William,
Try calling him on his cell. I would be interested in purchasing one each of any Morrison Hybrids you order.
I have been doing a LOT of research online during this miserable winter and have been accessing research papers and marketing brochures which go back 120 years or more. I have much clearer understanding of the history of some of the native Hibiscus populations in the eastern United States and what happened to them. In the case of New Jersey I know exactly were, to within a few feet, the first wild Hibiscus moscheutos were collected for the gardening hobby in the 1880’s; there is a very small chance that a fragment of that population may still exist, I will know this summer.
I have stared documenting Meehan’s Mallow Marvels and am updating the following Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Meehan to that end. I edited the photograph of Hibiscus coccineus from the original source and the high resolution format should be suitable for downloading, printing and framing. H. coccineus was critical to Meehan’s Hibiscus breeding program. The recovered photograph of Thomas Meehan is also my doing. In the next month, I will be adding a new section on Meehan’s Mallow Marvels. Hibiscus Annie J. Hemming, the first patented Hibiscus, was a direct descendent of this line.
There is one gardener in Wayne NJ who has been breeding native NJ Hibiscus moscheutos for several decades now and has forms which I have never seen before. All he has been doing is saving and planting seeds from Hibiscus he likes. 120 years ago there was an unbelievable level of genetic diversity in the wild Hibiscus moscheutos populations of NJ. That is way there was so much confusion in Hibiscus species identification.
A lot of very interesting hardy Hibiscus cultivars have disappeared from the hobby in the last 110 years or if they do exist are an un-named Hibiscus in the corner of someone’s garden. In the early 1900’s breeders were working on a hardy double and a hardy yellow. They didn’t get a double but they came very close and that one still exists. This why, increasing the distribution of the Morrison Hybrids is so very important.
Katharine’s mystery white was obviously created by someone, very likely in her area of the country given its cold tolerance but I can’t find out who it was. As more data becomes available online we may be able to identify the breeder. Two years ago if you were looking for the Annie J. Hemming (AKA Hemming Red), you would have been unsuccessful, now because of my DG posts on the subject they can be located. Hopefully others will be doing the same with other Hibiscus and we will all benefit.
Mike
