Drawings Betje Polak

The drawings were made by Betje Polak (1901-1980) with the aim of determining pollen in different peat soils in the Netherlands East Indies and Indonesia, in the years 1930-1954. Betje Polak worked at the Botanical Garden Buitenzorg at Bogor from 1930-1932. She travelled several times to Java, Borneo and Sumatra to do research on peat soils. Polak decided to make reference drawings herself, by lack of reference materials, to analyse soil samples containing pollen. She returned to Bogor in 1939 as a soil scientist. Some sheets have drawings on both sides, some only contain text.