Hey, remember that post I put up a few weeks back about how the story of how the Joshua tree was named is most likely folklore? The one where I said:
But in more than a decade of looking, I have seen not a single reference to the phrase “Joshua tree” having been used prior to the twentieth century.
Well, I can’t go around saying that any more. Here, in a passage from Botanical Observations in Southern Utah II, by botanist Charles Christopher Parry — yes, that Parry — I find the earliest reference to the name I have yet seen. The article was published in the March, 1875 issue of The American Naturalist.
Near the close of the day in ascending the last sloping ridge, leading down on the opposite side to the wide desert plain through which the Muddy courses to unite with the Virgin, we first recognized one of the principal objects of our journey in the singular forms of that remarkable desert production, Yucca brevifolia Engel. This is universally known among the Mormon settlers under the name of “The Joshua.” The mail rider over these desert tracts had furnished us weekly reports of its progress in flowering, so that we were constantly on the lookout for a first view of what had never yet been examined by a scientific botanist. At first a few scattering clumps of the peculiar stiff spiny leaves that characterize this genus of plants attracted attention, then some gaunt forms raised on withered trunks revealed the identical species. On hastening forward to a more vigorous growth, where the masses of compact flowers were visible at a distance crowning the top of the upper branches or main axis, we soon had one of the lower flowering stems ruthlessly torn down for a closer inspection. The first feeling was one of disappointment; the flowers, crowded in a close pyramidal head, failed to exhibit the ordinary graceful forms pertaining to the Liliaceae. The perianth was of a dull greenish-white color, its divisions long-linear, thickened and confusedly massed together, while the odor given out was decidedly foetid, seeming to present special attractions only to various beetles and insect larvae. An examination of the inflorescence shows a regularity such as the botanist would expect: the upper leaves of the flowering branch gradually becoming bract-form subtend in their axils small jointed flower-stems, with the lower flowers generally arranged in threes. These in continuing their spiral arrangement on the main axis form the condensed mass of flowers which, opening from below upwards, prolong the flowering process for several weeks. Only a few of the flowering stems perfect fruit, and occasionally (as during the present season) all prove abortive, possibly owing to the absence of some insect agency for effecting fertilization. In the desert districts lower down, where this species especially flourishes, the flowering heads are said to weigh frequently over fifty pounds.
The material and notes now supplied will, it is hoped, enable Dr. Engelmann who has made a special study of this genus, to complete the technical description of this remarkable species.
Oh, my poor, sweet, lovely hypothesis, killed so brutally by this damnable fact.
Parry was describing the Beaver Dam Wash and Bulldog Canyon area, near St. George, and it may be that the name was locally popular for some time before it caught on elsewhere in the tree’s range.
Nice find.
I know you know this, Chris, but it’s perhaps worth mentioning that The American Naturalist is still published (though it doesn’t carry many flower descriptions any more!).
Really looking forward to the whole book in one holdable paper package.
I miss the days when Am Nat actually published naturalist papers. The journal has become the equivalent of how MTV doesn’t play music videos. I’m uninterested in esoteric theory, but very interested in Joshua tree life history and the like.
Well goodness! I’m on the edge of my seat. You’ve been immeasurably helpful to me—i liked both the original post, which was entirely plausible, and this followup. It takes a big man to admit he’s wrong, friend. You sound awfully smart whether you’re wrong or right, which has to be a plus, right?