Two years before commencing the eponymous periodical Hardwicke's Science-Gossip (1865-93), the publisher Robert Hardwicke (1822-75) collaborated with the German botanist Berthold Carl Seemann (1825-71) to begin the Journal of Botany, which would survive them both by over half a century. Seemann had travelled from his native Hanover to London in order to study at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and subsequently took part in various scientific expeditions to North and South America.