayed in our exhibition and to supply loans from the ANU wood library (xylaria). Matthew Brookhouse is a Senior Lecturer in the Australian National University (ANU) Fenner School of Environment and Society, College of Science, and among his many areas of expertise, are Dendrochronology, the science concerning the study of the annual rings of trees in determining the dates and chronological order of past events, and Dendroclimatology. In 2016, Brookhouse’s knowledge was used in a joint research project3 to determine the age of a panel-based portrait of Henry VIII, held by the Art Gallery of NSW (AGNSW), using x-ray fluorescence. Brookhouse speaks about timbers in the way that a geologist speaks about rocks, explaining weather patterns and events that are visible in the timbers. Brookhouse, while closely investigating the 11

desk at Government House (see p.10) gave insights into its Blackwood and Tulipwood (Harpullia pendula, a Queensland timber) surfaces, pointing out small circular features in various sections, explaining these were small notches in the wood where fine twigs have broken off; now they form part of the delightful patterning on these beautifully polished timbers. Ruth Lane-Poole enthused about Tulipwood as ‘that most decorative of all Queensland’s woods.’4 The desk’s Tulipwood features a distinctive birds-eye and ripple combination and abuts the Blackwood. Brookhouse explains that Blackwood is distinctly brown compared to other varieties of timber and is the only acacia to produce the darklight contrast of wood-grain patterns such as are perfectly exemplified in this desk, and that ‘you have a sense of time and history embedded.’ In 1927, Lane-Poole, quoted in a popular magazine feature, discussed, as well as furniture, a jarrah dance floor revealed in Government House when the carpet is drawn up: ‘There is no ballroom, but the big doors which separate the reception rooms from the private entrance and stair halls are all hinged with pins, which can be pulled out at a moment’s notice… and a good dancing space made available…the wonderful two inch, secret nailed, jarrah floors laid bare for dancing. It is an accepted fact that tallowwood and jarrah floors are among the finest dancing floors in the world.’5 As the usage of Australian timbers was such an important priority for Ruth Lane-Poole, I do hope that visitors to this exhibition will closely examine the individual qualities of the timbers used, as well as appreciating the furniture design, the objects themselves on display, and the historical context, and, indeed the newly celebrated profile of the designer herself, cleverly brought to the fore by the exhibition curator. The extent of Lane-Poole’s work and its important context in our national design history should, well before now, have earned her greater documentation than exists today, albeit she enjoyed the contemporaneous feature in The Australian Home Beautiful in 1927; this exhibition helps to restore 12

Ruth Lane-Poole’s rightful place in the design history of the capital. In more recent times, even texts such as Canberra Following Griffin: A Design History of Australia’s National Capital (2002)6 do not make any note of the designer Ruth Lane-Poole and her extensive input to these key buildings in the capital, Government House and ‘The Lodge’; the text does however note that the ‘remodelling of the old Yarralumla Homestead… [including] furnishing, was carried out in contravention of the Commonwealth Public Works Committee Act, without reference to the Committee.’7 Although women are being honoured more widely now, belatedly, books such as Canberra Following Griffin, should, to be fair, be judged in context of their times. The present age is seeing widespread interest, through an increasingly revisionist approach to histories, in the profiling of female artists, designers and professionals of many disciplines, who are now given the acknowledgement or prominence they long deserved, but lacked owing to the societal norms of the period. The National Archives of Australia who published Canberra Following Griffin in 2002, is actually one of the few institutions who have profiled the designer, including LanePoole in their ‘Uncommon Lives’ series of 2006, which also notes the archive’s rich holdings of material relating to the designer and the project.8 Part of what is now Government House, was originally built by a grazier in 1891 on Ngunnawal lands following European pastoralists entering the area from the 1820s, sited perhaps especially near to the places the Ngunnawal women had employed as their sites, these being often closer to the rivers. The sites particular to the men and the boys were further away among places of caves and granite boulders.9 Now, in this place of the First Nations peoples and their songs, and food sources including bogong moths, came dinners, gavottes and waltzes after the displacement of Aboriginal people; the 1891 Yarralumla house can be imagined as a centre of mid-nineteenth century culture, possibly including balls and soirées where ‘the swordsmen

and the ladies can still keep company’, to borrow a line from, ‘The Curse of Cromwell’ (c.1936-7) by William Butler Yeats, who Margaret Betteridge and Jennifer Sanders each discuss in their catalogue essays; W.B.Yeats was a cousin to Ruth Lane-Poole. In a marvellous twist of fate, our programming at Canberra Museum and Gallery, during the period of Ruth LanePoole: A Woman of Influence, includes Ethel Spowers, who Margaret Betteridge notes Ruth Lane-Poole kept company with, together with artists Thea Proctor and Blamire Young. Spowers will be shown alongside her contemporary, LanePoole, when Canberra Museum and Gallery hosts the National Gallery of Australia exhibition, Spowers and Syme, 13 August - 6 November 2021; the NGA exhibition pairs the work of Spowers and Eveline W Syme. We greatly look forward to this NGA show, but it is worth noting that Ruth

Lane-Poole: A Woman of Influence is characteristic of CMAG’s programming emphasis: on thorough, highly considered exhibitions which CMAG curates or originates. This exhibition will not tour: it is a rare opportunity to see these items from public and private collections, seldom loaned, now brought together, in one place, in this important exhibition. I echo the thanks and congratulations to all those involved as stated by our Chief Executive Officer, Harriet Elvin AM, in her Foreword. Harriet has also generously sponsored this catalogue; I personally congratulate Harriet upon twenty-four years at the helm of the Cultural Facilities Corporation, an enterprise of the ACT Government. She is about to conclude this role, leaving us with an excellent solid footing for the future, as she embarks upon her own academic research.

ENDNOTES 1 ‘Furniture designs for Prime Minister’s Lodge and Government House’, Ruth Lane-Poole, 116 drawings, National Library of Australia, PIC Drawer 3264 #R10354. 2 Ruth Lane-Poole, ‘A Home for a Governor-General: How ‘Yarralumla’, the Government House at Canberra, was fitted and furnished’, The Australian Home Beautiful: A Journal for The Home Builder, special furnishing edition, May 2 1927, p.14. 3 Matthew Brookhouse, Simon Ives, Paula Dredge, Daryl Howard, Dan Miles, Martin Bridge, Rob Wilson, ‘Dating Henry: Non-destructive dendrochronological dating of a 16th-century panel painting based upon x-ray fluorescence lightning’, Australian National University, Art Gallery of New South Wales; Australian Synchtrotron; University of Oxford; University College London; University St Andrews —paper presented at ‘Revivify, 14th AICCM Paintings Special Interest Group Symposium’, National Portrait Gallery, Canberra, October 2016. An excerpt from the paper: ‘…quarter-saw[n]… panels often preserve tree-ring sequences that are visible on their upper and lower edges. These sequences allow the age and provenance of the timber panels to be determined (e.g. Haneca et al. 2009, Bridge 2012) which can, in turn, contribute significantly towards interpretation of the associated artwork… [The team] measured the assumed tree-ring widths within the x-ray scatter map… using digital images captured via microscopy and [a] tree-ring measurement program… to establish a ‘floating’ Henry VIII chronology… then objectively cross-dated a composite of these paths against existing regional oak tree-ring chronologies for continental Europe (Hamburg) and England to determine the most-recent calendar year in [the] measurement series and estimate the time of felling of the source tree… then correlated the dated Henry VIII chronology against site-specific chronologies to identify a likely provenance of the panel timber. [The team] compiled an 81 year-long tree-ring width series from nine measurement paths in the central left portion of the portrait…The last- formed tree ring in [the] series corresponds with a calendar year of 1480AD… When estimates of years included within the sapwood and time taken to pre-condition the panel are added to this calendar date, we conclude that work on the panel is likely to have commenced during 1500-1540AD. This dating is consistent with the assumed date of completion (c. 1535; see Dredge et al, 2015). Variation in the strength of our dating against local English chronologies suggests that the panel timber originated in the southern county of Surrey, Sussex or Hampshire.’ 4 Lane-Poole, R, 1927, op.cit, p.39. 5 Ibid, p.14. 6 Reid, Paul, Canberra Following Griffin: A Design History of Australia’s National Capital, National Archives of Australia, 2002. 7 Ibid, p.193. 8 Dargavel, J, ‘Charles and Ruth —Lane Poole’, Uncommon Lives, 8 November 2006, National Archives of Australia <web.archive.org> accessed June 2021. 9 See for example: <https://www.tidbinbilla.act.gov.au/learn/ngunnawal-culture-and-heritage>accessed June 2021.

Curator’s E ssay

AUTHOR’S NOTE While Ruth Lane-Poole styled her name with a hyphen and published her articles as such, the hyphen was never consistent for the name of Charles Lane Poole.

MARGARET BETTERIDGE

PREAMBLE The proclamation of Canberra as the site for the national capital of Australia in 1913 followed the Federal Parliament’s decision five years earlier to create a new city between Sydney and Melbourne. In presenting their vision in the international competition for its design, American architects Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, combined an appreciation for the natural landscape and the topography of the Molonglo Valley with principles of good urban design. They understood the desire for a public landscape which projected the powers and responsibilities of government as common to national capitals and balanced that with the democratic ideals and rights of citizens. The Griffins’ geometric framework for Canberra used the high points of Black Mountain, Mount Ainslie and Mugga Mugga to create a triangular plan within which would sit the centre of government. Its buildings were arranged around an imposing edifice, according to the importance of their functions and surrounded by the people the government was to serve. In a theatrical expression of idealistic vision, a Capitol hill would be crowned with a large pyramidal structure, a temple to the spirit of Australia, flanked by the residences of the Governor-General as the head of state and the Prime Minister as the elected head of government.1

The symbolic intent of the Griffins’ plan was lost however, in the mire of bureaucratic interference, economic stagnation created by the First World War, and the diminution of their design ideals in the race to meet the government’s commitment to open Federal Parliament in 1927 in Canberra, as promised. This also left the GovernorGeneral and the Prime Minister without homes in the national capital. The hastily developed solution to this problem, devised by the Federal Capital Commission, was only ever intended to be temporary. The former pastoral homestead ‘Yarralumla’, which had been acquired by the Federal government, would become the vice-regal residence for the GovernorGeneral, while Melbourne architects, Percy Oakley and Stanley Parkes were commissioned to design a suitable, but provisional, residence, until such time as a more substantial dwelling could be built for the Prime Minister. There was little time to waste. Their saving grace was a woman with impeccable credentials, a well-informed design aesthetic and social credibility. Her name was Ruth Lane-Poole and as the Commission’s ‘Furniture Specialist’, she was the first Australian government appointed woman to provide advice on matters of furnishing and decorating in an official capacity. 15

Ruth Lane-Poole, c. 1920 – 1927 © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families.

A WOMAN OF INFLUENCE Ruth Lane-Poole (née Pollexfen) was born at 15 Upper Mallow Street, Limerick on 27 September 1885, the third of nine children to Henrietta and Frederick Henry Pollexfen, the son of a shipping merchant in Sligo on the west coast of Ireland. Following the failure of her parents’ marriage, Ruth was made a ward of her cousin (her mother’s niece) Susan Mary Yeats, a member of the celebrated artistic and literary family whose names are immortalised as prominent exponents of the Irish Celtic Revival movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Ruth joined the Yeats family in London in 1900, moving with them to Dundrum, Churchtown, outside Dublin the following year. The impact of her exposure to the creative talents of her adoptive family was profound. Her uncle, John Butler Yeats (1839 – 1922) abandoned a legal career to become a noted portrait artist and gifted writer, driven by a great intellect. His daughter, Susan, known as Lily, had studied at the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin before working as an assistant embroiderer to May Morris, then Director of Embroidery for her father, William’s business, Morris & Co. Lily’s sister, Elizabeth Corbet (Lolly), also studied at the Metropolitan School of Art, later training to become a Froebel teacher, specialising in teaching art to children. She was encouraged by Emery Walker, a typographer at Morris’ Kelmscott Press to learn the art of engraving and printing. Together with Evelyn Gleeson, Lily and Lolly established Dun Emer Guild in Dundrum, a business committed to training women in creative practices and reviving traditional TOP Ruth Pollexfen, aged 2 ½ years, studio portrait photograph by Guy and Co Ltd, Dublin, 1888. BOTTOM Ruth Pollexfen, c. 1900. © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

Irish arts and crafts. Here, Ruth was employed as an apprentice embroiderer. In 1908, Lily and Lolly left Dun Emer to establish their own venture, Cuala Industries where Ruth was apprenticed to Lily, and Lolly ran Cuala Press, specialising in printing works by contemporary Irish poets and authors, including the work of their brothers, William Butler and Jack Butler Yeats. William Butler Yeats, poet, playwright and aesthete, was one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature and an influential contributor to the Irish literary renaissance, a founder of the Abbey Theatre and the recipient of the LEFT Susan Mary ‘Lily’ Yeats, c. 1910, oil on linen by Clare Marsh (1875 – 1923), a pupil of Lily’s father, portrait artist, John Butler Yeats. ABOVE The embroidery room, Dun Emer Industries, Dundrum, Dublin, 1905. © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923. His brother Jack Butler Yeats, regarded today as the most important Irish artist of the 20th century, began as a magazine illustrator, author and playwright but is best known for his works in oils and his depictions of Irish folk and rural life. At the 1924 Summer Olympic Games in Paris, he was awarded a silver medal in the arts and culture category for his painting, The Liffey Swim. The circumstances of how Ruth met Charles Lane Poole (1885 – 1970), the man she would marry, remain unknown, but it is likely to have been soon after she arrived in Dublin. Charles, the son of Stanley Lane-Poole and his wife Charlotte Bell Lane-Poole (née Wilson), had come to Ireland with his family when his father was appointed Professor of Arabic Studies at Trinity College, Dublin. After attending St Columba’s College, Charles briefly considered an engineering 19

TOP LEFT Detail of a bedspread, embroidered cotton thread on linen fabric, by Ruth Lane-Poole, n.d. TOP RIGHT Floral panel, copied from an embroidery Landscape at Night by Lily Yeats, silk thread on cotton fabric, early 20th century. BOTTOM LEFT Front cover of a needle case, embroidered by Ruth Lane-Poole, woollen thread on felt, early 20th century. BOTTOM RIGHT Pillow sham, embroidered by Ruth Lane-Poole, silk thread on cotton fabric, early 20th century. FACING Ruth Pollexfen, c. 1905, watercolour by Beatrice Elvery (1881 – 1970), painter and stained glass artist and sculptor associated with the Celtic Revival.

Brush Work by Elizabeth Corbet Yeats, published by George Philip & Son, London, 1896 and inscribed “To Ruth Pollexfen/ With love from the author/ July 16th 1896” © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

Brush Work Studies by Elizabeth Corbet Yeats, published by George Philip & Son, London, 1898 and inscribed “to Ruth from Charlotte/Sept 13 1917” © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

career, but after losing his left hand in a shooting accident, he enrolled in forestry studies at the prestigious l’Ecole Nationale des Eaux et Forêts at Nancy in France, graduating in 1906. Shortly after, he joined the British Colonial Service and travelled to the Cape Colony to train in South African forestry methods before his appointment as Forest Officer in the Transvaal Province. He had subsequent postings as District Forest Officer in charge of Woodbush Forest and later, as the first Forest Officer in Sierra Leone. Charles and Ruth were married at St Columba’s College Chapel on 20 July 1911, but their reunion was short-lived. Charles went to Sierra Leone in 1912, returning briefly on leave the following year. It wasn’t until Charles’ appointment as Conservator of Forests by the West Australian government in 1916 that they were able to contemplate a life together and provide a home for their two daughters, Charlotte and Mary. For Ruth Lane-Poole, time in Western Australia gave the opportunity to become acquainted with the local native timbers and their properties, no doubt encouraged by her husband who had attempted to persuade English cabinetmakers to consider using these for furniture, visiting respected cabinetmakers in London while there in 1920 to attend the first Empire Forestry Conference. Perhaps the greatest compliment paid to Australian timbers that year was the gift to HRH the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) during his tour of Western Australia of a presentation box of samples of Western Australian timbers which Ruth designed on behalf of the Saw Millers’ Association, the Chamber of Mines and the Pearlers’ Association. TOP Charles Lane Poole as a student at l’Ecole Nationale des Eaux et Forêts, 1904 -1906 BOTTOM Ruth Pollexfen on her wedding day July 20, 1911 © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

TOP The marriage of Ruth Pollexfen and Charles Lane Poole was held at St Columba’s College Chapel on 20 July 1911 BOTTOM LEFT Floral headpiece worn by Ruth on her wedding day. BOTTOM RIGHT Limerick lace veil, embroidered with the initials C and R worn with the floral headpiece.

ABOVE Pair of silver napkin rings with Arts and Crafts styled repoussé motifs and the initials CLP and RLP, made by Ramsden & Carr, London, 1911. The shamrock, symbolising the Holy Trinity, stands for hope, peace and prosperity; the artichoke, with its tender heart, is protected by strong layers of leaves. © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

LEFT AND FACING Watercolours of interiors in Gurteen Dhas, Dundrum, Dublin, painted by Ruth Lane-Poole, 1912 – 1914 © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

Charles held strong views about the importance of scientific training for foresters and advocated for sustainable forestry practice which brought him into conflict with the powerful timber and sawmilling industries and the government. Eventually his turbulent relationship with the authorities led to his resignation, prompting his good friend and staunch supporter of Charles’s work, Sir Ronald Munro Ferguson, to support the recommendations for his next job, surveying forests in Papua and subsequently in New Guinea. As a gesture of appreciation Charles chose a eucalypt timber to make a fire screen, featuring a gum tree embroidered by Ruth, as a farewell gift to Munro Ferguson’s wife at the conclusion of his term as Australia’s 6th Governor-General. In 1922, Ruth returned to Ireland where her third daughter, Phyllis, was born. It would be three years before the family was reunited, this time in Melbourne where Charles had been appointed as the Commonwealth’s Forestry Adviser. In Melbourne, the Lane-Pooles were welcomed into the city’s thriving artistic and creative circle and counted among their friends, architect Harold Desbrowe-Annear, industrialist and xylophile, Russell Grimwade and artists Thea Proctor, Ethel Spowers and Blamire Young. In September 1925, Ruth exhibited a model bedroom in the annual Arts and Crafts Exhibition in Melbourne Town Hall, opened by the Prime Minister’s wife, Mrs Ethel Bruce. It featured some of Ruth’s embroidered curtains and reproductions of period furniture which showcased Australian native timbers and local craftsmanship. Ruth’s display drew great praise from RIGHT TOP & BOTTOM Interiors of the Lane-Poole’s house in Cottesloe, Western Australia, c. 1916 – 1920 with Clare Marsh’s portrait of Lily Yeats and the artwork, Stencil on Black Linen by Christine Angus, the second wife of Walter Sickert, reminders of Ruth’s family and friends in Ireland © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

the reviewers for its sophistication. At the risk of ‘odious comparison’, a reviewer compared it most favourably to another exhibit, a living room in a new settler’s home, made with kerosene tins and cans, some stringy bark and half a dozen yards of hessian.2 Ruth’s influence expanded through her articles published in The Australian Home Beautiful, as she guided her readers through the challenges of home-making and furnishing. She wrote with conviction and authority, providing practical and sensible advice for attainable outcomes. Ruth regarded decorating as, ‘the art of ornamenting construction, not of constructing ornament’ and although never formally trained in the field, she made a clear distinction between a decorator and a furnisher: ‘In its true meaning the decorator takes possession of the house when the builders have left it and [will] elaborate the shell of the building with paints and papers.’3 On the other hand, a house furnisher was able to experiment within the constraints of her home or flat, confronting and working around the challenges presented by tradition, inherited atrocities, badly shaped rooms or a lack of money. It is little wonder then, that the Federal Capital Commission saw in Ruth, a person with impressive connections who moved in the same social circles as two women who would become her key clients, who understood the notion of ‘good taste’ and how to make a house a home. Ruth’s appointment by the Commission was confirmed in March 1926. Her brief was to prepare the Canberra residences to be occupied by the Australian GovernorGeneral and the Prime Minister in time for the opening of Federal Parliament in May the following year. With just LEFT Ruth with baby Phyllis, Mary (left) and Charlotte (right) in Ireland, c. 1923 © From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families

The pastoral homestead, Yarralumla, c. 1921 – 1925 Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 478

over twelve months to go, Ruth’s task was to ensure that ‘Yarralumla’, a former pastoral homestead on the outskirts of Canberra, and a new building, to be known as ‘The Lodge’, would be ready to welcome their occupants. Her brief stipulated that she should consult the GovernorGeneral’s wife, Lady Stonehaven and the Prime Minister’s wife, Mrs Ethel Bruce, for their ideas and requirements. Her remuneration was set at a daily rate of three guineas, from which she was to pay the draftsmen, designers and agents, with an allowance for her travel between Melbourne PREVIOUS ‘Home Life in Canberra’ by Ruth Lane-Poole extolled the virtues of living for new residents moving into the new capital. Table Talk, 22 April 1926, National Archives of Australia

and Canberra. Her budget, determined by the Federal Cabinet, was set at £10,000 for Government House and £5,000 for the Prime Minister’s residence. It was to be spent on Australian-made items and, only when there was no alternative, could the ‘best British-made’ be considered, time and money were tight. Ruth Lane-Poole relished the task of furnishing ‘The Lodge’ in particular, because the new build, designed by Melbourne architects, Percy Oakley and Stanley Parkes, gave her a clean slate. However, she found Government House more challenging, especially since the conversion of the pastoral homestead, ‘Yarralumla’ required extensive alterations and additions.

The Prime Minister’s residence under construction, 1926 Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 527

The newly completed Prime Minister’s residence, referred to as ‘The Lodge’, 1927 Collection, National Archives of Australia, A1200, L83791

Prime Minister Stanley Bruce and Mrs Ethel Bruce in the garden of ‘The Lodge’, Canberra, 1927

Fine linen tray-cloth, hand stitched and embroidered with the initials, P M, made in Ireland, 1927

Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 7647

Her first task was to consider the characteristics of each residence with their functional requirements and to provide plans and costings for their finishes and furnishings. The estimates she submitted in July 1926 horrified Cabinet, which, following a detailed review and Ruth’s threats to abandon the project, reluctantly agreed to increase her allocation. Her design aesthetic, grounded in the English traditions of historical period styles, the Arts and Crafts movement’s

rejection of industrialisation and her family associations with leading proponents of the Celtic Revival, was the cornerstone for her design schemes. Her knowledge of period styles assisted her in recommending the type of furniture to be commissioned in ‘imitation of the work of the great craftsmen of the past’ and influenced the choices she made for fabrics, silver, crystal glassware and fine china. For timber flooring, panelling and furniture, she emphasised Australian 33

Government House, 1927. Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 3372

Lord and Lady Stonehaven on horseback on the driveway beside Government House, 1929. Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 590

native timbers which she also championed in her range of commissioned furniture. Ruth found it surprising that, ‘Australia possesses a fine range of beautiful woods for cabinet work and there are not wanting the skilled craftsmen to carry out the building of notable pieces of furniture along the lines of the old masters of this art. Curiously enough, although Australia possesses these woods, she has no faith in them herself, with the result that it is almost impossible in either Sydney or Melbourne to buy in any quantity pieces of good taste made of Australian timbers.’4 She exclaimed with delight though, ‘here was the market bare of Australian furniture of the class I sought; here were supplies and the wood sawn and seasoned, and here were the craftsmen at hand to carry out the work.’5 The craftsmen of which she spoke, belonged to firms including Ackman’s of Fitzroy; W H Rocke and Co, S P Charteris and C F Rojo and Sons in Melbourne, while Dublin-born Francis de Groote, a purveyor of antiques and furniture in Sydney, was on hand to provide advice. It was with great pride that she was able to note that there was not one piece of furniture in the official residences made of imported timber. For the items she was unable to procure locally, Ruth enlisted Lily Yeats as her unofficial agent and processed the orders through staff in Australia House in London. With Lily’s help Ruth sourced fabrics from Liberty of London,

TOP State entrance hall, Government House, Canberra, 1927. BOTTOM Dining room, Government House, Canberra, 1930s National Library of Australia /Harold Cazneaux, collection: SLNSW PXD 806/40-132

Invitation to Mrs C E Lane-Poole to attend the viewing of the ceremonies connected with the establishment of the seat of Government at Canberra, 9 May 1927. From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families.

wallpapers and fabrics from Sanderson and Co and Morris & Co, household items from Heal and Company, prints from Cuala Press and fine Irish linen from William Liddell. Hardy Brothers in Melbourne found suppliers of good quality reproduction Georgian silver plate and cutlery from Sheffield, fine bone china from Royal Worcester, Crown Derby, Wedgwood and Copeland and Spode, and reproductions of Waterford lead crystal glassware. At Government House, Ruth furnished the State entrance hall with tapestry wall hangings, ‘Jacobethan’ furniture and Persian-style carpets, reproduced from originals in the Victoria and Albert Museum, with a view to impressing dignitaries as they entered the house. The reception, drawing and dining rooms, while required for formal entertaining, had to function equally as intimate family rooms. Using

timber panelling in contrast to painted or papered walls, she introduced a subtle hierarchy to the importance of these rooms in the choices of colours, fabrics and carpets. In the bedrooms, she avoided the notion of matching suites of furniture, giving each one its individual character by the careful juxtaposition of period reproductions. For the Prime Minister’s Lodge, her touch was lighter, respecting the smaller proportions of rooms and balancing public and private demands on those spaces. With an eye for practical necessity, she argued with the architects for ‘The Lodge’ for fireplaces to be changed from coal burning to wood, and for a morning room for the Prime Minister’s wife, equivalent in purpose to the Prime Minister’s study. Ruth appreciated the inherent functionality of working spaces in the official residences, applying her rules for furnishing a dining room, for example, with carpet to soften the noise of foot traffic, allowing enough space between the table and the walls, or necessary pieces of furniture, for staff to provide service to the table, and designing chairs

with backs low enough for staff to easily serve food to guests seated at the table. The responsibility of delivering this complex and challenging commission on time and for such high-profile clients must have weighed heavily on Ruth’s shoulders, disrupting her life in Melbourne and her role as a wife and mother. Her fee was without doubt hard-earned and her battles with the bureaucracy over budgets and the governance of quotes, purchase orders, receipts and deliveries were tiresome. She quietly rose to the challenge when, part way through her commission, it was announced that the first official visitors to stay at Government House with the Stonehavens would be Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of York, guests of the Federal Parliament for the opening of Parliament House on 9 May 1927. The last items to arrive were two elaborate bedspreads embroidered by Lily Yeats and members of Cuala Industries. The bedspread for the Duke of York’s bedroom, made of shot silk in shades of mauve and blue and featuring a crown above the centrepiece, was worked in shades of purple, rose and blue. For the Duchess, the moonlight blue satin bedspread was embroidered with golden tulips and mauve azaleas below a crown, and from the corners hung three golden tassels. These bedspreads were displayed in Melbourne before Ruth took them to Canberra where she attended to last-minute details and compiled the inventories of contents for each house.

The Australian Home Beautiful, 2 May 1927 From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families.

Throughout her commission, Ruth remained steadfast to her ideals of ‘good taste’ which she shared with the readers of The Australian Home Beautiful. Her articles were often illustrated with examples from her own home. It is clear from the published images of the completed rooms in the official residences that, irrespective of the status of her high-profile 37

LEFT Entrance hall, ‘The Lodge’, Canberra, 1927 National Library of Australia, PIC P890/14 LOC Album 881

RIGHT Sitting room, ‘The Lodge’, Canberra, 1927 Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 549

clients, she had departed little from her own dictum, her design aesthetic successfully translated from the suburban home to those occupied by the Governor-General and Prime Minister. The press were congratulatory in their praise of Ruth’s achievements, and she returned to Melbourne to take up an appointment, on the strength of her success, with The Myer Emporium as their adviser on interior furnishings. In a suite of specially constructed rooms designed by architect Harold Desbrowe-Annear, Ruth was on hand to advise customers on furniture, furnishings, floor coverings, silver, cutlery, glass and china, all stocked by the store. It was a short-lived engagement, the Lane-Pooles relocated to Canberra in late 1928 where Charles was appointed as

Acting Principal of the Australian Forestry School and the family moved into their own official residence, ‘Westridge House’, designed by Desbrowe-Annear. Ruth, content to concentrate on supporting Charles and immersing herself in family life, charitable work and Canberra society, chose not to work again professionally. Following Charles’ retirement in 1945, she moved with him to Sydney. Charles died in 1970, Ruth in 1974. Their legacies have been defined by their great contributions, Charles as a giant in the field of Australian forestry, and Ruth for her significant influence on practical suburban home furnishing and her lasting contribution to Canberra’s official residences. MARGARET BETTERIDGE Curator

ENDNOTES 1 W. B. and M.M. Griffin, ‘Map of the contour survey of the site for the Federal Capital of Australia’, c. 1911. National Archives of Australia A710 37 2 ‘Putting Art into Craft’, Herald (Melbourne), 12 September 1925, p.14 3 R. Lane-Poole, ‘The house and its interior by Ruth Lane-Poole’, The Australian Home Beautiful, 1926, vol. 4, no. 6, p.39 4 R. Lane-Poole, ‘A Home for the Governor-General by Ruth’, The Australian Home Beautiful, vol.5, no.5, 1927, p.17 5 R. Lane-Poole, ‘A Home for the Governor-General by Ruth’, The Australian Home Beautiful, vol.5, no.5, 1927, p.15

TOP LEFT Charles Lane Poole, c. 1930 TOP RIGHT Presentation of Charles , Ruth and Mary Lane Poole to Governor-General Sir Isaac Isaacs and Lady Isaacs, c. 1934 BOTTOM Ruth and Charles (right) at the opening of the Australian Forestry School, November 1927 Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3087, 1/ The estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families.

Entrance Hall featuring Australian native timbers, and including a table designed by Ruth LanePoole. Australian Forestry School, 1927 Australian National University Archives

Westridge House, Yarralumla, designed by Harold Desbrowe-Annear as the residence for the Commonwealth’s Forestry Adviser, c. 1930 Collection, National Archives of Australia, A3560, 5665

LEFT Sketch No 68 Design for a chair RIGHT Queensland maple dining chair with PM monogram, made for ‘The Lodge’, 1927 National Library of Australia, PIC Drawer 3264 #R10354/68/ The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet

Champions of Australia’s Timbers: Richard Baker, Curator and Economic Botanist, and Sir Ronald C. Munro Ferguson P.C. G.C.M.C, Governor-General and Forester. JENNIFER SANDERS, CHAIR, THE AUSTRALIANA FUND Ruth Lane-Poole’s use of Australian timbers in her furniture designs for the official residences sprang from a love of Australian timbers that she shared with her husband, Charles Lane Poole. Two other significant proponents of native timbers were Richard T. Baker (1854 – 1941),1 museum curator and economic botanist at the Technological Museum, Sydney,2 and His Excellency Sir Ronald Craufurd Munro Ferguson P.C. G.C.M.C, Governor-General of Australia (1914 – 1920). In 1919, Richard Baker published his magnum opus, The Hardwoods of Australia and their Economics.3 As Baker stated in his preface, ‘The object of this work is primarily to arouse a keener interest in, and to make known to Australians in particular and the world in general, the diversity of hardwoods with which nature had endowed this wonderful Continent’.4 Baker’s dedication of the publication to Sir Ronald Munro Ferguson, in part, reads: ‘As an appreciation of the keen interest which His Excellency (by application of his European knowledge of, and wide experience in Sylviculture) has displayed in promoting the advancement of Australian Forestry during the period of His Governor-Generalship over This Island Continent of the British Empire.’5 Records from the Technological Museum and newspaper accounts from the time indicate a relationship based on

mutual respect for knowledge and experience shared, plus a mutual goal to advance Australia’s native timber industry. The impetus for their association was the challenge facing those within Australia’s Sylviculture community (the growing and cultivation of trees). In his position leading the Technological Museum, Richard Baker undertook extensive research on eucalyptus and its commercial applications, research supported by his colleague H.G. Smith. Their work, which challenged more orthodox botany, is now recognised as pioneering, and the basis for the commercialisation of the eucalyptus oil industry. The Museum’s botanists – especially Baker and his predecessor Joseph H. Maiden, were leaders in the important new field of Economic Botany. Baker’s book on Australia’s hardwoods remains a standard reference on this subject. Written for the ‘technologist in wood – the Architect, Builder, Saw-miller, Engineer, Cabinet-maker, and not least by any means, the Forester, for it rests with him whether the species producing these valuable hardwoods will become extinct…’.6 Baker’s book championed the ‘Reafforestation of our fast disappearing varieties of timber…’.7 Sir Ronald C. Munro Ferguson was born in Scotland in 1860 and had a distinguished career in the Grenadier Guards before entering parliament in 1884 as a Liberal. In 1889, he married Lady Helen Hermione Blackwood. In February 1914 Munro Ferguson accepted the post of Governor-General of Australia. When war broke out later that year, promotion 45

Copy as presented to His Excellency Sir Ronald C. Munro Ferguson P.C. G.C.M.C, Governor-General of Australia by Richard T Baker, Curator Technological Museum, Sydney. The Australiana Fund

reported that Mr Baker had: ‘gathered together a magnificent collection of raw timber and cabinet work of Australian manufacture. Nearly 100 articles of furniture are shown, and for variety of pattern, design, colour and figure, they are truly remarkable … There is no more ardent practical forester in the Commonwealth to-day than the present occupant of Federal Government House … Sir Ronald Munro Ferguson … His principal exhibit … consists of three chairs designed by himself and executed in blackbutt, blackwood and stringybark.’ 9

Ronald Craufurd Munro Ferguson (1860-1934) by unknown photographer, c. 1930 State Library of South Australia, SLSA: B 3861

of the British and Australian war effort became his main preoccupation. Still, Munro Ferguson continued his lifelong interest in forestry. In his essay, ‘Australia’s Foresters’, John Dargavel writes ‘Sir Ronald Munro Ferguson, GovernorGeneral … was an outstanding example (of a forester) who encouraged forestry in Australia and nurtured his plantations in Scotland’.8 Scotland was one of the first countries to establish a scientific and educational basis for Forestry. With shared interests and goals, Baker and Munro Ferguson worked together to promote Australian timbers - both men knew that Australia’s timber industry had great potential in a post-war world and was an essential industry for rebuilding the Australian economy. In 1918, Baker organised a major exhibition devoted to Australia’s timbers and cabinetmaking and The Sydney Mail

A highlight of the exhibition was the series of one hundred dummy ‘books’, each carved out of a sample of an Australian timber; each volume with a simulated ‘book spine’ with the scientific name of the timber and of the botanist who named it. The ‘book cover’ carries the ‘common’ name of the timber. Baker commissioned a duplicate set for presentation to Munro Ferguson. One volume, the species Eucalyptus Fergusonii, named by Baker for the Governor-General, was stamped on the front ‘cover’ with the crest and initials of Munro Ferguson. These timber sample ‘libraries’ (or xylotheques) are a tangible record of a major undertaking in scientific research, the classification of Australia’s native timber. The attributions are a visual legacy of the work of distinguished botanists from across Europe and Australia, including Sir Joseph Banks. Both sets of timber sample ‘books’ were carved by Frederick W. Tod (1879-1958)10. A renowned woodcarver and cabinetmaker, his inventiveness to show the qualities of different timbers is well displayed. As well as commissioning Tod to carve the timber sample ‘books’, Baker acquired several of his works which are masterful renditions in 47

Eucalyptus Fergusonii timber book. Collection: The Australiana Fund.

Carved frieze/cornice moulding, with Waratah motif, specimen of Alpine Ash, (Eucalyptus delegatensis) carved by Frederick W Tod, Sydney 1916.

D8494, MAAS Collection, https://ma.as/225499

Detail of the set of 82 timber books acquired by The Australiana Fund from JB Hawkins Antiques, who had acquired it from descendants of Sir Ronald Craufurd Munro-Ferguson, PC GCMG, Viscount Novar of Raith, former Governor-General of Australia. Courtesy of The Australiana Fund © Gillian Vann Photography.

Richard Baker’s ‘Australian Flora Applied to Art’ exhibition, Technological Museum, Ultimo, 1906. Collection: Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences

Australian timber of Australia’s distinctive flora. Baker championed the use of Australian timbers not only in industry but also in decorative and applied arts. His 1915 book, The Australian Flora in Applied Art,11 is a passionate call for the nation’s flora to be the inspiration for decorative motifs for design, art, craft and industry - one of the defining themes in the national story of our artistic development, a theme closely identified with Federation in 1901. His book inspired his popular exhibition of ceramics, furniture, metalwork, woodwork and textiles - all decorated with motifs sourced from Australia’s flora. Baker and Munro Ferguson were a formidable partnership committed to the development of Australia’s timber industry. Timing was a major factor – Federation fostered national

pride and enthusiasm for Australia’s distinctive flora while the challenges and aftermath of World War One placed greater emphasis on the economic value of the nation’s natural resources. Richard Baker led the Technological Museum’s research on Australian timbers and the promotion of their economic value and decorative qualities. Governor-General Sir Ronald C. Munro Ferguson P.C. G.C.M.C, was an energetic and informed advocate with the practical skills to support his firm belief in the Australian timber industry. This was one of the defining contributions of his term of office, and a new form of contribution for the Governor-General. JENNIFER SANDERS Chair The Australiana Fund

ENDNOTES 1 J. L. Willis, ‘Baker, Richard Thomas (1854–1941)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/baker-richard-thomas-5108/text8533, published first in hardcopy 1979, accessed online 17 September 2019 2 In 1988, the original Technological Museum (then Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences and renamed the Powerhouse Museum), opened in a new building at 500 Harris St centred on the former Ultimo Power House. 3 The Hardwoods of Australia and their Economics, Richard T Baker, Technological Museum, The Government of New South Wales Government Printer, Sydney, 1919 4 Ibid., Preface, page xi. 5 Ibid., dedication page 6 Ibid., Preface, pxi 7 Ibid., pxiii 8 John Dargavel, ‘Australia’s Foresters’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/essay/17/text32330, originally published 10 November 2015, accessed 29 May 2021 9 Extracts from article ‘Australian Furniture for Australian Homes’, Sydney Mail, Wed 25 December, 1918, p.10 National Library of Australia http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article160628099 10 See: Alan Perry ‘The works of Frederick W. Tod (1879-1958)’ in The Furniture History Society Australasia Inc Newsletter, July 2005 pp.4-5; Alan Perry ‘Church Furniture in Australia: the Work of F.W. Tod, 1879-1958’ in Regional Furniture vol. XXI, 2007, pp.242-254 11 The Australian Flora in Applied Art, Richard T. Baker, Technological Museum, Government Printer Sydney, 1915

RIGHT ‘Private Lives’, No 36, Smith’s Weekly, Saturday 5 August 1933, p.23

1880s

1910s

16 AUGUST 1885 Charles Lane Poole born at Easebourne, West Sussex, England

JANUARY 1910 Charles proposes marriage by letter and Ruth writes to accept

27 SEPTEMBER 1885 Ruth Pollexfen born at Limerick, Ireland

JUNE 1910 Charles disagrees with the policies of the Transvaal government and resigns

1900s 1900 Ruth becomes a ward of her cousin Susan Mary ‘Lily’ Yeats in the London household of her uncle, the artist John Butler Yeats The Lane-Poole family moves to Dublin when Charles’ father, Stanley, is appointed Professor of Arabic Studies at Trinity College 1901 Ruth moves to Dublin where Lily and Elizabeth Corbet ‘Lolly’ Yeats set up an arts and crafts workshop, Dun Emer Industries, with Evelyn Gibson and Ruth trains in art, design and embroidery Ruth and Charles meet in Dublin some-time in the early years of the new century Charles enters St Columba’s College, Dublin 1903 Charles starts an engineering course but stops when he loses his left hand in a shooting accident 1904 Charles attends forestry school at l’Ecole Nationale des Eaux et Forêts at Nancy in France, graduating with a Diploma in 1906 1906 Charles joins the British Colonial Service and is appointed to the Cape Colony where he trains in South African forestry methods MAY 1907 Charles is appointed Forest Officer in the Transvaal Province and is subsequently posted as District Forest Officer in charge of Woodbush Forest

23 NOVEMBER 1910 British Colonial Service appoints Charles as Forest Officer, Sierra Leone 27 MAY 1911 Charles reports on forests and the need for a Forest Department in Sierra Leone 20 JULY 1911 Charles and Ruth marry in Dublin JUNE 1912 Charles travels to Sierra Leone to take up a position as its first Conservator of Forests and subsequently becomes a Member of the Legislative Council, while Ruth remains in Britain FEBRUARY 1913 Charles returns to Freetown in Sierra Leone after leave 23 OCTOBER 1913 A daughter, Charlotte Ruth, is born in Cheltenham, England 16 MARCH 1916 Charles is appointed Conservator of Forests by the Western Australian government 1916 Ruth and Charles set up their first home together in the Perth suburb of Cottesloe Charles reorganises the Forestry Department of Western Australia and drafts new legislation 8 JUNE 1917 Second daughter, Mary Jet, born in Perth

1908 Lolly Yeats, with support from her brother, W B Yeats, establishes Cuala Press, specialising in printing works by writers associated with the Irish literary revival while Lily manages the embroidery workshop at Cuala Industries

RUTH LANE-POOLE: A WOMAN OF INFLUENCE

1920s 1920 Charles attends the first Empire Forestry Conference in London 31 DECEMBER 1921 Charles disagrees with the policy of the Western Australian government and resigns as Conservator of Forests for Western Australia 16 MARCH 1922 Charles leaves Perth to survey the forests of Papua 3 JUNE 1922 Ruth and their daughters leave for Britain 22 SEPTEMBER 1922 Youngest daughter, Phyllis Gainsborough, is born in Donnybrook, Ireland 1 JULY 1923 Charles returns from Papua and recuperates in Melbourne

22 JULY 1926 Ruth finishes designing furnishing schemes for ‘The Lodge’ and Government House APRIL 1927 Government House and ‘The Lodge’ are ready for occupation by their vice-regal and prime-ministerial occupants who relocate from Melbourne to Canberra 9 MAY 1927 Parliament House, Canberra is formally opened by the HRH The Duke of York (later King George VI) JULY 1927 The Myer Emporium in Melbourne announces the appointment of Ruth as their consulting adviser on interior furnishing 1927 Charles is appointed Commonwealth Inspector-General of Forests and Acting Principal of the Australian Forestry School 24 NOVEMBER 1927 Governor-General Lord Stonehaven declares the Australian Forestry School open

1925 Charles is appointed Commonwealth Forestry Adviser in the Department of Home Affairs and Territories with an office in Melbourne pending relocation to the Federal Capital in Canberra Charles and Ruth both return to Australia Charles and Ruth make their home in South Yarra, Melbourne, and Ruth writes articles on interior design for Table Talk, The Australian Home Builder and The Australian Home Beautiful 5 MAY 1925 Cabinet approves the establishment of the Australian Forestry School in Canberra SEPTEMBER 1925 Ruth is invited to display a model bedroom in the annual Arts and Crafts exhibition in Melbourne Town Hall, opened by Mrs Ethel Bruce, wife of Prime Minister Stanley Bruce

1930s ~ 1970s 1934 Charles is elected first President of the Canberra Alpine Club 16 AUGUST 1945 Charles retires and moves with Ruth to Sydney 1945 Charles practises as a forestry consultant in Australia and New Guinea 22 NOVEMBER 1970 Charles Lane Poole dies 11 OCTOBER 1974 Ruth Lane-Poole dies

29 MARCH 1926 Ruth is engaged as furniture specialist to decorate ‘The Lodge’ and Government House

TIMELINE OF EVENTS

SOURCE: National Archives of Australia

5 SEPTEMBER 1923 Charles travels to New Guinea to survey the forests

Grandmother’s box, owned by Charles’s mother, Charlotte Bell Lane-Poole, containing family mementoes including Charlotte’s seal, an infant teething ring, Charles’s monogrammed silver cigarette case, his metal hook hand and Ruth’s poker dice. From the estates of Ruth Lane-Poole’s daughters, Charlotte Ruth Burston and Phyllis Gainsborough Hamilton, by descent to their families