AIS: REF: Notes in the 1939 AIS Check List

In a message dated 9/16/2007 6:36:09 AM Eastern Daylight Time,  
lmann@lock-net.com writes:

Fascinating tidbits about hybridizers in the 1939  checklist!


Oh! I agree. I've spent a lot of time over the years tracking some of that  
data to see where it would lead. I've looked into Rosalie M. Dumble Davis of  
Ashland, Virginia, and Texas, who ran a commercial nursery and also  
hybridized. I've got her catalogs and I found her farm. I ran down Mrs. Plecker,  in 
Richmond, who introduced one iris named for the lady on whose  property is now 
the local botanical garden. 
 
But you *absolutely* must confirm the factual material before  relying on it 
too heavily for subsequent researches. There are errors. 
 
For instance, as I have written elsewhere, despite the fact that the  notes 
for Cayeux state that they introduced some irises "about 1909,"  the  
implication being those were their first, a statement that has been reprinted  many 
times without questioning, there are, in fact, quite a  few Cayeux 
introductions--- not just 'Ma Mie'-- dated prior to 1909. 
 
My book The Rev. C. S. Harrison and the Genus  Iris,  published  by HIPS in 
2004, began as a need to  clarify the date on Harrison's own book, A Manual on 
the  Iris, which was erroneously stated to be 1905 in two separate  places in 
the notes of the 1939CL. 
 
I was just trying to round up some data on the culture of irises in the  
USA-- but outside of New England-- in the first decade or so after the turn of  
the XXth century. 
 
Anybody who has examined either version of Harrison's  Manual-- the latter of 
which has been circulating in Iris circles for some years--- will immediately 
realize that the  correct date cannot be 1905 if only because because the 
first edition  references material dated as late as 1909--not to  mention 
Bertrand Farr's catalog--- and the second edition references the  1915 iris growing 
season. 
 
I've pinned down the dates of each edition to within  a few weeks, give or 
take, in my book, the first essay of which  was also published, in ROOTS. Anyone 
interested in the subject can  speak to Dorothy Stiefel about a back issue of 
ROOTS containing same. There may  be copies of the book still available. It 
contains the essay with full  notes and documentation, and facsimile copies of 
both editions of the  Manual. 
 
I doubt there were any earlier editions, because Harrison referred  to the 
revision as his second work on the subject  in his intro, and no bibliographical 
traces of a version datable  to 1905 can be found. I have beaten the bushes 
pretty hard. 
 
All of this matters because the Rev. Harrison's unassuming little  Manual 
is--- so far as is now known--- the first book on the  history and culture of 
garden irises to be published in North  America. 
 
And this error in the 1939 Check List also matters because Ethel  Peckham 
appears to have used it as a benchmark on some other entries, which  means they 
are probably also faulty. 
 
Cordially,
 
Anner Whitehead
Richmond VA USA
 
 



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