By Nicole Tarnowsky, Laura Briscoe

Mar 6 2019

Mary Emily Eaton was an accomplished natural history illustrator employed at the New York Botanical Garden from 1911-1932. She was born in England in 1873 and got her university degree studying art. In 1909, Ms. Eaton went to visit her brother in Jamaica where she gained in reputation painting butterflies. Two years later she landed a job at the New York Botanical Garden as an illustrator.

Mary Eaton's most famous work was done for The Cactaceae, a publication written by the founder of NYBG, Nathaniel Lord Britton along with his colleague Joseph Nelson Rose. Eaton also contributed the majority of the plates for the journal Addisonia, gorgeous watercolors of fungi published in Field book of Common Gilled Mushrooms, and American Wild Flowers published by National Geographic

See photo of the staff at the 20th anniversary celebration of the Garden in 1915. Mary Eaton is the first on the left, in the second row.