November 18, 2024 A Century of November Garden Reflections, Archibald Menzies, Asa Gray, New Nordic Gardens by Annika Zetterman, and Beatrix Farrand Plans the Rose Garden for the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG)

Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart Support The Daily Gardener Buy Me A Coffee  Connect for FREE! The Friday Newsletter |  Daily Gardener Community Botanical History On This Day 1793 Archibald Menzies (MEN-zeez), the Scottish surgeon-botanist, reluctantly departs Santa Barbara aboard the HMS Discovery during Vancouver’s expedition. 1810 Asa Gray is…

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Asa Gray: The Birth of American Botany’s Greatest Voice

Asa Gray by Sir David McNee, 1838

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. November 18, 1810 On this day, Asa Gray (1810-1888) was born. He was a figure who would become America’s preeminent botanist and one of the most influential scientists of the 19th century. Born…

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October 29, 2024 A Gardener’s Late October Checklist, Charles Wright, Thoreau the Botanist, A Home in Bloom by Christie Purifoy, and USDA Pioneer Effie Southworth

Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart Support The Daily Gardener Buy Me A Coffee  Connect for FREE! The Friday Newsletter |  Daily Gardener Community Botanical History On This Day 1811 Texas botanist Charles Wright is born on this day in Wethersfield, Connecticut. 1972 The Berkshire Eagle published a revealing article about Henry David…

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The Walking Botanist: Celebrating Charles Wright

Charles Wright, botanist

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. October 29, 1811 Today we celebrate the birthday of Charles Wright born on this day in Wethersfield, Connecticut. Wright embodied the spirit of botanical exploration in early America, becoming one of the most…

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November 18, 2022 William Shenstone, Leo Lesquereux, Asa Gray, Margaret Atwood, We Took to the Woods by Louise Dickinson Rich, and November Garden Work Inspires

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Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart Support The Daily Gardener Buy Me A Coffee  Connect for FREE! The Friday Newsletter |  Daily Gardener Community Botanical History On This Day 1714 Birth of William Shenstone, English poet and landscape gardener. 1806 Birth of Charles Leo Lesquereux, Swiss botanist. 1810 Birth of Asa…

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From Harvard to Herbarium: The Blooming Legacy of Asa Gray

Asa Gray, circa 1870s

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. November 18, 1810 On this day, the botanical world welcomed a true titan of the field – Asa Gray, whose birth heralded a new era in the study of plant life and the…

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Botanical Hide and Seek: Charles Short and the Shortia Story

Dr. Charles Wilkins Short

This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. October 6, 1794 On this day, dear readers, we celebrate the birth of a true luminary in the world of botany and medicine, Charles Wilkins Short. A son of Kentucky, Short would go…

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Asa Gray and Goldenrod or Solidago

Asa Gray

A Letter from a Friend November 18, 1881 On this day, Asa Gray received a letter from his botanical friend and colleague George Engelmann. Asa wrote him back in December: “My dear old Friend, It is shabby of me to wait so long in response to your kindly greetings, which were dated on my birthday,…

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Asa Gray

Asa Gray

For Team Darwin November 18, 1810 Today is the birthday of one of the leading American botanists of his time and a member of Team Darwin, Asa Gray, who was born on this day in 1810. In 1857, Asa Gray received a confidential letter from Charles Darwin. In the letter, Darwin confided: “I will enclose…

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November 18, 2020 Winter Garden Plants, William Shenstone, Leo Lesquereux, Asa Gray, Beverley Nichols, The Kew Gardener’s Guide to Growing House Plants by Kay Maguire, and Goldenrod

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Today we celebrate the man who was a gardener and a poet and he inspired the trend toward the picturesque natural Landscape. We’ll also learn about the Swiss botanist who specialized in mosses. We’ll remember the birthday of the Father of American botany. We’ll take a look back at a popular November fruit – I…

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November 5, 2020 Humphrey Marshall, the Chrysanthemum, John Redfield, Henry Rollins, The New Southern Garden Cookbook by Sheri Castle, and the Vancouver Chinese Garden Otter

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Today we celebrate the man remembered as the “Father of American Dendrology” (the study of woody plants, trees, and shrubs). We’ll also learn about the November birth flower, which was celebrated in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on this day in 1883. We also recognize the botanist, who was Philadelphia’s botany man during the 1800s. We hear some…

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Asa Gray

Asa Gray

A Person of Action  On this day, the botanist Asa Gray resigned from the Wilkes Expedition. Gray was frustrated by all of the delays, he was a person of action, and he also disliked Captain Charles Wilkes. Gray disagreed with Wilkes about the Latin descriptions of the new taxa, and he also disagreed with Wilkes’s…

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