Edna Gunnell

Edna Mary Gunnell (1879–1963) was one of the first women gardeners trained at Kew Gardens in professional horticulture. Gunnell went on to become the first female county council horticultural superintendent in the United Kingdom when she was appointed superintendent in Devon County Council in 1920.

Biography Gunnell was born into a middle class family and completed her studies at Salt School in Shipley. Gunnell undertook a Certificate in Horticulture at the University College of Reading, which ran a women only horticulture course. She then applied to Kew and moved there in 1900 where she studied until 1901.

Back in England, she gave postal horticultural tuition in 1914, working as lecturer at Swanley College of Horticulture for a year. the first female to be appointed to this role by any council in the United Kingdom. While in Devon, she promoted horticultural knowledge including jam making, growing vegetables and preserving to the Devon Federation of Women Institutes.

Gunnell was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1945.

Gunnell died on February 16, 1963.