PART 3
Later that evening, the doorbell rang. Mrs. West had come to visit, and entered the house in good humor with a touch of flourish, carrying a box with mysterious papers, books, and photographs. We settled in the family room to see what she had brought. As she unpacked the materials, she explained that she was the great niece of the internationally renowned rosarian of the 1920s and 30s, Dr. Jean Henri Nicolas (pronounced Nee·coh·lah). And as fortune would have it, some of her uncle's and family’s rose-related materials had been passed down to her. She appreciated their significance, but had never been sure quite what to do with them beyond safe-keeping. But knowing of my passion for roses, and my second passion for antiquarian books, she thought perhaps I might like to have the materials.
This was a remarkable gift, and I was deeply touched. To understand the significance of the materials she brought is to understand who Jean Henri Nicolas was. He was born in 1875 in Roubaix, France, permanently moved to the U.S. after meeting his wife here (and promising her father he would not take her back to France), and died in New York in 1937. Although his love affair with roses started as a hobby, he became a world-recognized expert and gave up a business career to make his living in rose horticulture.
In addition to writing three books on roses, his accomplishments included serving as the first Director of Research for Jackson & Perkins Company (when it was among the largest rose growers in the world), and before that served as a researcher for Conrad-Pyle / Star Roses. He was a Trustee of the American Rose Society, Vice President of the National Rose Society of England, and was frequently honored by the Rose Society of France and the German Rose Society. He held a doctorate in natural science for his accomplishments in creative horticulture, was a Knight of the Merite Agricole, Officer of the Academy of France, and Chevalier of the French Legion of Honor. And to top it all off, he was also a gourmet. As the French rosarian Francis Meilland once said of him, “He was everything all at once, a man of fine letters, a fine speaker, a good writer, a wonderful diplomat and a surprising geneticist."
As a rose hybridizer, Nicolas was a pioneer who enjoyed considerable success. As Director of Research for Jackson & Perkins from 1929 to 1937, his crosses led to 31 roses, including the yellow hybrid tea ‘Eclipse’ (which won gold medals in Rome and Bagatelle), ‘Empire State’, ‘Kismet’, the hybrid tea blend ‘Gloaming’, the hardy yellow climber ‘King Midas’, the hybrid nutkana ‘Leonard Barron’, the original floribunda ‘Rochester’, as well as ‘Mary Margaret McBride’, ‘Miss America’, ‘Starlight’, ‘Yosemite’, ‘Flambeau’, and ‘June Morn’, among others.
Yet for all his grand accomplishments, he eschewed the pretentious names given to so many roses. As noted in the 2010 book, A Rose by Any Name, by Douglas Brenner and Stephen Scanniello (Algonquin Books), Nicolas poked irreverent fun at long-winded names like ‘Baronesse A. van Hovell tot Westerflier’, whereas he named one of his own cultivars, quite simply, ‘Smiles’. His hybridizations were not limited to crossing roses with other roses; he also crossed roses with other members of the Roaceae family, such as apples, in an effort to bring novelty and improved hardiness to his cultivars. Even after his death in 1937, his hybrids continued to be introduced to the market, including the climber posthumously named for him, the everblooming ‘Dr. J. H. Nicolas’.
In addition to his hybridizations, Nicolas was an accomplished author, as evidenced by his three books, The Rose Manual: An Encyclopedia for the American Amateur (1930, 335 pp.), A Year in the Rose Garden (1936, 105 pp.), and A Rose Odyssey (1937, 238 pp.) all published by Doubleday, Doran & Co. The collection of materials Mrs. West brought with her that evening included two signed copies of A Rose Odyssey, one that Jean Henri inscribed to his beloved wife, and the other to his daughter, Lucy. The dust jackets of both showed extreme wear – these books had been read many times over! But the books and their bindings were still in very good condition and have held up well through the years.
Also included in the collection of Mrs. West’s materials was a thick envelope filled with several years’ worth of the monthly bulletin entitled “The Rose”. Its publisher, the Philadelphia Rose Society, had serially printed Nicolas’ previously unpublished manuscript, The Rose Breeder’s Manual, beginning with their January 1952 issue of the bulletin.
Also included in the box were three portraits of Nicolas, including two of him working with roses in the test fields (shown above). There were also photographs of American Rose Society ceremonies, and a close-up photograph of the Nicolas cultivar named for 'Mary Margaret McBride', which was put into production in 1942 five years after his death.
But perhaps the most interesting item in the collection of materials was a typewritten manuscript that his daughter Lucy helped prepare in 1966, that posthumously updated and combined the original texts of her father’s first and third books (The Rose Manual and A Rose Odyssey) with The Rose Breeder’s Manual, which she hoped to have published as The Nicolas Anthology. Along with the manuscript were various letters Lucy had written to propose the project to publishers like Dodd, Mead & Co., Dover Publications, and M. Barrows and Co., along with their cordial and sincerely interested replies. But as far as I know, the proposed anthology was not ultimately published, and the 403-page hand-typed manuscript, while mostly comprised of the same content found in his original works, is somewhat unique.
I told Mrs. West that not only would I take good care of these materials and properly conserve them, but that I would surely enjoy reading them to learn more about the man who contributed so much to rose culture. In fact, I wasted no time doing so. The next day, after saying farewell to my parents until our next planned get-together in September, I began reading A Rose Odyssey on the plane trip home to New York. I found it very readable, and just as timely now as it was in 1937. The book records Nicolas’ annual excursions around the globe to visit his friends and contemporaries in the field of rose cultivation. These included such well-known names as Pedro Dot, Samuel McGredy, Wilhelm Kordes, Joseph Pernet-Ducher, Marc Guillot, A. Meilland, the Poulsens, and many others.
Nicolas' journeys are recounted in the style of a travelogue, sprinkled with insight and humor. Although he was certainly part of what we might call the rose “establishment”, he made some interesting observations that challenged conventional wisdom. For example, his perspectives on the vagaries of optimal soil conditions and pH levels not only challenged prevailing opinions then, but would still do so today.
I so enjoyed reading A Rose Odyssey that I have ordered Nicolas’ other two books. Although they are long out of print, copies can still be obtained from antiquarian book sellers. I also plan to read the Rose Breeder’s Manual contained in the Anthology manuscript I was given. Although hybridization’s state of the art has surely advanced since the manuscript was originally written, I hope it might serve as a useful primer should I ever decide to tinker with hybridizing myself – something that, given the odds of genetic crossings, isn’t likely to lead to any great creations, but might be fun in the trying.
Regardless of which one of Nicolas’ books I may find to be the most interesting, I suspect I will always appreciate A Rose Odyssey best of all, for its title aptly describes both the literal and figurative journey I embarked on this summer with my mother as "traveling companion." It involved equal parts of fun, hard work, and learning as we planned and carried out our endeavors. Best of all, it culminated in a successfully installed bed of roses that my mother is already expanding with the acquisition of 16 more plants! It would seem that just like other travelers who have succumbed to entomological dangers while traversing through flora and fauna, she, too, has been “bitten by the bug”, and that means her own rose odyssey is just beginning.
