The Botanical Legacy of Joseph Rock - Arnoldia

31The people of Chingshui, Kansu, are gathered in front of the inn where Joseph Rockstayed, listening to his phonograph playing the sextet from Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor.Soldiers are guardmg the entrances to the mn. Photographed 11 April 1925.collections at the Royal Botanic Garden in appalledEdinburgh. No record could be found of anherbarium specimen or field note, and someeven believe it to be a hybrid. It is variouslyclassified either as a hybrid or as a speciesform of other Chinese rowans. It goes bythe name Sorbus ’Joseph Rock’ and mostlikely will never be classified with absolutecertainty.Although Rock continued to do some collectingduring his final years in China, mostlyfor the American Rhododendron Society, hedid not return to botany with real zeal untilthe last years of his life in Hawaii. During thistime, while in his seventies, he would oftendash up a volcano to collect a specimen ofsome nearly extinct plant for the botanicgardens of Kew, Edinburgh, or elsewhere. Rockreported to botanists at Kew that he wasat the besieged state of nativeHawaiian plants. He was among the lastbotanists to see several now-extinct plant speciesgrowing in their native habitats.The solid achievements of this self-taughtbotanist in the rugged and spectacular worldof plant hunting in western China will longoutlast the eccentricities of character andscholarship for which he is otherwiseremembered.Jeff Wagner, who holds a master’s degree in forestry, didhis research for this article at the Arnold Arboretum. Thisarticle was reprinted from Michael Aris, Lamas, Princes,and Brigands: Joseph Rock’s Photographs of the TibetanBorderlands of China, the catalogue of an exhibition atChina Institute m America, New York, April 18 throughJuly 31, 1992. The photographs are from the Archives ofthe Arnold Arboretum.Overleaf: "The central portion of the Labrang Monastery, Kansu, China, showmg the large buildings, either yellowor red, the market, and a crowd of people can be seen to the left near the trees. Spruces are in the left handcorner, while poplars are in the squares near the bottom of the picture." Caption written by Rock. Photographed30 April 1926.

34"Pale red sand stone mountains, absolutely bare and deeply eroded as if sculpted,in a valley back of Kansu, which is situated directly in the valley of the YellowRiver, west of Shun Hoa." 24 November 1925.’An alpine meadow at the summit of Tsarekika," Joseph Rock wrote, "the lastpass across the Minshan to the valleys debauching into the Tas River. It was herethat our party was attacked last year by Tebbu brigands and one of my men badlywounded. It is a rendezvous place of Upper Tebbu robbers as three trails convergethere." Elevation 11,250 feet. Photographed 18 September 1926.

Populus simonii growing at Chom, southwest Kansu, China. Note the large burl at the baseof the tree and the smaller ones along the trunk. Elevation 8,300 feet. Photographed inJanuary 1926.35