Sandy Bannerman: Dr George Thorburn - 'Job Talk'

At their first meeting of 2025, Hawick's Rotarians heard about the career of their newest member, Dr George Thorburn, son of well known Teri Jock Thorburn and brother of John. George described his career as a rollercoaster which had taken him on many adventures.

He began a 60 year career in horticulture by being a part-time worker at Forbes Nurseries at Stonefield and at Newhouses Farm, but his early adult years took him to Guernsey and to Sark as a policeman. Four years there however served him well as he could develop a plant nursery which was later incorporated in the larger business of Duncan & Davies Ltd.. His early specialism was in plant propagation and in the introduction of plants such as the popular Photinia Red Robin to Britain. Duncan & Davies is a New Zealand based firm and so many of his introductions originated there. George held a senior management role with Duncan & Davies, but then moved on through Glendale Industries, which had many local authority contracts for parks and open spaces management, and then on to his own businesses. This included a five year consultancy role with Alissar which specialised in the provision of cut flowers in the Middle East. Much travelling was involved, to the Netherlands, to New Zealand, to the Middle East and to China, and he became more involved in tissue culture (without soil), in the improvement of soil quality using polymers, and in water-saving technologies.

Unfortunately George's career ended abruptly in 2010 as the result of a fall and attendant medical problems.

Many questions followed before Sandy Bannerman led the Vote of Thanks for what had been a most interesting talk.