Ella Campbell

9th August 2003

Botany Department, University of Otago

Dunedin-born Ella Orr Campbell (1910-2003) graduated from the University of Otago with an MA in 1935. Between 1937 and 1944 she lectured at Otago; her speciality was liverworts, ferns, orchids (she was an accredited judge), and the wetlands of New Zealand. In 1945 she joined the faculty at Massey University, Palmerston North, and although ‘retiring’ in 1976, she kept researching, especially on ‘her beloved bryophytes’ (New Zealand Garden Journal, 2003). In 1997, she was made a Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, with her citation reading: ‘pioneer in the field of university botanic research’.