Mary E. White

Mary Elizabeth White AM (5 January 1926 – 5 August 2018) was an Australian paleobotanist and author.[1]

She was born in South Africa, grew up in southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and received a master's degree in paleobotany from the University of Cape Town.[2] She married Bill White, a geologist; the couple came to Australia in 1955.[1] White worked as a consultant for the Bureau of Mineral Resources in Canberra until the 1980s; she also consulted on a part-time basis for mining companies. In 1975, she was hired as a research associate for the Australian Museum; she established a collection of 12,000 specimens of plant fossils for the museum.[2]

White began writing large format, well illustrated science books after her husband died in 1981. She was the author of:

• The Greening of Gondwana – The 400 Million Year Story of Australia's Plants (1986)
• The Nature of Hidden Worlds – Animals and Plants in Prehistoric Australia and New Zealand (1990)
• Muttaburrasaurus: An Australian Dinosaur in Its Time and Space (1990) – with Robyn Muche (Illustrator)
• Time in Our Hands – Semi-precious Gemstones: Keys to the Geological Past (1991)
• After the Greening: The browning of Australia (1994), received a Eureka Prize
• Listen... Our Land is Crying (1997)
• Running Down: Water in a Changing Land (2000), which was shortlisted for a Eureka Prize[3]
• Earth Alive! From Microbes to a Living Planet (2003)[4]

White received honorary doctorates from four Australian Universities,[1] plus the Riversleigh medal in 1999 for "excellence in promoting understanding of Australian prehistory". In 2010, she received a Lifetime of Conservation award from the Australian Geographic Society.[2] She was awarded the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science's Mueller Medal in 2001. In 2009, she was made a Member the Order of Australia (AM) for "service to botany as a researcher and through the promotion of increased understanding and awareness of the natural world".[4][5]

In 2003, White purchased a large forested property, Falls Forest Retreat, approximately halfway between Taree and Port Macquarie in New South Wales; she established a covenant to protect the land and preserve its biodiversity.[2] In 2013 she sold the property but with the covenant it can never be disturbed.

In her later years White suffered from vascular dementia and a stroke and went to live with her daughter and her daughter's husband between in Bundanoon, New South Wales between 2014 and 2016. In 2016, following another stroke she moved to a nearby aged-care centre. On 5 August 2018, White was found dead in her room at the Warrigal aged care complex. Her daughter, Barbara Eckersley, has been charged with her murder; at her bail hearing, her barrister maintained that his client had the "belief that the aged-care centre weren't able to deal with Dr White's agitation and pain".[6][7][8]