JARS v64n2 - St. Columba's 'Cynthia' Revisited

St. Columba's 'Cynthia' Revisited
Clive Justice
Vancouver, British Columbia Canada

The rhododendron hybrids George Fraser carried in his isolated Westcoast Ucluelet Nursery were all Waterer created hybrids - all, that is, except for the first ever named hybrid 'Cunninghami', a Rhododendron caucasicum hybrid created or selected by the Cunningham nursery in Scotland. When I looked through George Fraser's 1925 catalogue and compared it with the 1922 Layritz list for a recent May 2006 Indumentum (chapter newsletter) article, it failed to register with me that the Fraser or the Layritz nursery did not include hybrid 'Cynthia'. Cerise 'Cynthia' was an introduction from the mid 1850s by the Standish and Noble Nursery that had become Sunningdale Nurseries, when the partnership of Standish and Charles Noble broke up in 1857.

In the 1960s I received the George Fraser letters from Joe Gable that he said he would send me when I had first talked with him in 1957, at the ARS International convention in Portland. It was a busy time for our firm of landscape architects so it wasn't until the spring of 1977 that we made it over to the Ucluelet, Tofino area on the west coast of Vancouver Island to investigate whether there were any remains of the Ucluelet nursery or any large rhododendrons in gardens in the two communities since Fraser's death in 1944. Much to our surprise we found a very large rhodo in full bloom beside the St. Columba Anglican church in Tofino. It was deep mauve pink with a nice round truss and classic rhodo leaf shape so we named it 'Cynthia'. Both Lil Hodgson and I wrote articles for the ARS Journal that perpetuated the name. There it stood. No one questioned it, and although there were some doubters no one said anything.

As I had only seen very large rhodos on our 1974 trip to Sikkim and Nepal Himalayas; all were species. The only large deep pink hybrids I had seen were the two plants of 'Cynthia' that Ted Van Veen had moved into the Portland ARS Chapter Crystal Springs Rhododendron Test Garden in East Portland. The park was across the street from Reed College. I also remember landscaper Len Living trying to move a Dunbar area front lawn 'Cynthia' specimen out of flower. While digging out the root ball we tipped it over to free it in the hole and the 6-foot diameter ball top broke off from the root cleanly as if severed with a saw. Len was out $50, his labour costs, and $5 for a replacement rhodo. In those days most if not all rhodo hybrids were grafted on ponticum or caucasicum understock. Ken Gibson, Tofino historian, tells me that St. Columba Anglican Church was built in 1913. Ken also says that the church grounds were landscaped soon after by George Fraser using plant material from his Ucluelet nursery. A close examination was made of later photographs, especially the one with Gene Rounds' daughter, all in white, standing under it, taken when the Vancouver Chapter Harold Johnson led tour of the Ucluelet Tofino area in May of 1983. Then as before it was touted as 'Cynthia'. A photo also taken on our 1977 visit was of a large rhodo with red flowers. It was also on the church property but to the rear and below. In the background up above the flowers is the distinctive flared shingle roof of the St. Columba's steeple. We never got around to identifying it, but with George Fraser's nursery list in hand it is none other than 'John Waterer'. It is a cross made by Anthony Waterer the founder of the Waterer Nursery firm, 50% catawbiense and 50% unknown, probably arboreum , and named for his son John. It was introduced in the 1850s.

Our 'Cynthia' turns out to be another Waterer creation, 'Mrs. Milner'. It was probably named in honour of the mother of Alfred Milner, 1st Viscount Milner (1854-1925), who after passing out of Oxford with honours became assistant editor of the Pall Mall Gazette, moving on to become Undersecretary of Revenue for Egypt. His book England in Egypt came out in 1892. In it he recommended independence for the then British Protectorate. After 1900 he became Governor of Cape Colony S.A, and then Transvaal. He was secretary of War during the Boer war and WWI.

You won't find either 'John Waterer' or 'Mrs. Milner' on the St. Columba churchyard if you visit Tofino today; Ken tells me these rhodos, sadly, have gone. I will try to find out who was the architect for St. Columba, hopefully before it too disappears. Of course all you trivia buffs know who St. Columba was.

References
Justice, Clive. 1996. Pacific Northwest Rhododendron 'Improvers': Their hertage and progeny. J. Amer. Rhododendron Soc. 50: 83-88.
Justice, Clive. 2006. Rhododendron hybrids available locally for BC coastal gardens in the post World War I period (Part 2 continued from the April issue). Indumentum 37(8): 3.
Milner, Alfred. 1892. England in Egypt. Edward Arnold, London: 448 pp.
Van Veen, Ted. 1969, Rhododendrons in America. Sweeney, Krist & Dimm, Portland, Oregon: 176 pp

Answer re Saint Columba:
Saint Columba (7 December 521 – 9 June 597), better known as Colmcille and sometimes referred to as Columba of Iona, or, in Old Irish, as Colum Cille (meaning "Dove of the Church") was an outstanding figure among the Gaelic missionary monks who, some of his advocates claim, introduced Christianity to the Kingdom of the Picts during the Early Medieval Period. He was one of the Twelve Apostles of Ireland. Or the short answer is: "The Scotsman who brought Christianity to the Irish".

Clive Justice, a plant historian, is a member of both the Vancouver ARS Chapter and the J.D. Hooker ARS Chapter.