Mary E. White

Mary Elizabeth White AM (born 1926) is an Australian paleobotanist and author.

She was born in South Africa, grew up in southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and received a master's degree in paleobotany from the University of Cape Town. She married Bill White, a geologist; the couple came to Australia in 1955. White worked as a consultant for the Bureau of Mineral Resources in Canberra until the 1980s; she also consulted on a part-time basis for mining companies. In 1975, she was hired as a research associate for the Australian Museum; she established a collection of 12,000 specimens of plant fossils for the museum.

She is the author of:

• The Greening of Gondwana (1986)
• After the Greening: The browning of Australia (1994), received a Eureka Prize
• Listen...Our Land is Crying (1997)
• Running Down: Water in a Changing Land (2000), was shortlisted for a Eureka Prize
• Earth Alive! From Microbes to a Living Planet (2003)

White received the Riversleigh medal in 1999 for "excellence in promoting understanding of Australian prehistory". In 2010, she received a Lifetime of Conservation award from the Australian Geographic Society. She was awarded the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science's Mueller Medal in 2001. In 2009, she was named to the Order of Australia.

In 2003, White moved to a large forested property at Johns River, New South Wales; she established a covenant to protect the land and preserve its biodiversity.