William Douglas Cook (New Plymouth, New Zealand, 28 October 1884 – Gisborne, New Zealand, 27 April 1967) was the founder of Eastwoodhill Arboretum, now the national arboretum of New Zealand, and one of the founders of Pukeiti, a rhododendron garden, close to New Plymouth. He was a "plantsman with the soul of a poet and the vision of a philosopher".
Biography
Douglas Cook was the second son of William Cook (Aberdeen, Scotland 1855) and Jessie Miller (Glasgow, Scotland 1853). William arrived in Auckland, New Zealand at 8 September 1879 and started working as an accountant with the Bank of New Zealand. Jessie arrived 19 August 1881. They married three weeks later. The first son John Arthur was born 9 September 1882. The family changed home often. At 28 October 1884 Douglas was born in New Plymouth. A daughter named Sheila Mary Melot was born in Auckland at 25 December 1891.
Douglas had a difficult relation with his father and left home when he was 17 years old to go working as a "cowboy" in Hawke's Bay region. One year later he bought a peach orchard in the neighbourhood of Hastings. The money he needed he borrowed from his father. He bought the orchard of James Nelson Williams, the grandfather of H. B. (Bill) Williams, who would play such an important role in the history of Eastwoodhill 60 years later. Douglas had bad luck. Two times frost destroyed most of the crops. He had to find another job. In a ballot he acquired a part of the Ngatapa settlement, large. He called his new property "Eastwoodhill", after the house where his mother grew up near Glasgow.
He would live there all the rest of his life, and create a large arboretum, with more than 2,000 different taxa of trees and shrubs. In the early years after his arrival at Ngatapa, the farm was substantially enlarged. But in later years he sold parts of the property again, to gain money for buying trees. In 1965 Douglas Cook sold Eastwoodhill to H. B. (Bill) Williams, who bought the arboretum with the purpose to preserve it for the future.
During World War I Cook fought in Asia, Africa and Europe as a trooper of the Wellington Mounted Rifles and as a gunner in the N.Z. Field Artillery.
William Douglas Cook married Claire Bourne at 20 October 1930. They adopted a son, named Sholto. The marriage did not succeed and Douglas and Claire separated in 1937.
Cook died in 1967, at the age of 83 years, a "plantsman with the soul of a poet and the vision of a philosopher".
Eastwoodhill
When Douglas Cook arrived at his newly bought land in 1910, he started planting immediately. In this first plantings "he followed a utilitarian approach – some mixed eucalyptus and Monterey Pine (Pinus radiata) for firewood, and of mixed orchard including apple, pear and plum trees for household use". He built a small cabin to live in. This was replaced by a larger dwelling in 1914. In that same year he left for voluntary service in World War I. Just before his departure an order of a hundred trees and shrubs and a hundred rhododendrons and azaleas arrived and it was a rush to get these planted.
In the First World War Douglas Cook served in Gallipoli, Egypt and France. In France he lost the sight of his right eye in 1916. He spent some time in England to recuperate. During that time he visited some beautiful gardens, especially the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. After returning to New Zealand in 1917 (with a plant of both the red and variegated cabbage tree, that Arthur William Hill of Kew gave him) he started creating his own park. Now that he had learned to admire the beauty of trees, he started planting on a large scale. For instance in 1920 about 2,500 trees and shrubs were ordered for the garden. Bulbs and perennials were ordered too, including tulips, hyacinths, lilies and gladioli.
In the subsequent years plantings continued. The garden was extended. From 1927 onward, when Bill Crooks got engaged, the creation of the "Parks" started: In 1927 the first plantings of "Corner Park" were made. From 1934 "Cabin Park" was planted. At the end of World War II "Douglas Park" was included in the plantings. In 1952, Douglas Cook, then being 71 years old, sold of his property. The money was used for making ponds throughout the arboretum and for the development of "Pear Park", "The Circus", "Orchard Hill" and "Glen Douglas".
At the end of his life, Douglas Cook had established an arboretum of international importance. Since then, new plantings contributed to what now has become the National Arboretum of New Zealand.