Parham, John Willoughby   (1929 - 2002)

John Parham was born in Christchurch, New Zealand, to Bayard and Dorothy Parham.

The family moved to Fiji in 1933 to join Bayard Parham's parents, who had initially moved 2017_AMPF-and-rare-and-threatened-flora-Gayndah-2017-Updated to establish a coconut plantation in 1919. Bayard was subsequently appointed to a position at the Fiji Department of Agriculture as a plant pathologist, and was stationed 17 miles outside Suva.

John and his sister, Elizabeth, were given a primary education by their mother.

With the onset of World War Two, John and Elizabeth were sent to boarding school in Christchurch, New Zealand.

John Parham returned to Fiji in 1948, where he joined the Department of Agriculture as a laboratory assistant.

Awarded a scholarship, however, he returned to New Zealand and enrolled at Auckland University College, then Canterbury University College in Christchurch, where he completed his BSc degree.

Returning to Fiji in 1953 he was appointed Assistant Botanist in charge of the Fiji Herbarium. He later became Senior Botanist.

Under Parham, the herbarium grew to become a major repository of plants from Fiji and other Polynesian and Melanesian islands. His research was varied, but especially looked at grasses, weeds and cultivated plants.

Parham's most significant publication was his 'Plants of the Fiji Islands' (1964, revised 1972), illustrated by his wife, Margaret.
He also wrote 'Plants of Samoa: a guide to their local and scientific names with authorities; with notes on their uses, domestic, traditional and economic' and 'The Grasses of Fiji'

The Parhams then moved to Brisbane, Australia, after Fiji's independence was granted in 1970.

John began work at the Queensland Herbarium in early 1971, among other duties supervising early attempts to computerise herbarium specimen labels.

He spent a year in Tasmania in 1975 advising on the establishment of a State Herbarium and was effectively its first curator.

John and Margaret spent 1976-1986 living at Mount Tamborine on the Gold Coast, where they grew avocadoes and cut flowers, before moving back to Brisbane and taking up work as honorary research associates at the Queensland Museum.

He later became an honorary research associate at the Tasmanian Herbarium, his son having settled on the island.

Parham's last curatorial effort was in organising the Tasmanian Herbarium's seaweeds.

Source: Extracted from:
G. Kantvilas, 2003, 'Obituary. John W. Parham (1929-2002)', Austrobaileya, 6(3)p.576-579
https://plants.jstor.org/stable/10.5555/al.ap.person.bm000153080
Portrait Photo: none known.

Collecting localities for 'Parham, J.W.' from AVH (2025)

Data from 464 specimens