to an agreement with Eugene Fitzalan, a trained botanist, to establish an ornamental garden on a recreation reserve (now the Flecker Botanical Gardens), sufficiently attractive to entice the public. In return Fitzalan was permitted to sell refreshments (which would enhance the public appeal of the gardens) and to operate a private commercial nursery from the reserve. He was appointed caretaker of the reserve with a nominal annual salary of £5. Fitzalan developed about 5 acres (2 hectares) in the northeast of the reserve as an ornamental botanic garden (then known variously as Rosebank or Fitzalan's Botanical Gardens), largely on the site of earlier Chinese market gardens. An 1891 survey plan indicates that Fitzalan's early gardens were located on section 75, just south of Collins Avenue, below what is now the Tanks Arts Centre. This was a short distance from the railway line near the cutting at the Three Mile, where the Edge Hill railway station was constructed in 1888–1889. Access to the gardens was made easier in 1887 when a crossing was made over Saltwater Creek. Between 1887 and 1891 Fitzalan landscaped the ground, planted colourful garden beds and constructed a perimeter fence to keep out goats. He built a small cottage in the garden and established the Edge Hill Nursery, constructing a long shed roofed with coarse canvas in which he raised seedlings and cuttings and in 1887 cut a main garden path, about wide, through the reserve at his own expense, planting specimen and fruit trees along its length. In 1891 this pathway was surveyed as Edge Hill Road (Collins Avenue from 1934). He also formed other paths opening off this track, including a circular walking track through the rainforest. Among the plants cultivated by Fitzalan were 50 varieties of roses, 11 varieties of hibiscus, orchids, ferns, rain trees, native myrtle and local plants from the adjacent Mt Whitfield Range. He also grew coffee, and grafted orange, lemons and mangoes, which he made available to residents of the area. He exported large numbers of orchids, palms and palm seeds, ferns and other plants to Europe, and received specimens from other parts of Australia to trial in a tropical environment. Later life Fitzalan relinquished his caretaker role of the botanical gardens in 1897 due to poor health. Fitzalan died in Brisbane on 20 June 1911. He was buried in the South Brisbane Cemetery on 21 June 1911. Named in