Wild Flowers of the Undercliff, Isle of Wight

book jacket The Miller Library receives many donations of books each year, and sometimes we open a box and a particular book enchants us. A recent example is a small volume entitled Wild Flowers of the Undercliff, Isle of Wight, published in London in 1881. It is a field guide to a small area of the southern coast of the Isle of Wight, England. The region is prone to landslides and possesses a unique microclimate, as it is protected beneath an escarpment, facing south. The authors, Charlotte O’Brien and C. Parkinson, hoped the book would enable temporary residents of the Undercliff to acquaint themselves with the various plants blooming throughout the year. “As a rule, they are very timid, these ‘wildings of Nature,’ and recede before the advances of man and his bricks and mortar,” and this book seeks to help “seekers after one of the purest of earthly pleasures” [wildflowers] find them.

As a librarian, I have absorbed a concern for ‘bibliographic control,’ the attention to details that help people find the information they need. I was troubled by the lack of a first name for the co-author, and curious about the note in the preface in which the two authors thank “Miss Parkinson” for her colored drawings [8 plates] that illustrate the book. Our copy of the book was inscribed by M. Parkinson, with a dedication to “Miss Prince.” Who were these nameless Parkinsons, I wondered, wanting to give bibliographic credit where it was due.

I asked assistance from a friend who is a gardener and genealogist in England, and she found a reference to an article by David E. Allen (affiliated with the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland), “C. Parkinson, A mystery Wight Botanist identified,” which was published in the 2009 proceedings of the Isle of Wight Natural History & Archaeological Society. We could not obtain a copy, and that made both of us even more eager to solve the mystery.

The initials F.G.S. after Parkinson’s name on the book’s title page might stand for ‘Fellow of the Geological Society,’ and that led to a discovery of an obituary for a “Cyril Parkinson” in the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London Vol 26 (1920): “Cyril Parkinson was born at Hesgreave [Hexgreave] Park, near Southwell (Nottinghamshire), and died in London on August 20th, 1919, at the age of 65. During five years’ residence in the Isle of Wight (1875-¬80) he made a collection of fossils, which was acquired by the British Museum (Natural History). He became a Fellow of our Society in 1880. He was a member of the Worcester Naturalists’ Club, and an occasional contributor to ‘Borrow’s [Berrow’s] Worcester Journal’ on natural history subjects. He also contributed articles to various periodicals on natural history, geology, and botany, and brought out a handbook of the Isle of Wight Marine Algae in collaboration with Mrs. O’Brien, of Ventnor.”

book jacket Now that I had birth and death dates and a first name, I used genealogy resources like Ancestry.com and found that Cyril had a sister Marian who lived with him for a time, and she was undoubtedly the illustrator whose signature is in our copy. Census records indicate that she was a woman of “private means,” and this squares with the family’s history as landed gentry with their own coat of arms. At the time of the book’s publication, the 1881 census lists Cyril as a tile manufacturer living with his unmarried sister Marian in Bournemouth, not terribly distant from the Isle of Wight. Their parents were John and Catherine Parkinson of Southwell, Nottinghamshire.

A review of Wild Flowers of the Undercliff appeared in the October 11, 1901 edition of The British Architect and it makes special note of the illustrations: “There are eleven different species of the orchid tribe growing in the Undercliff, and this guide helps one to find these ‘wildings of Nature.’ The beautiful coloured drawings were executed by Miss Parkinson.”

It is very satisfying to list the full names of the co-author and illustrator in the bibliographic record for this book. I would love to discover whether Marian Parkinson illustrated any other botany books, but that is still a mystery.

Planting Design for Dry Gardens

Planting Design for Dry Gardens is an excellent book but unfortunately is poorly titled. Author Olivier Filippi lives in the south of France and the original French title, Alternatives au gazon, or “alternatives to lawn” more accurately describes his work, a very detailed and practical study of the options for replacing resource demanding turf grass.

A translation of a different type, from the parameters of Filippi’s classic Mediterranean climate to our more modified version, will take some work on the reader’s part. I found the effort worthwhile, as it exposed me as a gardener to ideas not typically found in a Pacific Northwest oriented garden book.

For example, Filippi does not recommend using a drip irrigation system for a dry garden of groundcover plants. Instead he advocates hand watering, using temporary basins created around the new plantings, so that plants will more likely to survive without supplemental watering once established. Many other general gardening topics, from planting to attract beneficial insects to concerns about invasive plants, are addressed from a refreshingly distinctive, continental European perspective.

Published in the November 2016 Leaflet Volume 3, Issue 11.

Food and the City: Histories of Culture and Cultivation

Food and the city book jacket The UW Farm is a great example of the increasing interest in urban agriculture, but this is not a new movement. Food and the City: Histories of Culture and Cultivation provides historical snapshots of food growing projects from around the world, concentrating on the late 19th century through the mid-20th century. Two global depressions and two world wars made this a particularly difficult time for city dwellers.

These essays were developed from lectures given at a “Food and the City” symposium held at the Dumbarton Oaks research institution in Washington, D.C. in May 2012 that “…sought to historically contextualize the current discourse on urban agriculture.” I found the chapter written by Laura Lawson and Luke Drake of Rutgers University particularly engaging with its focus on American cities and because Lawson was a co-author of the 2009 book Greening Cities Growing Communities: Learning from Seattle’s Urban Community Gardens.

Both books bring an academic perspective on this very human activity of gardening. However, neither is locked in a strictly scholarly discourse. At the end of Lawson and Drake’s chapter in Food and the City, the authors conclude “In cities across America, food is being grown to feed families, to enliven communities, to provide economic opportunities, and to educate young and old…it is reassuring to realize that gardening for food is a normal part of the urban landscape…”

Published in the November 2016 Leaflet for Scholars Volume 3, Issue 11.

One Writer’s Garden

One Writer's Garden cover

Susan Haltom has written about restoring an historic garden, that of author Eudora Welty in Jackson, Mississippi. Haltom had the advantage of knowing her subject’s creator over the last few years of her life, learning that Welty did not want the garden to be “pretentious, inappropriate, or filled with plants chosen for showiness.”

The resulting book, “One Writer’s Garden,” co-written with Jane Roy Brown, is primarily an engaging biography of this 20th century master of novels and short stories set in the American south. Many of her stories have garden or gardening themes, likely inspired by the family garden. The final chapter not only recaps the restoration process, but also brings to light the gardening practices and customs of the garden’s heyday in the 1920s through 1940s.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

A Rich Spot of Earth

A Rich Spot of Earth cover

Peter Hatch has been the Director of Gardens and Grounds at Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia, since 1977. I find his recently (2012) published “A Rich Spot of Earth” to be the most engaging of the Miller Library’s several books on Thomas Jefferson’s famous home.

Hatch is a skillful writer, blending much of Jefferson’s own words into his narrative. The narrative tells how the former President was enthralled with all matters of gardening, especially of food crops throughout his life, despite his many public duties. He was also deeply involved with the fabric of his local community and region, and seemed to value friendships that did not overlap with his professional career.

Not surprisingly, I found the chapter on gardening books in the presidential library especially interesting. I think all gardeners will find something of value in the discussions on Jefferson’s approaches to garden layout, planting methods, soil amending, staking, seed saving, and dealing with pests and weeds – you’ll easily forget that your mentor lived roughly 200 years ago.

The second half of the book is subtitled “A Catalog of Selected Monticello Vegetables.” Similar to many how-to books on vegetable gardening, this is an evaluation of the many favorite crops grown on the estate, broadly divided by the edible portion of each, including fruits, roots, and leaves. Most of the selections are familiar, but some were used in different ways than we do now, and some the modern reader may find a bit odd.

For example, nasturtiums were grown primarily for their seeds, while the flowers were only a garnish. Jefferson had a passion for sesame (Sesamum indicum), and experimented unsuccessfully with different pressing techniques to produce oil.

Finally, every gardener has his or her favorites, and “Jefferson fussed over his garden asparagus far more than any other vegetable.” It was only grown in “in carefully amended beds because this long-lived perennial…was a major investment.” I think most gardeners can relate to this type of obsession.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

The Book of Pears

The Book of Pears cover

“The Book of Pears” is primarily a meticulous history book. Author Joan Morgan traces the human pursuit and usage of the pear from the empires of Persia, Greece, and Rome to the culinary heights of industrial Europe, especially in Italy, France, England, and Belgium. This British author does not ignore North America, as from the late 19th century on the story of the pear becomes global in scope.

Will this book help you with growing pears? Somewhat, with a brief cultivation section, but better help is found in the extensive directory of varieties, as the choices you need to make will influence your cultural decisions. Do you prefer early fruits which often don’t hold so well? Or good keepers that fruit late? Will these pears be used for eating fresh, canning, for cooking, or for making perry (the pear equivalent of cider)?

If you have a tree of unknown variety, another section on pear Identification may help. Presented in a chart, pear varieties are classified by season and by shape, including pyriform, the traditional pear silhouette, although pears come in many shapes. Further identifiers include color (everything from near white to deep red, including flushes of a deeper color), size, and the amount of russeting or spotting.

As any fruit shopper knows, there are pears and then there are Asian pears. The latter is given some consideration in this book. Each type probably developed separately, one in modern day Iran and eastern Turkey, the other in the Yangtze Valley, from two different wild species. There is evidence of hybridization between the two forms as early as the fifth century CE, but this possibly occurred much earlier.

Throughout the book are 40 stunning plates showing varieties of pears, including the fruit, both unripe on the tree and ripe and sliced for eating, along with the fresh leaves and flowers of spring. These works by Elisabeth Dowle are worthy of a folio book on their own, as they would benefit from presentation in a larger size.

This is an excellent book, I only wish it had been printed in a bigger format, partly for the beauty of the plates, and also to make the minutiae of detail, especially in the directory, more readable.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Pawpaw

Pawpaw cover

Andrew Moore’s “Pawpaw” is the result of an individual’s love for a favorite fruit. While it is a native small tree to 26 states in the eastern United States, the pawpaw is still unfamiliar to most Americans.

To those who love this fruit, Asimina triloba has been sadly overlooked. The author compares it to the blueberry, another native that was relatively unknown 100 years ago, and was included among the “wild foods that Americans gathered and ate.” The blueberry, thanks to the dedicated work of a handful of enthusiasts, has become a mainstay of the American diet. The pawpaw lacked such champions.

Moore writes most of the book like a travelogue, visiting growers and enthusiasts throughout the native range of the pawpaw. You get the impression that but for a few twist of fates, the pawpaw might have come to share the blueberry’s popularity. While this is not a culture book, you’ll pick up some ideas from the many stories on how to grow your own and even more ideas on how to prepare the fruit for eating.

There are some suggestions that a pawpaw will grow well here, and one Oregon nursery, One Green World in Portland, is listed as a source. If reading this book whets your appetite, you can visit the nursery this fall for variety tastings and pawpaw ice cream!

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Apples of Uncommon Character

Apples of Uncommon Character cover

Rowan Jacobsen, the author of “Apples of Uncommon Character,” lives in Vermont and is fascinated by apples, but instead of a grower he is primarily an “apple stalker” to use his own term. He credits many professionals for his knowledge, including Tom Burford, author of “Apples of North America,” who “helped me see the eternal in the apple tree.”

The author’s list of favorite varieties, including some that originated outside North America, is the principal part of this book. These include ‘Spokane Beauty’: “This Brobdingnagian apple is probably the best to hail from Washington State….yet its fame has not spread beyond the Northwest.” He notes it may be the largest apple known, but retains its crispness and “…makes wonderfully zippy sweet cider.”

Another favorite is ‘Hudson’s Golden Gem’ from Tangent, Oregon (east of Corvallis). He describes this apple as thinking it’s a pear in shape, coloring, russeting (freckles on the skin) and “…the intense aromatics. Even the granular texture is pearlike.”

Jacobsen is a well-known food author and he particularly enjoys sharing his favorite recipes for apples, and making recommendations on which varieties to use for each (although he also urges the reader to experiment). While I expected a number of desserts, I was surprised to learn that apples can be used in everything from appetizers to salsa to pot pies.

The photographs of each dish will have you drooling, and throughout the photographs of the apple varieties are engaging and distinctive, with some taken at Harmony Orchards in Tieton, Washington.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Apples of North America

Apples of North America cover

Tom Burford has a goal to restore the apple to near the diversity and prominence it enjoyed in America during the early 20th century, when one nursery catalog alone listed 17,000 cultivars. He is optimistic that this return to greatness is happening. To further this effort, he has selected 200 varieties that he regards as “apples of the real world” (not the supermarket), to feature in his book “Apples of North America.”

The A-Z encyclopedia of these varieties is the heart of the book. All are of American origin. For example, ‘Hawaii’ was introduced in Sebastopol, California and has a “distinctive pineapple flavor and is exceptionally sweet when grown in western regions.”

‘Criterion’ was introduced in 1973 from Parker, Washington (south of Yakima) and while it does well in our region, in more humid apple growing areas, such as the author’s home in Virginia, it does not color well and is more susceptible to diseases. It is noted as being one of the best apples for salads as it does not oxidize quickly after slicing.

Many apples do not store well but are delicious for fresh eating. Others are noted for baking, pie-making, cider-making, or even frying. Some don’t look that great. ‘Kinnaird’s Choice’ is mottled red with purple spots, and would like be rejected by most shoppers. However, it was a mainstay during the Great Depression because it was dependable and its good flavor worked well for all purposes.

The book concludes with a section on “Planning and Designing an Orchard”, a very detailed look at the cultural needs of apples, from planting, propagation (including rootstocks and grafting), pruning, and dealing with diseases and pests. He even tells you how to properly eat an apple, a “mind-expanding experience.” He finds it “…mildly irksome to see someone eating an apple while walking down the street, unaware that a body sense event is happening, and perhaps focusing on something else entirely at the time.”

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Vitamin N: the Essential Guide to a Nature-rich Life

Vitamin N book jacket New on our shelves this month you’ll find Richard Louv’s new book, Vitamin N: the essential guide to a nature-rich life. Joining his earlier work, Last child in the woods: saving our children from nature-deficit disorder, this thought-provoking hands-on manual introduces many simple ideas for getting outside and benefiting from everything nature has to offer, no matter one’s age and ability.

While the book will be useful for parents of small children, it also covers what individual teens and adults can do to have a nature-rich life as well as how teachers and grandparents can support outdoor play and learning for the children in their lives. Check it out!

Published in the October 2016 Leaflet Volume 3, Issue 10.