{{Short description|Australian botanist and university lecturer (1880–1957)}} '''Bertha Clara Rees''' (1880–1957) was an Australian botanist and university lecturer.
Rees was born in Brighton, Victoria in 1880, daughter of Clara Anna (née Wadelton) and solicitor David Curtis Rees.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Birth certificate: Rees, Bertha Clara 6734/1880 |url=https://my.rio.bdm.vic.gov.au/efamily-history/68d9e5dcdcf3e708289c0533/record/5c6543074aba80ac315f8413 |access-date=2025-09-29 |website=Births deaths and marriages Victoria}}</ref> She passed the University of Melbourne matriculation examination in 1899, achieving honours in elementary anatomy and physiology and botany.<ref>{{cite news |date=1 January 1900 |title=University of Melbourne |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article196020022 |accessdate=29 September 2025 |newspaper=The Age |location=Victoria, Australia |page=3 |via=National Library of Australia |issue=13,986}}</ref>
Rees taught at Tintern Girls Grammar School where her students included Ethel Irene McLennan.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Ethel McLennan (1891–1983) botanist |url=https://www.loststory.net/australianwomen/ethel-mclennan |access-date=2025-09-29 |website=Lost story: 200 Australian Women}}</ref> She returned to the school in 1931 as guest of honour with McLennan, then associate professor of botany at the University of Melbourne.<ref>{{cite news |date=17 December 1931 |title=Garden Party at Hawthorn |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article147417121 |accessdate=29 September 2025 |newspaper=Table Talk |location=Victoria, Australia |page=49 |via=National Library of Australia |issue=3319}}</ref> She also taught science at Sydenham Ladies' College, Moonee Ponds in 1909.<ref>{{cite news |date=6 May 1909 |title=Advertising |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article269909647 |accessdate=29 September 2025 |newspaper=The Essendon Gazette and Keilor, Bulla and Broadmeadows Reporter |location=Victoria, Australia |page=2 |via=National Library of Australia |volume= |issue=1000}}</ref> In June that year she received a £50 government scholarship from the University of Melbourne to study the "longevity of seeds' contribution to flora of Victoria".<ref>{{cite news |date=12 June 1909 |title=Current Notes |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article170907465 |accessdate=29 September 2025 |newspaper=Advocate |location=Victoria, Australia |page=31 |via=National Library of Australia |volume=XLI |issue=2016}}</ref> In April 1912 she replaced Jean White as botanical lecturer assisting Alfred James Ewart.<ref>{{cite news |date=11 April 1912 |title=Fact and Rumour |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article175616426 |accessdate=29 September 2025 |newspaper=Punch |location=Victoria, Australia |page=23 |via=National Library of Australia |volume=CXVI |issue=2959}}</ref>
She wrote a number of papers, singly or as joint author with Ewart and White, which were published in the ''Proceedings of the Royal Society of Victoria''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Rees, Bertha |url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/creator/181667 |access-date=2025-09-29 |website=Biodiversity Heritage Library}}</ref>
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== Personal == Following her marriage to engineer Edgar Gowar Ritchie in September 1914,<ref>{{cite news |date=15 October 1914 |title=Mr. E. G. Ritchie to Miss B. Rees |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article121086815 |accessdate=29 September 2025 |newspaper=Punch |location=Victoria, Australia |page=40 |via=National Library of Australia |volume=CXXI |issue=3090}}</ref> she resigned from her university post.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Rees, Miss Bertha |url=https://archives.library.unimelb.edu.au/nodes/view/542689 |access-date=2025-09-29 |website=University of Melbourne Archives}}</ref> Her husband died in 1956.<ref>{{Citation |last=Morgan |first=Marjorie |title=Edgar Gowar Ritchie (1871–1956) |work=Australian Dictionary of Biography |url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/ritchie-edgar-gowar-8215 |access-date=2025-09-29 |place=Canberra |publisher=National Centre of Biography, Australian National University |language=en}}</ref>
Rees died in 1957 at St Kilda East, Victoria.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Death certificate: Ritchie, Bertha Clara 2431/1957 |url=https://my.rio.bdm.vic.gov.au/efamily-history/68d9e5dcdcf3e708289c0533/record/5c654aa14aba80ac3179dc4a |access-date=2025-09-29 |website=Births deaths and marriages Victoria}}</ref>
== References == {{Reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Rees, Bertha}} Category:1880 births Category:1957 deaths Category:20th-century Australian botanists Category:Australian women botanists Category:Academic staff of the University of Melbourne