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The man who planted Canberra: Charles Weston and his three million trees
In 1911, English-born Charles Weston climbs Mount Ainslie to the crest of a landscape that has become the site for the Australian capital. Down on the flats, in the harsh sunlight of an April noon, occasional clumps of sheep feed into the prevailing westerly on the scant leavings of an insatiable swarm of rabbits.
On the denuded, rabbit-infested Limestone plains, Charles Weston embarked on an ambitious re-greening project that would transform the region and the fledgling nation's capital.
London-born Weston rose through the massive British gardening industry in the second half of the 19th century, becoming Foreman of 79 gardeners at the magnificent Drumlanrig Castle on the Scottish borders. With testimonials from the most influential Head Gardener in Britain, he migrated to Australia seeking new challenges free from the British class system and reached Sydney in 1896. In the wake of Federation in 1901, he set his sights on the greatest challenge of all the new national capital. It was here that he gave life to his 'dream city', and the reforestation of its surrounds.
This highly readable story of the tree planter of Canberra includes familiar characters in Home Affairs Minister King O'Malley and Walter and Marion Griffin portrayed in a surprising new light and offers readers new insight into the making of the national capital. This is also a story of three million trees and shrubs from Australia and around the world, planted to create a template garden city, less susceptible to climate change.
This will be a book of interest to the great number of Canberran gardeners, garden-enthusiasts, park-goers and bushwalkers, and their interstate visitors. Lavishly illustrated with both historic and modern images that highlight the impact of Westons planting's on the Federal Capital.
On the denuded, rabbit-infested Limestone plains, Charles Weston embarked on an ambitious re-greening project that would transform the region and the fledgling nation's capital.
London-born Weston rose through the massive British gardening industry in the second half of the 19th century, becoming Foreman of 79 gardeners at the magnificent Drumlanrig Castle on the Scottish borders. With testimonials from the most influential Head Gardener in Britain, he migrated to Australia seeking new challenges free from the British class system and reached Sydney in 1896. In the wake of Federation in 1901, he set his sights on the greatest challenge of all the new national capital. It was here that he gave life to his 'dream city', and the reforestation of its surrounds.
This highly readable story of the tree planter of Canberra includes familiar characters in Home Affairs Minister King O'Malley and Walter and Marion Griffin portrayed in a surprising new light and offers readers new insight into the making of the national capital. This is also a story of three million trees and shrubs from Australia and around the world, planted to create a template garden city, less susceptible to climate change.
This will be a book of interest to the great number of Canberran gardeners, garden-enthusiasts, park-goers and bushwalkers, and their interstate visitors. Lavishly illustrated with both historic and modern images that highlight the impact of Westons planting's on the Federal Capital.
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Published September 1, 2025
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October 27, 2025
The Man Who Planted Canberra, Charles Weston and His Three Million Trees is a lovely book. I can just imagine tourists browsing in the NLA Bookshop in search of a meaningful souvenir of the national capital, when they chance upon this book, face out on the shelves so that its cover illustration by Trisha Garner can be seen. The man, the dog, the russet autumn leaves and the broad pathway entice the browser to take a closer look, and inside they find maps, gorgeous photos, botanical illustrations, plans and the intriguing story of a man most of us have never heard of: Charles Weston MBE, who made the barren plains of our fledgling capital into a garden city.
Part I covers the unedifying history of the newly federated states and their squabble about where the national capital was to be. Mind you, there’s something to be said for the luxury of such a squabble. A rabble of self-interested states came together to federate into a single nation through conferences, debates and a whole lot of hot air and argy-bargy, a much more civilised way to achieve a union than the violent revolutions and military conflicts that characterised the birth of other nations. Australians achieved it in 1901 through voting. And in the end Sydney and Melbourne put aside their differences (more or less) and a surveyor called Charles Robert Scrivener and his colleague Alf Chesterman set out to investigate the site options in regions claimed by popular historians to be equidistant from Sydney and Melbourne, but in fact had to be in the most populous state i.e. NSW — as long as it wasn’t Sydney.
And if you think Canberra is quite cold enough in Winter, you can be grateful that in 1908 the House of Representatives voted 39 to 33, in favour of Yass-Canberra over Dalgety on the banks of the Snowy River in the Snowy Mountains.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2025/10/17/t...
Part I covers the unedifying history of the newly federated states and their squabble about where the national capital was to be. Mind you, there’s something to be said for the luxury of such a squabble. A rabble of self-interested states came together to federate into a single nation through conferences, debates and a whole lot of hot air and argy-bargy, a much more civilised way to achieve a union than the violent revolutions and military conflicts that characterised the birth of other nations. Australians achieved it in 1901 through voting. And in the end Sydney and Melbourne put aside their differences (more or less) and a surveyor called Charles Robert Scrivener and his colleague Alf Chesterman set out to investigate the site options in regions claimed by popular historians to be equidistant from Sydney and Melbourne, but in fact had to be in the most populous state i.e. NSW — as long as it wasn’t Sydney.
And if you think Canberra is quite cold enough in Winter, you can be grateful that in 1908 the House of Representatives voted 39 to 33, in favour of Yass-Canberra over Dalgety on the banks of the Snowy River in the Snowy Mountains.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2025/10/17/t...
Displaying 1 of 1 review