Plants in Early American Gardens - Spice Viburnum

Spice Viburnum (Viburnum carlesii)

William Richard Carles, the British Vice-Consul in Korea from 1883-85, discovered this remarkably fragrant Viburnum during one of his excursions into unknown territories and sent dried specimens to Kew in 1885. Nine years later the species was named in his honor and the first living plant was sent to England in 1901. The French nursery firm, Lemoine, was first to propagate and distribute this desirable shrub on a wide scale. British hybridizers crossed the Spice Viburnum with V. fragrans to develop the popular V. x burkwoodii.

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History Blooms at Monticello

Peggy Cornett at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello tells us that

The hardy annual Larkspur, Consolida ajacis, re-seeds abundantly in the Monticello Flower Gardens. Jefferson noted Larkspur blooming at Shadwell in July 1767, thought it suitable for naturalizing at Monticello "in the open ground on the west" in 1771, and sowed seed around his Roundabout flower border on April 8, 1810.

Larkspur, Consolida ajacis

Plants in Early American Gardens - Japanese Stewartia

Japanese Stewartia (Stewartia pseudocamellia)

The Stewartias are a small but valuable genus of ornamentals in the Tea Family, and are closely related to Camellias. Japanese Stewartia is more tree-like than the native species (S. malacodendron and S. ovate) and its bark is more distinctly flaking. This species was introduced before 1878. A Korean variety of this species was introduced by E. H. Wilson in 1917.

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Plants in Early American Gardens - Heartleaf Foamflower

Heartleaf Foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia)

This is a choice native perennial groundcover for shaded sites. It occurs naturally in rich woods from Canada to parts of North Carolina and Tennessee. Foamflower was introduced into Britain in 1731; however, references to it being grown in American gardens did not appear before the nineteenth century. Boston seedsman and garden writer, Joseph Breck recommended its use as an ornamental flower by the mid-1800s. This plant is not attractive to deer.

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Plants in Early American Gardens - Celandine Wood Poppy

Celandine Wood Poppy (Stylophorum diphyllum)

Unlike the rank and weedy European or greater celandine (Chelidonium majus), this eastern North American native is very desirable in the shade garden. It was first introduced into cultivation in 1854 and was recommended in The English Flower Garden (1883) by the British landscape designer and garden writer William Robinson. New Jersey garden writer and nurseryman Peter Henderson cited Robinson in his Handbook of Plants (1890) and noted that the native species was as showy as the other found in India and Japan (Stylophorum japonicum). The yellow sap in the stems was used as a dye by Native American Indians.

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Plants in Early American Gardens - Lady Tulip

Lady Tulip (Tulipa clusiana)

Charles de l’Ecluse, also known as Clusius, a botany professor at Leiden, was largely responsible for the introduction of tulips from Turkey to Europe beginning around 1570. The Lady Tulip was later named for him, to honor his contributions to botany and horticulture. This bulb, a native of Asia Minor, grew in English gardens by 1636, and made its way to the New World shortly thereafter. A story persists that when the Monticello flower gardens were restored by the Garden Club of Virginia in 1941, Lady Tulips were brought from Edgehill, a nearby estate and former home of Jefferson’s daughter Martha. These bulbs were planted at Monticello, where they have thrived and still flower in mid-April.

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History Blooms at Monticello

Peggy Cornett at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello tells us that

This spring we have enjoyed one of the finest displays of purple and white foxglove, Digitalis purpurea, in recent memory. This highly deer-resistant biennial flower has been cultivated in American gardens since 1735, and it became more popular after its medicinal qualities were discovered in the late 18th century.

Plants in Early American Gardens - Green Lavender Cotton

Green Lavender Cotton (Santolina rosmarinifolia)

Green Lavender Cotton, also known as Holy Flax, is native to the western and central Mediterranean regions and has been cultivated in gardens since the late 17th century. It is well-suited as a ground-cover and for edging perennial beds and intricate, geometric knot gardens. Its yellow flowers can be cut during or after they bloom to encourage fresh growth of the aromatic, deep green foliage, which is not attractive to deer.

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Plants in Early American Gardens - Smooth or Common Ironweed

Smooth or Common Ironweed (Vernonia fasciculata)

Also known as Prairie Ironweed, this robust species in the aster family is native to moist prairies and marshes in midwestern North America from Manitoba south to Texas. The genus name honors 17th century English botanist and plant collector William Vernon. André Michaux first recorded Vernonia fasciculata in his flora of North America (Flora Boreali-Americana, 1803). The flowers are attractive to butterflies and other pollinators. Deer-resistant.

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Plants in Early American Gardens - Woodland or Florentine Tulip

Woodland or Florentine Tulip (Tulipa sylvestris)

The Florentine or Woodland Tulip is a European native introduced very early into American gardens. Although Jefferson did not mention this species in his Garden Book, it is now naturalized through the West Lawn at Monticello. It blooms with the Virginia Bluebells in mid-April. Florentine Tulips have a distinctly sweet fragrance and multiply freely once planted, two qualities lost with the development of modern Tulip cultivars.

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History Blooms at Monticello

‘Old Blush’ China, which appears in silk paintings dating to 1000 AD, remains one of the finest of the old garden shrub roses. Also called Parson’s Pink China & Pink Monthly, it became a parent of the Noisette Class of roses when it crossed with the European Musk Rose in the Charleston, SC, garden of John Champneys sometime after 1802.

Single moss rose (Rosa muscosa simplex), an 1807 Jefferson-era variety with deep pink flowers on an upright shrub.

Rosa ‘Belle Vichyssoise’ is a climbing Noisette rose, hybridized in 1858, with good reblooming qualities & medium fragrance.

Plants in Early American Gardens - Snowball Bush

Bare Root Snowball Bush (Viburnum opulus roseum)

This sterile garden form was known in Europe by 1554 and has been a favorite ever since. The flowers, described in 1770 as "balls of snow, lodged in a pleasing manner all over its head," have inspired other common names such as Whitsun-boss, Love-roses, and Pincushion-tree. On April 16, 1807, Jefferson planted V. opulus rosea on the "N.W. brow of the slope" of Monticello Mountain. That same day he also planted the species Gelder Rose or Cranberry Viburnum, V. opulus.

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Collecting America's Native Plants - Meriwether Lewis "No Regular Botanist"

"Like most people of his day, Meriwether Lewis (1774-1809) was knowledgeable about plants. His mother was an herbalist, & as an agriculturist he was interested in plants of economic importance. Thus, when Jefferson assigned Lewis the task of naturalist it was natural that Lewis would focus, as Jefferson instructed him, on medicinal plants, plants of economic value such as corn, wheat, grasses, fodder, & plants that would have been of horticulture interest, as Jefferson had a large garden & was very much interested in horticulture plants.

"For Jefferson, the decision not to send a true naturalist, but rather one that was semi-trained was both fortunate & unfortunate. For the botanical community the fact that Jefferson did not send a naturalist meant that only a few select specimens were collected. Nonetheless, the more than two hundred specimens that reached Philadelphia, from the activities of the Lewis & Clark Expedition, signified the richness of the flora of the Pacific Northwest & particularly the states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho & Western Montana.

"Lewis’s collection activities were limited to opportunities when he had a chance to collect. As captain he had many other duties besides looking for new plants. Thus it was, we know from his journals, that not only did he collect, but so did some of the other men. There are even indications that Sacagawea or Saka Kawea collected plants as well.

"Lewis's collecting activities were not described by him, but looking at contemporaries, it is clear that Lewis used a small hand press. This allowed him to collect small samples that he would then dry over a period of days. Because he had no other means of drying these plants other than sunshine he was very careful what he collected. For example; he avoided cactus & all kinds of succulent plants except for two—both sedums, or rock plants. He collected lots of grasses, because they were economically important as food. He collected crop plants that were grown by the native people. And he collected a bountiful number of wildflowers, particularly in 1806 as he crossed the Rocky Mountains.

"Some of the plants that Lewis collected were found along the Lolo Trail in late June of 1806, & then across Lewis & Clark Pass in early July of 1806. Many of those species are represented in his herbarium & may be seen even today along the Lewis & Clark Trail.

"Lewis's tendency was to collect specimens that he could, in a small sample, show all of the detail that he needed to show. Thus, he tended to collected plants in good flower & occasionally, if he felt it was important as a medicinal plant, in fruit, so he could then grow seeds from the plant once he returned the material to Philadelphia.

"Seeds were commonly collected in 1805 particularly along the Columbia River. Very few seeds were collected in 1806 on the return trip. Numerous specimens & seeds were collected as they ascended the Missouri River in 1804.

"Lewis's interest in the wildflowers of what we now call the Rocky Mountains was much as any individual's today. They are abundant & beautiful & easy to collect. The success of his collection resulted in the discovery of three new genera, one named for him, one named for Clark, & another named for the character of the plant. Several new species were collected. And, most that you see surrounding us here today were collected by Lewis & were named from his specimens.

"Lewis's plant press was probably in the form of a book. A very large book, probably twelve by eighteen inches. It may or may not have been bound on the one side. This is a traditional plant press that you find in China. It is made out of bamboo & consists of a flat strong surface that specimens can be placed in. Lewis used paper much like you used as a youngster in kindergarten. A kind of construction paper. It was folded in half & the specimen placed in between. Now, Lewis's paper was twelve by eighteen when folded, this is half that. You'll notice that the paper is absorbent. This way the specimen's moisture would go into the paper, be absorbed by the paper, & then the specimen could be slowly dried. But in drying, everyday Lewis had to open his press, remove the old pages that were damp, lay them in the sunshine, allow them to dry, & move his plants into new paper so they would continue to dry.

"Modern botany is quite different from Lewis's day. We use very large presses & in a good operation you'll run three to five presses, filling each during the course of a day. Each press consists of about room for one hundred different specimens. We are able to dry these very rapidly using what is known as a Holmgren drying frame, by putting a heat source underneath, a coleman stove or electric light bulbs. The heat rises through the corrugates, the holes in the corrugates, & will dry plants overnight, if not during the course of twenty-four hours.

"Today we are in Packer Meadow on the Clearwater National Forest. This was a lunch stop for the Lewis & Clark Expedition in late June of 1806. Very likely, because Lewis had collected so many plants coming up the Lolo Trail, he took time out during that lunch break to work his plant specimens. Lewis would open his press & open up, in his case, each individual page of his press. Coming on to his first specimen he would then take a look at it, make sure that the leaves were flat & that all the diagnostic characters of the flowers were shown so they could be studied. He would repeat this for each specimen &, if necessary, would replace the paper with new paper.

"This is the common camas that Lewis & his men experienced in 1805. Tradition says that Lewis & Clark & his men became ill from eating the bulbs. That's probably not true. More likely the culprit was salmonella poisoning associated with the dried—poorly dried—salmon.

"It's interesting that Lewis collected the Canadian Dogwood or Cornus candadensis. This is a plant he knew well from Virginia. It's interesting to speculate whether he collected it because he knew it, collected it because he wanted to show that something from Virginia also grew in the Rocky Mountains, or what. Maybe he was homesick. The other specimen that I have here is the new genus of mariposa lily collected by Lewis & Clark along the Lolo Trail in Idaho & Montana in late June & early July. This is Calicortis pulcella, or "beautiful mariposa lily".

"Two specimens that Lewis would have handled during the stop in Packer Meadow is a skyrocket, this little high elevation blue flower which occurs near the summit, & also near the summit is this species of menzesia, named for the surgeon naturalist Archibald Menzies who preceded Lewis & Clark in the Pacific Northwest in the late 1790's. Menzies collected only along the coast, & this is one of those species that goes from the coast to the high mountains in the Rockies. Lewis was very judicious in what he collected. He made only small specimens. Even though this is a large shrub he would have collected only a little bit of it. The reason is simple, someone had to carry it to Philadelphia.

"A specimen has three dimensions: odor, good color & a feel of surroundings, not seen on a flattened dried specimen. And yet, all the technical details necessary for identification, the number of petals, sepals, stamens, the condition of the ovary & fruit, the leaves, even the habitat of the plant can be nicely preserved in any specimen. Occasionally if you have a tree or a shrub it is necessary to make notes indicating the size of the tree or the shrub. This Lewis did on occasions, & we now have his original notes to go by.

"This plant has bulbs. They are thick & fleshy. Drying one of those would be very difficult. Thus, Lewis rarely collected any succulent plant & certainly none of the bulbs that would require days, if not years, to dry. In fact, the reason Lewisia rediviva is called Lewisia rediviva is the genus name honors Lewis but the species name, or epithet, rediviva means revived. That's because the specimen that Lewis made at Travelers' Rest July 1, 1806, was still alive when it reached Philadelphia in September of that year. The specimen that Lewis returned to Philadelphia with, that would later be called Lewisia rediviva, was removed from his collection paper & grown in Philadelphia. It was observed for almost a full year before it suddenly died. Very likely, as everyone knows, over watering plants can be dangerous & deadly, & certainly that's the case with Lewisia.

"Meriwether Lewis described his plants in his journals. He had his training from Barton in Philadelphia, but he also had with him two volumes of John Miller's book on Linnaeus's system of botany. One was an illustration of the terminology of the Linnaean system & the other was on the system itself. So what Lewis could do is, he could use these two books & write his descriptions in a very technical way, so botanists who read the journals would be able to have that information.

"As a naturalist, Lewis has been fairly highly regarded by the modern community. He worked under trying & difficult situations. While it is clear that he was only able to devote a portion of his time to the effort, what he did is widely respected. It should be noted however, that in 1811, Thomas Nuttall of England, went up the Missouri River & collected several hundred more specimens than Lewis & Clark did in 1804. In 1834 & 1835 Thomas Nuttall came to the Rocky Mountains of Idaho, Oregon & Washington & collected hundreds of specimens. Many of the plants that Lewis & Clark found, that were not named in Lewis' time were subsequently named by Thomas Nuttall from his own collections."

By James L. Reveal, Professor Emeritus, Botany University of Maryland, Supported in part by a grant from the Idaho Governor's Lewis & Clark Trail Committee

History Blooms at Monticello

Peggy Cornett at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello asks...

The Tuscany, or Old Velvet Rose, is a distinctive variety of the Apothecary Rose (Rosa gallica ‘Officinalis’) with highly perfumed, velvet-textured, deep wine-red blossoms, dating to the 16C. Could this be the “Black Rose” Thomas Jefferson received in 1808 from his friend Margaret Bayard Smith? Margaret Bayard Smith (1778-1844) was a friend of Thomas Jefferson & chronicler of early life in Washington, D.C. She met Jefferson through her husband, Samuel Harrison Smith, a Republican newspaperman & founder of the National Intelligencer. Mrs. Smith's recollections of Washington society life in the early 19C constitute one of the major sources of information on Jefferson's social life as President. After Jefferson's retirement from political life, Smith visited him at Monticello. Her account of this visit is another source of information on Jefferson's daily life.

Plants in Early American Gardens - Littleleaf Linden

Littleleaf Linden (Tilia cordata)

This European species has been cultivated as a shade tree since ancient times. It appeared on the nursery lists of John Bartram (Philadelphia) and William Prince (Long Island, NY) during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Jefferson mentions a related species, the native Tilia americana, in his book, Notes on the State of Virginia. The two magnificent specimens of the Littleleaf Linden that flank the entrance walk to Monticello today were probably planted around the turn of the 20th century.

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History Blooms at Monticello

Peggy Cornett at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello tells us that 

In July 1791 Thomas Jefferson ordered three each of ten varieties of roses from the William Prince Nursery on Long Island, NY. In November of that year William Prince sent two each of the roses including Cinnamon Rose, Rosa cinnamomea. This spring flowering species has reddish-brown, cinnamon-colored stems and fragrant, pale pink, semi-double flowers.

Plants in Early American Gardens - Waterer Spirea

Bare Root Anthony Waterer Spirea (Spiraea japonica cv.)

The Japanese spirea was introduced from Japan around 1870, and is one more than 80 species found in the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. The well-known cultivar ‘Anthony Waterer’ was raised by 1890 at the Knap Hill nurseries in Great Britain and was admired by many garden writers. The earliest American reference to this cultivar was in 1901. The old-time herbaceous spireas are important heirloom plants and many garden and natural hybrids were available by the end of the 19th century. They were used for edging along walkways or borders and for the foreground of shrubbery.

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History Blooms at Monticello

Peggy Cornett at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello tells us that

English Peas are thriving in this year’s cool, moist Central Virginia spring. We will soon harvest from several historic varieties in the Monticello vegetable garden. Meanwhile the Prickly-seeded spinach, a rare variety Jefferson noted planting in 1809 and 1812, is forming valuable seed heads.

History Blooms at Monticello

Peggy Cornett at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello tells us that

Sweet William, Dianthus barbatus, was one of Jefferson's favorite ornamental flowers. He observed "sweet William began to open" at Shadwell on April 16, 1767, reported flowers in May and June of 1782, and also planted this biennial in an oval flower bed at Monticello in 1807.

A similar variety with the red auricula-eye was called Painted Lady Sweet William and was illustrated in William Curtis’s Botanical Magazine 1792

Plants in Early American Gardens - Wild Petunia

Wild Petunia (Ruellia humilis)

This wide-ranging wildflower is found from southern Pennsylvania west to Nebraska and south to Florida and Texas. It was identified and named by the early 19th century plant explorer Thomas Nuttall, who traveled and collected plants across the continent and who was commissioned by Philadelphia botanist Benjamin Smith Barton to re-collect many of the Lewis and Clark species. Several South American species were commercially available in the mid-19th century and this long-blooming North American species is likewise considered a desirable plant for borders, rock gardens, native gardens, butterfly gardens, and prairies.

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