Biography

Botanist Frank Nigel Hepper (known as Nigel) was formerly Head of the Africa Section and Assistant Keeper at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He is an authority on African plant taxonomy and the history of botanical exploration in Africa, and has written widely on archaeobotany and the plants of Bible lands.

Born on the outskirts of Leeds, England, Hepper spent part of his youth in Yorkshire and part in Cumbria, where the family evacuated during the Second World War. A keen natural historian as a boy, Hepper collected plants in the countryside in both counties. He went on to study botany at Durham University, and spent a period working at the Natural History Museum in London. He also came into contact with the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and began working in the herbarium there in 1950. Initially he worked as a taxonomist with H.K. Airy-Shaw, dealing with Bornean plants, but had to leave Kew after a short while when he was called up to serve in the Royal Air Force (RAF).

After two years in the RAF Hepper returned to Kew in 1953 to work with Ronald Keay on revising the Flora of West Tropical Africa. He worked on this project until its completion in 1972, latterly as editor. In relation to this he conducted two expeditions to West Africa. The first involved trekking in British Cameroons (located on the present day borders of Cameroon and Nigeria), while the second took him by hovercraft from Senegal to Lake Chad.

Having been appointed Head of the Africa Section at Kew, Hepper later travelled to East Africa, collecting in Kenya, Tanzania and Malawi. He also visited the Yemen and Ceylon (Sri Lanka). In 1986 he returned to West Africa, establishing the Rain Forest Genetic Resources Project at Limbe Botanic Garden, Cameroon.

Aside from his taxonomic work, Hepper developed an interest in the history of African exploration and published many works on the subject including Plant Collectors in West Africa (1971, with F. Neate), The West African herbaria of Isert and Thonning (1976) and the paper "The Niger and the Nile: Botanical Exploration Around Two African Rivers" (in the Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden, 1990). He has also produced several publications on plants from the Bible lands, including Bible Plants at Kew.

For several decades, Hepper kept phenological records of plant flowering times at Kew, publishing the first 20 years’ worth of these in 1973 under the title Commencement of Flowering. Closely associated with the Gardens staff, he was Honorary Secretary of the Kew Guild from 1967-1975, Vice President in 1983-1984 and President in 1991-1992. He continued with research work at Kew long after his official retirement.

Sources:
Anon., 1991, Journal of the Kew Guild, 11(96): 5-6
F.N. Hepper, 1961, "Plants of the 1957-58 West African Expedition: I", Kew Bulletin, 15(1): 56-66.