WHO'S IN A NAME?

(Blakely photo, 2004)

I first encountered this delicate and lovely native shrub a decade ago, at 9100 feet elevation along Mammoth Creek, near the entrance to the Mammoth Consolidated Mine ghost camp. I learned then, from my year-old Jepson Manual, that it grows over much of North America. I did not react at that time to "Banks", the namer. (This plant, which ranges over much of North America, is usually designated var. involucrata to distinguish it from a variety of limited range, var. ledebourii, which occurs in coastal regions of northern California and southern Oregon)

Joseph Banks in 1773, protrait by Joshua Reynolds (source)

This little essay started out to be a book review of a biography of Joseph Banks (1743-1820) (1), a botanist of considerable historical interest for botanical science. But then I happened to rediscover the nomenclatural connection between Sir Joseph and the Eastern Sierra, in the form of this species of honeysuckle, which indeed was named by him. I thus decided to switch genres. By the way, the 1987 biography, Joseph Banks: A Life, by Patrick O'Brian, is a remarkably enjoyable read. O'Brian is the brilliant author of the Master and Commander series of 'tall ship' sailing novels set in the time of Banks' life.

Though this essay is about Banks, let it be noted that the genus Lonicera was named for German herbalist Adam Lonitzer (1528-1586), by Linnaeus. Mention will be made below of Richardson (and a few other historical figures). The rest of the scientific name is accounted for by an involucre which expands and reddens in fruit, highlighting the pair of dark purple berries.

Joseph Banks inherited considerable wealth while quite young, his father having died when he was 18. A prodigious income and extensive properties became his when he turned 21. Some young men in those circumstances might have become self-indulgent and profligate, but Joseph, throughout his long life, not only used his fortune in numerous worthy pursuits, but, by good management, actually increased his wealth. And he became a giant in the history of modern botany.

A lifelong passionate interest in botany began at age 14. With his wealth and considerable influence, he became a major player, largely by supporting and fostering the careers of others, in those heady decades of botanical exploration which occurred during the latter half of the 18th and first half of the 19th centuries. Especially with regard to botanical exploration, think: Linnaeus, then Banks, then Everybody Else. Generally, Banks left to others the naming of the great many plants he collected, or whose collection he fostered.

Banksia ericaefolia L.f., Plate no. 738, Curtis Botanical Magazine, 1804 (2)

He personally engaged in worldwide exploration in his early adulthood. His greatest achievement, which firmly established his reputation, was the role he so successfully played as chief naturalist aboard the Endeavour, on the first round-the-world voyage commanded by Captain James Cook, during the years 1768-1771. You can join the members of that remarkable expedition, vicariously that is, through the medium of Banks' journal, made available in its entirety by an Australian government website. The Australian connection is understandable, as that voyage resulted in the rediscovery and early mapping of the island continent. Major botanical discoveries came during a stop at what Cook named 'Botany Bay'. (It was Banks who later promoted Botany Bay as a destination for transportation of criminals.) The genus name Banksia was coined by Linnaeus' son for an unusual plant Banks collected there.

Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) (3)

Linnaeus himself sang Banks' praises to the highest degree, and regretted that his age would probably prevent him from seeing the publication of Banks' collections. He proclaimed Banks an immortal - having seen more plant species than any earlier botanist. Many of Linnaeus' students were among the first botanical explorers. Daniel Solander, who accompanied Banks on the Endeavour, was one of Linnaeus� students. Solander became Banks' right hand man, and continued to serve him for many years after the return of the Endeavour.

David Nelson was a 'gardener' (sort of an apprentice botanist at that time) at Kew when Banks urged Cook to take him along as botanist on Cook's fatal (for Cook) third voyage of discovery. Banks later included him as botanist among the company he assembled for a mission to Tahiti to collect breadfruit seedlings, employing the ship the Bounty, commanded by another of those he helped professionally, William Bligh. Nelson stayed with Bligh after the famous mutiny, and, though he survived the thousands of miles in an open boat, tragically died not long after safe harbor was reached. Banks later secured the governorship of an Australian province for Bligh. (Bligh's story was briefly noted in another of these essays, the one on Layia glandulosa.)(4)

One of Banks' more famous proteges, as least insofar as North American botany goes, was the Scottish botanist Archibald Menzies. He was botanist on two voyages from England, around the Horn, to the shores of western North America, where he made extensive collections. Many California plants bear his name, most famously the Douglas fir, Pseudotsuga menziesii, (5) collected in 1792 during the voyage of Captain Vancouver. Menzies' journal and his extensive correspondence with Banks make fascinating historical reading. Thanks to the wonders of the world wide web, they are now, at least in part, easily available for all to read. (6)

With Banks' botanical fame spread far and wide, it was no wonder that he had many supplicants for help in finding botanical employment. He told one of them that botany was the most unprofitable trade he knew, but the brave young fellow was not to be deterred, and Banks found him a job.

Banks' fame and influence garnered him the presidency of the prestigious Royal Society, England's major scientific society, in 1778, a post he held until his death 42 years later. He had been a member since before the voyage of the Endeavour. Membership in the Royal Society was aspired to by all scientists of the time. (This remains so even now; among all the letters following his name, my professor at Cornell was proudest of his FRS, 'Fellow of the Royal Society'.) No saintly dandies, these top luminaries of science; an eyewitness account of one of their meetings, given by a visiting European scientist ca. 1780, has principal members, including Banks who presided, and their guests, sharing a pre-meeting feast featuring multiple courses of variously cooked beef, lamb, and vegetables washed down with numerous rounds of strong beer, wine (everyone present, along with absent notables, had to be individually toasted), champagne, and brandy, capping off the meal with several cups of both tea and coffee. At the following meeting, the visitor noted, "We were all pretty much enlivened but our gaiety was decorous."

The Palm House at Kew Gardens (Blakely photo, 1975)

Another of Banks' many botanical accomplishments was the establishment of the famous Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, near London. This was accomplished in partnership with his friend King George III - yes, one and the same as the nemesis of the embryonic USA. The King had his good and bad points, and times, like everybody else. During bad times - sometimes a result of periodic mental health lapses - he even turned the genial Banks off. It was during good times that he and Banks planned and developed the national botanical treasury of dried and living specimens, garnered from explorations all over the world.

Banks was a supporter and mentor of international science, thoroughly apolitical in times of European upheaval. He was a friend of Ben Franklin before and after the Revolutionary War, and of French scientists during the Napoleonic Wars. Franklin was in England for several years prior to the Revolutionary War, and one day, ca. 1773, he (nearly 70) and Banks (about 30), accompanied by Solander, got together to carry out a field experiment to test one of Franklin's theories. (7) Franklin had been elected to membership in the Royal Society in 1756, in recognition of his experiments on electricity. Later, when peace had been established between England and the US, Franklin, still in France, reported to Banks on the first hot-air balloon flights. (8) In one of his replies, Banks apologized for "the illiberal treatment towards you, with which I fear this country may too justly be accused." Franklin had instructed the US government, during the Revolutionary War, not to interfere with the scientific voyages of Captain Cook, a gesture for which Franklin was honored, in 1784, by the English; had he not left England in 1774, to evade an arrest warrant, the same English probably would have hanged him then. (9)

* * *

A year prior to leaving with Cook aboard the Endeavour, Banks sailed to Labrador and Newfoundland, where he did his first serious collecting on foreign shores. That was to be his only direct contact with North America, but he did not collect the honeysuckle on that trip. So how did he come to name Lonicera involucrata? Following is the story, with the facts and some conjecture.

Richardson's party traveled overland for thousands of miles, by canoe (with frequent portages) up and down rivers and across lakes, by doglsed, and on foot. Richardson collected a large number of new plant species on this trip, many of which were named for or by him. (Public Domain graphic, 10)

English naturalist John Richardson (1787-1865; the 'Richardson' in the full name of the plant) traveled with John Franklin, leader of an eventually disastrous expedition (their hair-raising journal is online) to explore the North American shores of the Arctic Ocean, during the years 1819-1822. They arrived, by ship, from England at York Factory on Hudson Bay on August 30, 1819, and left to proceed overland on September 19. Richardson's notes say he collected the honeysuckle in "wooded country between 54 and 64 degrees latitude", but exactly when and where is, apparently, not recorded. Prior to arriving at York Factory their ship made a landfall for fresh water after entering Hudson Strait; both Richardson and Franklin eagerly explored the shore, and Richardson collected specimens of thirty plant species. It seems most likely that the honeysuckle was among this collection, which could then have

Banks in the regalia of President of the Royal Society (source)

been taken back to England - and Kew Gardens - by the Hudson's Bay Company supply ship Prince of Wales, the ship which dropped the explorers off at York Factory. (11)

Banks was in ill health during much of the latter part of his life, and he was so incapacitated by gout and other ailments during the last year of his life that he asked to be relieved of the Royal Society presidency. But his colleagues would have none of it, and he withdrew the request in a letter written about three weeks before his death, which came on June 19, 1820. It seems clear from his involvement with the honeysuckle that even in his poor health he retained the ardor he had held over his entire adult life for arrivals of new plant specimens from distant shores. Somehow he managed to examine Richardson's shipment; he either forced himself to go see it at Kew, or perhaps had it sent to his home.

In 1823 Richardson published names for many of the new species among his extensive North American collections, and gave the name Xylosteon involucratum to the honeysuckle. (12) But when Banks was examining Richardson's early specimens, in late 1819 or early 1820, and came to the honeysuckle, perhaps he wrote "Lonicera" on the herbarium sheet, or in some other way made it be known what genus he thought it belonged to. Whatever the circumstances, Banks' name Lonicera involucrata did not appear in a publication until 1825, 5 years after his death. Richardson is recognized for first naming the plant and coining the specific epithet, but he assigned it to a genus whose members were not long after transferred to Lonicera. Banks is recognized as the one first responsible for assigning it to the proper genus. Thus the scientific name by which the pretty shrub, widespread in Nature, including the Eastern Sierra, and widely cultivated, came into being.