1-626-652 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Joseph Paxton (1801-1865), English gardener and architect. Paxton was Superintendent of the Duke of Devonshire's gardens at Chiswick and Chatsworth from 1826, and designer of the Crystal Palace, built to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. He set up the Daily News, appointing Charles Dickens as editor, and was Liberal MP for Coventry from 1854. Paxton was born into abject poverty but died a very wealthy man. Illustration from The Life & Times of Queen Victoria, Vol II, by Robert Wilson.