Susannah Alice Stephen

Other names: 
Zannah (nickmane)
Dates: 
1960-1997

Susannah was born in 1960 the district of Houston and Killellan in Renfrewshire.

She studied at St Andrew’s University, gaining a degree in Modern Languages. After working in Glasgow and London, and then travelling for a year, she studied Landscape Architecture at Edinburgh University and set up a business in Edinburgh as a Landscape Architect. Susannah helped to found the Scottish Society of Garden Designers.

Susannah died in a diving accident in the Galapagos Islands in 1997. Her friends erected a memorial to commemorate her life in James’s Court, Lawnmarket, Edinburgh, a place with special connections to her. She knew that Patrick Geddes, pioneering town planner with a special interest in including green spaces in urban settings, had lived in St James's Court, Lawnmarket.

One of her ancestors was Alexander Moncrieff of Culfargie, who was one of the four brethren of the first major secession in the Church of Scotland in 1733. His portrait, an etching, hangs in a room adjacent to James's Court in the Free Church of Scotland building, whose windows overlook the location of her memorial. The room also contains the carved wooden chair in which he prayed through the night before signing the historical document.

The memorial, in the form of a seat, with a sculpture of a parakeet and garden trug on the top, is the work of Edinburgh born Frances Pelly.

Sources
RCAHMS Website
Site record for James ('s) Court
Scotland's People
Record of birth 565/00 0003 (available to order) No marriage or death certificate found for Susannah Stephen or Susannah Alice Stephen in any record.
Susannah Alice Stephen...
Workers Educational Association, Edinburgh Women webpage