orchids and orchidology in central america. 500 ... - lankesteriana.org

LANKESTERIANA 9(1-2): 1-268. 2009. 

ORCHIDS AND ORCHIDOLOGY IN CENTRAL AMERICA. 

500 YEARS OF HISTORY * 

Carlos ossenbaCh 

Centro de Investigación en Orquídeas de los Andes “Ángel Andreetta”, 

InTroducTIon 

Geographical and historical scope of this study. 

The history of orchids started with the observation and 

study of species as isolated individuals, sometimes 

grouped within political boundaries that are always 

artificial. With rare exceptions, words such as 

“ecology” or “phytogeography” did not appear in the 

botanical prose until the early XX century. 

Although Humboldt and Bonpland (1807), and 

later Oersted, had already engaged in the study of 

Universidad Alfredo Pérez Guerrero, Ecuador 

Orquideario 25 de Mayo, San José, Costa Rica 

caossenb@racsa.co.cr 

“plant geography”, botanical exploration in our region 

seldom tried to relate plants with their life zones. The 

XIX century and the first decades of the XX century 

are best defined by an almost frenetic interest in the 

identification and description of new species, without 

bothering too much about their geographical origin. 

No importance was given to the distribution of orchids 

within the natural regions into which Central America 

is subdivided. 

Exceptions to this are found in the works by Bateman 

(1837-43), Reichenbach (1866) and Schlechter (1918), 

* The idea for this book was proposed by Dr. Joseph Arditti during the 1st. International Conference on Neotropical 

Orchidology that was held in San José, Costa Rica, in May 2003. In its first chapters, this is without doubt a history of 

orchids, relating the role they played in the life of our ancient indigenous people and later in that of the Spanish conquerors, 

and the ornamental, medicinal and economical uses they gave to these plants. It is not until the late XVIII century, but 

above all in the XIX century that we can talk about a history of orchidology, with the development of botanical science 

and the establishment of the bases of modern orchidology by Lindley. But the XIX century was also the time of legendary 

commercial collectors who, frequently with the complicity of men of science, collected with a frenzy often bordering on 

madness. Orchid knowledge became sometimes a synonym of orchid destruction. During the second half of the XX century 

the world developed a growing conscience of the negative impact of man on his natural habitat and I would like to believe 

that, in the future, orchidology will devote itself in an increasing manner to the study of orchids as a means to preserve them. 

Motivated by this belief, I decided to write this history, that will be more a story about orchids and men than a story about 

orchids and science, hoping that mankind will rediscover the harmonious relation with nature that characterized the life of 

the first inhabitants of our region. The great naturalist Alexander F. Skutch, who chose a life of study and contemplation 

amidst the forests of southern Costa Rica, expressed it in much better words: “Sometimes, before leaving the hilltop, I visit 

the old Indian burial ground. Despite promises of golden ornaments, I have never permitted anyone to excavate these graves, 

for I believe that we should treat the burials of alien races with the same respect that we desire for our own. Sometimes, in a 

meditative mood, I ask myself whether, from the moral standpoint, my title to this land is as valid as that of the men whose 

dust lies beneath the red clay. Perhaps the only answer to this perplexing question is that he most deserves to have the land 

who makes the best use of it. If my love of the mountains and rivers and forests is greater than theirs, if these things speak 

more meaningfully to me and I am more keenly appreciative of their beauty; if I strive harder to preserve this natural setting 

in its pristine splendor and to conserve the soil’s fertility — then perhaps I can justify my possession of this land that once 

belonged to them. If I fall short of the aborigines in these respects, then I — and the whole line of too-aggressive palefaces 

who transmitted to me what was once theirs — are but piratical intruders, whose right to this land would be hard to defend. 

Enlarging on this theme, it seems to me that, unless evolution miscarries, the ultimate possessor of the earth will be the race 

that most appreciates its grandeur and beauty and cherishes it most carefully, that rules it as a generous and compassionate 

lord instead of raping it like a greedy tyrant, as men have all too commonly done” (Skutch, 1971: 223-224).

2 

but above all the monumental account by Godman 

and Salvin on the Central American biology, in which 

Hemsley wrote the botanical part (Hemsley, 1883). 

The enumeration of species in this work is followed 

by a detailed description of the known localities of 

collection from which the phytogeographical regions 

of Central America can already be inferred. 

In the first chapters, our history centers on Mexico- 

Tenochtitlan, capital of the Aztec empire and later of 

the Viceroyalty of New Spain. The first descriptions of 

orchids for our area of study (with a medicinal rather than 

botanical purpose) originate in locations that, although 

outside of the geographical area with which we are 

concerned, were strongly influenced by the ancestral 

culture of the Maya and maintained a close interaction, 

during the centuries preceding the Spanish conquest, 

with the rest of Central America. It is no coincidence 

that the northern limit of the cultural expansion of the 

Mayas overlaps very approximately with what today 

is considered the northern limit of Mesoamerica: the 

Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The southern region of Central 

America during this period offers only a few references to 

the use of orchids in ritual ceremonies of the indigenous 

cultures of northern Colombia, Panama and Costa Rica. 

During the colonial period and especially since the 

XVIII century, Guatemala became more and more the 

political and cultural center of the region. Important 

during this period are the works of Friar Francisco 

Ximénez and, above all, the arrival in Guatemala of the 

expedition of Sessé and Mociño. After independence 

from Spain, Chiapas was separated from the Captaincy 

General of Guatemala. Due to its annexation to 

Mexico, the northern border of Guatemala became the 

first artificial border in northern Central America. The 

botanical exploration of southeastern Mexico and the 

Yucatan peninsula, isolated from Guatemala as well 

as from Mexico itself for geographical and political 

reasons, was delayed until the late XIX century. 

The separation of Belize, that had become a British 

possession in the last third of the XVIII century, 

contributed to this problem. Something similar 

occurred to the south. Panama remained as a part of 

Colombia and its integration with the rest of Central 

America did not begin until the second half of the XIX 

century (Fig. 1A—B). 

Modern history of botanical exploration and of 

orchids in Central America, initiated by the botanists 

LANKESTERIANA 

LANKESTERIANA 9(1—2), August 2009. © Universidad de Costa Rica, 2009. 

of the expedition of Malaspina, continued during the 

first decades of the XIX century with the exploration 

by Cuming of the Pacific coast belt and the arrival of 

Skinner in Guatemala. It gained strength at the end of 

the first half of the century with the fortunate arrival of 

the illustrious trio formed by Oersted, von Warscewicz 

and Wendland. In the second half of the century, 

knowledge about our orchids grew in an accelerated 

form and experienced an enormous boom during the 

first decades of the XX century. The publications by 

Reichenbach (1866) and Hemsley (1883), and later 

Schlechter (1918), opened the eyes of the world to the 

richness of orchid diversity in Central America. 

Their place was taken by Standley and especially 

Ames after World War I. Ames, Hubbard and 

Schweinfurth published in 1936 a work of great 

importance at the generic level, The Genus Epidendrum 

in the United States and Middle America (Ames et 

al., 1936), but it was not until the first years of the 

second half of the XX century that a new attempt was 

made to see the orchids of Central America in a more 

phytogeographical than political context, with the 

publication by L. O. Williams of his Enumeration of 

the Orchidaceae of Central America, British Honduras 

and Panama (Williams, 1956), preceded some years 

before by The Orchidaceae of Mexico (Williams, 

1951). During the last decades of the XX century and at 

the beginning of the third millennium, the investigation 

of our orchids showed an increasing emphasis in the 

study of our natural regions. A higher awareness of the 

multiple threats to the conservation of our biodiversity 

contributed to generate a growing interest in studying 

orchids from an ecological and phytogeographical 

point of view. An example of this is the publication 

of the monumental Flora Mesoamericana (Missouri 

Botanical Garden, UNAM, Field Museum of Natural 

History, in press), preceded by works of smaller scale 

but no less importance, such as Field Guide to the 

Orchids of Costa Rica and Panama by Dressler (1993) 

and the Synopsis of the Orchid Flora of the Mexican 

Yucatan Peninsula by Carnevali et al. (2001). 

Our history has important gaps that cannot be 

avoided. Research on our species started in Guatemala 

with Mociño and continues there through the present 

days. After the travels by Oersted, von Warscewicz and 

Wendland, the orchid floras of Nicaragua, Costa Rica 

and Panama were brought into the light of day.

In Belize, the Botanical Station was founded in 1892 

and by 1899 there were already reports of 23 orchid 

species. However, it is surprising that for the combined 

territories of Honduras and El Salvador, Hemsley 

(1883) and Schlechter (1918) only mention a scarce 

dozen species. Knowledge of orchids of El Salvador 

began with the publication of the Lista preliminar de 

las plantas de El Salvador by Standley and Calderón 

(Standley & Calderón, 1925) and another 50 years had 

to pass until the publication of Las Orquídeas de El 

Salvador by Hamer (Hamer, 1974—1981). Honduras 

is still mostly unknown territory. With the exception of 

the few species mentioned by Ames in Standley’s Flora 

of the Lancetilla Valley (1931) and the work of L. O. 

Williams (1956), not one single work has ever been 

published about the orchids of this country. 

To summarize, the historical scope of this study 

covers the years from the beginning of formal botanical 

exploration (the arrival of the Malaspina expedition in 

Panama) to the present. It is preceded by two chapters 

about orchids during the prehispanic period and the 

first three centuries of Spanish rule. 

The geographical scope corresponds to the 

presently accepted concept of Mesoamerica, an area 

that reaches from the isthmus of Darien, in Panama 

(and that should probably include the northern regions 

of the Colombian departments of Chocó, Córdoba 

and Antioquía 1 to southeastern Mexico (the states of 

Yucatan, Quintana Roo, Campeche, Tabasco, Chiapas 

and the eastern regions of the states of Veracruz and 

Oaxaca). The area includes the Bay and Swan Islands 

in Honduras and Cocos Island in Costa Rica 2 . 

Political history of Central America 

ossenbaCh — Orchids and orchidology in Central America 

“Venient annis saecula seris quibus Oceanus, vincula 

rerum, laxet et ingens pateat telus tethysque novos 

detegat Orbes nec sit terris ultima Thule.” (“Years 

will come with the passing of the centuries when the 

Ocean, opening its barriers, will let us see a land of 

immense extension, a new world that will appear in 

the dominions of Thethis, and no longer shall Thule 

be the limit of the Universe”. 

Seneca, who was a Spaniard (54 B.C. – 39 A.C.) 

“I arrived at Cape Gracias a Dios 3 and from there our 

Lord gave me prosperous wind and current. This was on 

September 12” (Masiá, 1971: 247) Columbus described 

with these words, in the navigation log of his fourth 

voyage to America, the discovery of the coast of Central 

America, in what we call today Honduras. It was the 

year of 1502. Columbus continued south, touching land 

in Nicaragua and Costa Rica, and arriving finally in 

Veraguas (today Bay of Almirante, in Panama). From 

there he sailed to Jamaica. In 1504 he returned to Spain, 

where he died in poverty in 1506. Columbus is credited 

with the first recorded comment on canopy-adapted 

vegetation; he wrote that tropical trees “have a great 

variety of branches and leaves, all of them growing 

from a single root” (Benzing, 1971: 1). The land that 

Columbus had just discovered was inhabited, in the 

northern two thirds of Mesoamerica, by descendants of 

the ancient Mexican civilizations that had disappeared 

600 years earlier and were now under the influence of 

the Aztec Confederation, with its political center in 

Tenochtitlan, in the Valley of Mexico. Living together 

with dozens of other languages, nahuatl or dialects 

derived from it became a lingua franca that facilitated 

the cultural and commercial exchange between the 

nations of the area.The southern third of Mesoamerica 

had been settled by tribes whose culture and language 

originated in the Chibcha civilization of northern South 

America (Fig. 1C). 

The conquest of Central America began in 1508, with 

the expedition of Alonso de Ojeda and Diego de Nicuesa 

to Panama. During the next decades, while Pedrarias 

Dávila was governor of the new land, Panama was the 

point of origin for numerous penetrations to the North, 

during which the present territories of Costa Rica and 

Nicaragua were explored and conquered. In northern 

Mesoamerica, Hernán Cortés began his conquest of 

Mexico in 1519 that culminated victoriously when 

the Aztec Empire surrendered in 1521. Emperor 

Charles I created, in 1535, the first Vicekingdom on 

American soil with the name of New Spain. Pedro de 

Alvarado, lieutenant of Cortés, attempted from Mexico 

the conquest of the present territories of Guatemala, 

Honduras and El Salvador in 1524. The conquest was 

1 Quesada, R. (1980, Costa Rica, la frontera sur de Mesoamérica) defines the basin of the Atrato river in the Colombian Chocó as 

the “southern limit of southern Central America”. 

2 The term Mesoamerica is a subject of discussion. Attempting to define a region composed of countries that present a similar 

phytogeographical character and that have their origin in a common geological past, the term “Central America” was used until 


3

4 

successfully concluded in 1568, with the establishment 

of the Captaincy General of Guatemala that included 

Chiapas, Soconusco, Guatemala, El Salvador, Verapaz, 

Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. 

During the XVI Century, the history of Central 

America cannot be separated from that of Mexico. 

Beginning with the XVII Century however, although 

nominally dependant on the Vicekingdom of New 

Spain, the distance from the capital gave the Captaincy 

General of Guatemala more autonomy to establish 

relations with the mother country. 

In the south, Panama took a different course. After 

Vasco Núñez de Balboa discovered the Pacific Ocean 

in 1513 and Pizarro conquered the Inca Empire in 1533, 

Panama became the crossing point for all communications 

between Spain and the future Vicekingdom of Peru. The 

separation of Panama from the rest of Central America was 

consolidated in 1717, when Spain established in Santa Fe 

de Bogotá the Vicekingdom of New Granada, into which 

Panama was integrated. After the defeat of the Invincible 

Armada in 1588, Spain consumed herself in sterile wars 

against Great Britain and France. The growing British 

Empire gained commercial advantages and set foot in the 

LANKESTERIANA 


Caribbean, invading Jamaica in 1655. In 1673, through 

the Treaty of Paris, the Spanish allowed the British to 

log in a prescribed area of Belize (Miller Carlstroem & 

Miller, 2002: 13). The famous buccaneer and cartographer 

William Dampier alternated his life between logging in 

Belize and Honduras and plundering the Spanish fleets in 

the Caribbean between 1675 and 1688. 

France and Holland did not stay behind. From the 

Lesser Antilles to the Guyanas, Spain lost slowly the 

absolute control it had exercised during the XVI Century 

over the Caribbean and its coasts (Fig. 2A). 

The decadence of the Empire continued throughout 

the XVII Century. Without precious metals to offer to the 

crown, the Central American colonies languished under 

the Hapsburg kings Philip III, Philip IV and Charles II. 

Unable to beget an heir, the last monarch of the Hapsburg 

dynasty made his will, in 1700, in favor of Philip of 

Anjou, grandson of Louis XIV, King of France: with 

him, the house of Bourbon arrived at the throne of Spain 

(García de Cortázar & González Vesga, 1994: 337). 

Under Philip V (1700-1746) and Fernando VI (1746- 

1759), Spain attempted to reorganize the Empire. In 

the second half of the XVII Century the enlightened 

the first years of the XX century. This was the term used by Hemsley (1883) in his Biologia Centrali-Americana and Schlechter 

(1918) in his Kritische Aufzählung der bisher aus Zentral-Amerika bekanntgewordenen Orchidaceen. Both used the term in a very 

broad sense, including in their catalogues the species known from western Panama to the Río Grande, which marks the border 

between Mexico and the United States. Williams (1956) comes much closer to the geological and phytogeographical reality when 

he writes about the Orchidaceae of Central America, British Honduras and Panama, adding in his introduction that southeastern 

Mexico (to the isthmus of Tehuantepec) belongs biologically to Central America. Williams is the first to insinuate in the title of 

his work the political and historical differences of Panama and Belize with respect to the five Central American nations sensu 

strictu. In the last decades of the XX century the term “Mesoamerica” begins to gain adepts in our region, mainly through the 

publication of the Flora Mesoamericana by the Missouri Botanical Garden, as the region that comprises all of Panama through 

southeastern Mexico (states of Yucatan, Quintana Roo, Campeche, Tabasco, Chiapas and the eastern part of Veracruz and Oaxaca). 

The area includes the Swan and Bay Islands in Honduras and Cocos Island in Costa Rica. This definition is contradictory for various 

reasons. The northern limit is defined by a geological accident, the isthmus of Tehuantepec, an imaginary line that crosses 

the southeastern part of the Mexican states of Veracruz and Oaxaca. The southern limit is formed by the border between Panama 

and Colombia. If we accept the theory that Central America was probably an archipelago without continental connection with 

either North or South America (following Dressler, 1993), then we would accept the northern limit (Tehuantepec) but would 

have to establish the southern limit in its geological counterpart, the isthmus of Panama. But even the most superficial study 

about the distribution of plants in the region will show that, in phytogeographical terms, many species escape their geological 

limits. Therefore, these limits should be extended to the Colombian Chocó and northern Ecuador in the south and to the Mexican 

states of Michoacán, Mexico and Puebla in the north. Quesada (1980) defines the watershed of the Atrato River in the Colombian 

Chocó as the “southern limit of southern Central America”. To confuse things even more, the database of the Missouri Botanical 

Garden includes under “Mesoamerican specimens” all plants collected between northern Mexico and eastern Panama, returning 

curiously to the old definitions of Hemsley and Schlechter. To make matters worse, Jorge León (pers. com., 2003) is right in stating 

that Mesoamerica is not a geographical but a cultural term, that comprises the areas that in pre-Columbian times were under 

the influence of the ancient Maya civilization in Guatemala and Yucatan, as well as those that were dominated (centuries later) 

by those cultures that had their center of power in Mexico-Tenochtitlan. Those territories had their northern limit in the present 

Mexican states of Sinaloa, Zacatecas, San Luis Potosi, Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas and their southern limit in northwestern Costa 

Rica. Excluded from the term “Mesoamerica” in a cultural sense are the totality of Panama, most of Costa Rica and the Atlantic 

coast of Nicaragua and Honduras: territories that were under the influence of the Chibcha cultures of northern South America. 

3 Gracias a Dios, in English “Thanks to God”. Columbus gave this name to the cape after he had sailed over 70 days against a terrible storm.


A B 

C 

Figure 1. A — Map of the Pacific Coast of Central America and South Western Mexico. From Malaspina, 1990: 240. 

b — Map of the northern South American Pacific Coast and of Panama. From Malaspina, 1990: 240. C — Map of Central 

America showing the limits of the ancient Mesoamericancultures. In Carmack et al., 1996: 30. 


5

6 

A 

B 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 2. A – Map of Central America and the Caribbean (1675). In Dampier, 1998: 23. b – Political map of Central 

America. Magellan Geographix, 1992, Santa Barbara, California. 

LANKESTERIANA 9(1—2), August 2009. © Universidad de Costa Rica, 2009.

despotism penetrated the social sectors close to the 

crown. When Charles III became king (1759), the 

ideas of the Enlightenment gained force, pretending to 

reorganize the Spanish society on the foundations of 

utility, prosperity and happiness (García de Cortázar & 

González Vesga, 1994: 370). 

These new ideas, and the crumbling of the Spanish 

administrative apparatus under French occupation at the 

beginning of the XIX century, opened the way to the 

independence of the American colonies. On September 

15, 1821, the Captaincy General of Guatemala declared 

its independence from Spain, followed by Panama on 

November 28 of the same year. While Panama remained 

united to Colombia, the rest of Central America became 

part of the short lived Mexican Empire of Agustín de 

Iturbide. In 1823, the United Provinces of the Center 

of America were born. The Federation dissolved in 

1838, giving way to the present republics of Guatemala, 

Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Only 

Chiapas, historically part of the Captaincy of Guatemala, 

maintained its union with Mexico. 

The discovery of gold in California in 1848 brought 

thousands of adventurers who used the routes of the 

Isthmus of Panama and the San Juan River in Nicaragua 

as the shortest way between Atlantic and Pacific. An 

interest in the region woke up that led William Walker, 

with the support of pro-slavery North Americans, to 

take possession of Nicaragua, threatening to expand his 

dominions to the rest of Central America. Following 

several military campaigns, Walker was finally defeated 

and executed in Honduras, in 1860. 

In 1903, North American interests in the construction 

of an interoceanic canal led, on November 3, to the 

separation of Panama from Colombia. While U.S. naval 

forces prevented the Colombian army from intervening, 

the United States recognized the new republic officially 

on the 13 of the same month. Five days later, the Hay- 

Bunau Varilla Treaty was signed, in which Panama 

ceded the strip of its territory through which the future 

canal was to be built, in perpetuity to the United States. 

In Belize, the battle of Saint George’s Caye, in 1798, 

marked the beginning of full British control, although the 

territory did not become a colony of the crown until 1871, 

under the name of British Honduras. In 1973 it changed 

its name to Belize, and despite the protests of Guatemala, 

who claimed it as part of its territory, on September 21, 

1981, Belize officially became an independent nation, 


but it remains a member of the British Commonwealth 

(Miller Carlstroem & Miller, 2002: 14). 

After almost 500 years, Central America had finally 

reached its present political configuration (Fig. 2B). 

Central America: biodiversity and phytogeography 

“The world is so large and beautiful, and has 

such a diversity of things so different one from 

the other, that it brings admiration to all who 

think and contemplate it well”. 

(Francisco López de Gómara, 1982) 

Few regions in the world can compete with Central 

America in floristic diversity. This diversity can only 

be understood through the study of its phytogeography. 

The great number of microclimates in a territory of 

barely 650.000 square kilometers (slightly more than 

the area of Spain), has produced, in the case of the 

Orchidaceae, almost 3,000 different species in the 

Central American area, approximately one tenth of all 

species known worldwide. Ossenbach et al., (2007), 

indicate a total of 2,670 species for the region. 

The Panama land bridge -here considered to be the 

Isthmus of Panama and all the land northward to the 

Isthmus of Tehuantepec in the Republic of Mexico- is 

one of the most interesting and challenging parts of 

this planet to study with regard to questions of past and 

present biogeography. This is the only extant land bridge 

of biogeographical significance, and in past geological 

times its importance as a passageway for flora and fauna 

between continents may have been equaled only by the 

Bering land bridge (D’Arcy & Correa, 1985: 117). 

Friar Bartolomé de las Casas in his General History of 

the Indies (chapter XLII) makes reference to Columbus’s 

astonishment when first seeing the trees loaded with 

epiphytes: “He saw there many trees, very different from 

those in Castilla, and they had the branches in many 

different manners, and all from one trunk or one stem, 

and one branchlet in one form and the next in other, so 

that it was the greatest marvel of the world, such was 

the diversity from one to the other, and those were not 

grafted, because the Indians did not cure them ...” (cited 

in Masiá, 1971: 223). 

Alexander von Humboldt was a pioneer when he 

wrote, in 1807, about the relationship between climate and 

vegetation. For this he has been called, with justice, the 

“Father of Plant Geography”. Richard B. Hinds, surgeon 


7

8 

on board of H.M.S Sulphur, who explored the Pacific 

coast of Central America between 1836 and 1842, wrote 

in 1843 about The regions of vegetation (Hinds, 1843, 

cited in Jörgensen, 2003: 5). Schlechter cites Galeotti, 

who in 1844, divided the climatic zones in Mexico in 

“warm regions”, “temperate regions”, “temperate regions 

rich in Cactaceae” and “cold regions” (Schlechter, 1918: 

332). Somewhat later, Anders S. Oersted, who visited 

Central America and the Caribbean about the middle of 

the XIX Century, illustrated the vegetational zones of a 

tropical island taking Jamaica as an example (Fig. 3A). 

The phytogeography of Central America in general 

has been considered by Grisebach, in 1884, based on 

a few personal and a lot of foreign observations, in his 

work Vegetation der Erde. Andreas Schimper published 

his classic Plant geography upon a physiological basis 

(Schimper, 1898). Richer in regional information than 

the phytogeography of Grisebach (1872), Schimper’s 

book divides the region from Mexico to Colombia into 

monsoon rain forests, thin and monsoon forests, and 

xerophilic vegetation (woodland savannas) (Gómez, 

1986: 13). The progress in phytogeographical knowledge 

in the XX Century is described by G. S. Hartshorn who, 

in the case of Costa Rica 4 says: “The first essays for 

the description of the phytogeography of Costa Rica 

highlight a few floristic regions, based mainly on altitude. 

Pittier recognizes three altitudinal bands: (1) a basal 

zone from sea level to 1,000 m, with a mean temperature 

between 28º and 21º C; (2) a montane or intermediate 

zone from 1,000 m to 2,600 m with a mean temperature 

between 21º and 14º C; and (3) a superior or Andine zone 

above 2,600 m with mean annual temperatures between 

15º and 5º C” (Hartshorn, cited in Janzen, 1991: 120). 

In a very comprehensive essay about the phytogeographical 

regions of Costa Rica, Wercklé described four 

regions: (1) the Atlantic or Caribbean region from sea 

level to 800 m; (2) The Pacific region, from sea level 

to 800 m; (3) the temperate region from 800 to 1,500 

m; (4) the cold region above 1,500 m. (Wercklé, 1909). 

Standley followed the phytogeographical divisions 

of Wercklé, but affirmed that the cold region had to 

be subdivided into a low and a high band. In addition, 

Standley was the first to point to the difficulty consisting 

in assigning one single altitudinal limit to a particular 

type of vegetation (Standley, 1937-38). 

LANKESTERIANA 


Some decades later, L. R. Holdridge, who lived for 

long years in Costa Rica, proposed in 1947 his system of 

“Life Zones” (Fig. 3B) in which he assigned a primary 

importance to temperature and rainfall and considered the 

fluctuation and distribution of these climatic parameters 

as the main determinants of the vegetation of the world. 

The vegetation of each life zone has a physiognomy and 

a particular structure that are present every time that 

similar bioclimatic conditions occur (Holdridge, 1947). 

To describe and illustrate in a simple manner the 

Central American phytogeographical regions, we follow 

Smith and Johnston (1945: 11) who, oversimplifying, 

define for the region three basic zones: (1) the tropical or 

subtropical rainforest; (2) the tropical deciduous forest; 

y (3) the montane zone (Fig. 3C). 

Tropical or subtropical rainforest: this zone extends 

along the Atlantic coast, from Panama in the South 

to the Yucatán peninsula in the North, although we 

find similar forests in some points of the Pacific coast 

(Darién in Panama, Osa peninsula in Costa Rica). It 

corresponds to the “tierra caliente Atlántica” (= Atlantic 

warm region) of Standley. The vegetation is determined 

by high temperatures and rainfall and alluvial soils. On 

its western limits, the rainforest ascends the mountain 

sides until it merges with the premontane forest. A 

certain monotony in the climatic conditions along the 

year may be the cause for a relatively low biodiversity. 

In Central America we find in this zone approximately 

25% of all orchid species that are known for the region. 

However, all generalizations are dangerous. As Smith 

and Johnston warn, it is not to be assumed that the 

rain-forests thus outlined are uniform in constitution. 

On the contrary, they disclose a high degree of local 

differentiation, being grouped together only because of 

a superficial resemblance and because they are acted 

upon by more or less similar climatic forces (Smith & 

Johnston, 1945: 14). This is equally valid for all other 

phytogeographical zones. 

Tropical deciduous forest: for Central America, 

this zone extends along the Pacific coastline and is 

characteristic because of its two well differentiated 

seasons. It corresponds to the “tierra caliente Pacífica” 

(= Pacific warm region) of Standley. The appearance 

of the vegetation undergoes striking changes during 

the year. It is the zone where the variety of orchids is 

4 Although each of the countries in the region shows phytogeographical differences, it is valid to generalize for Mesoamerica using 

Costa Rica as a model.

A 

B 

C 


Figure 3. A — Illustration by Oersted (1857) of the vegetational zones in Jamaica. In Verdoorn, 1945, p. xiv. B — “Life 

Zones” of L. R Holdridge. In Hall & Pérez Brignoli, 2001: 23. C — Phytogeographical regions of Central America after 

Smith & Johnston, 1945: 12. 


9

10 

smallest, with only about 15% of all species, those that 

have evolved to support periods of drought that can last 

up to eight months. 

Montane zone: this zone is formed by the mountain 

ranges that cross Central America from Northwest to 

Southeast, forming the backbone of the subcontinent. 

It corresponds to Standley’s “tierra templada” (= 

temperate region) and “tierra fría” (= cold region). Well 

developed temperate forests, characterized by oak and 

pine, are found in the central highlands of Guatemala 

and Honduras and south to northern Nicaragua. Many 

elements in the temperate flora of southern Mexico 

and Central America appear to have migrated from 

northern centers. South of Nicaragua the temperate flora 

appears to have more affinity with that of the northern 

Andes in South America (Smith & Johnston, 1945: 

17). Schlechter places the limit between the Andine 

and the North-American influence zones in Guatemala 

(Schlechter, 1918: 332). Sapper, however, affirms that: 

“Although this forest in its general character, with its 

diverse gigantic and luxuriant trees, its rich variety of 

orchids … reminded me completely of the similar and 

humid forests of Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua, 

it produced however a strange impression, because these 

species of plants are generally different from those of 

my adoptive motherland, Guatemala, since the region of 

the South American flora begins in Costa Rica” (Sapper, 

1902: 83). The biodiversity in the temperate regions, 

especially in what is commonly known as “rainforest”, 

is amazing. 60% or more of all orchid species known in 

Mesoamerica are found at elevations of over 900 m. In 

an example that is not exceptional, Pupulin et al. counted 

39 species and 504 individuals of Orchidaceae in one 

single tree at San Ramón Forest Reserve, Costa Rica, at 

1,350 m above sea level (Pupulin et al., 1995: 49). 

The “páramos” (= high, bare and cold regions of 

tropical South America) in Costa Rica deserve special 

mention. Although almost no orchids are found in this 

region, they represent the northern limit of the Andine 

‘páramo’, today restricted to the highest peaks of the 

Cordillera de Talamanca. Their peculiar vegetation can 

not be found elsewhere in Central America. 

The importance of phytogeographical differentiation 

and its relation to biodiversity is clear. If we compare 

LANKESTERIANA 


the totals of species of Orchidaceae in each of the 

Central American countries, and using Standley’s 

terminology, we will find that Costa Rica, Panama 

and Guatemala, where the “tierra templada” is larger 

in proportion to the total area of the national territory, 

have the highest numbers of species. Belize, Honduras 

and Nicaragua follow, with a larger proportion of 

“tierra caliente Atlántica” and total numbers of species 

that are significantly lower. El Salvador, finally, has the 

smallest number of species and this corresponds with 

the largest proportion of “tierra caliente Pacífica”. 

orchIds In The prehIspanIc perIod 

“Then they ordered the Creation and the growth 

of the trees and vines and the birth of life and the 

creation of man”. 

Popol Vuh, XVI Century 5 

The area of influence of the Chibcha culture. The 

Chibcha culture extended its influence from Colombia 

to the North, reaching Panama, Costa Rica (with the 

exception of the Nicoya peninsula) and part of the 

eastern coast of Nicaragua (the Coast of the Miskitos) 

and Honduras. There are no written documents that 

could explain the relations of the indigenous population 

of southern Central America with nature in prehispanic 

times. However, archaeology has discovered what could 

be the first representations of orchids before Columbus. 

Pieces of golden jewelry, dating probably from the VIII 

Century (A. C.), and found in the valley of El General, 

Costa Rica, that are popularly known as eagles or 

vultures, show a surprising resemblance to the labellum 

of Oncidium cebolleta (Jacq.) Sw. Costa Rican naturalist 

Anastasio Alfaro (1865-1951) was the first to observe 

this likeness. While describing Oncidium cebolleta, 

Alfaro says: “… the sepals and petals are spotted with 

brown and are so small that two of them hide behind the 

labellum; this resembles a small eagle cast in gold, of 

sixteen millimeters, pure yellow with the crown spotted 

red-brown.” (Alfaro, 1935: 19) ( Fig. 4A). 

Atwood and Mora de Retana confirm Alfaro’s 

observation: “In the Museo Nacional and Gold Museum 

at San José are exhibited numerous gold artifacts 

labeled as águilas (eagles) and zopilotes (vultures), 

5 The Popol Vuh, or ‘Book of the Community’ of the Mayans, was written in the language of the Quiché shortly after the Spanish 

conquest, with the help of the Latin alphabet, and translated into Spanish in the first years of the XVIII Century by friar Francisco 

Ximénez (1666-1729).

ut we believe that they resemble the animated lips of 

Oncidium cebolleta. The general shape is consistent 

with this orchid, and the use of gold seems appropriate. 

More convincingly, some of the artifacts are life-size 

and others display what can be interpreted as the typical 

callus of the orchid animated as the belly and claws 

of a bird.” And they continue: “Oncidium cebolleta is 

known to have been used by pre-Columbian Americans 

in Mexico, perhaps as a hallucinogenic drug. In view of 

these observations, we believe that the significance of 

the gold artifacts needs to be reconsidered” (Atwood & 

Mora de Retana, 1992: text to plate 1467) (Fig. 4B). And 

Lawler confirms: “Oncidium cebolleta (Jacq.) Sw.: The 

alkaloid-containing orchid is an important replacement 

for peyote among the Taraumaras of México and may be 

hallucinogenic”. 

The Bribrí Indians from Costa Rica and Panama call 

this species sulër kili (“symbol of the spear”) and use it 

as a medicine against heartache. “They cut the plant in 

little pieces, then crush it and seeth it; let it cool. Adults 

must drink half a glass and infants one spoonful, 

three times a day” (García Segura, 1994: 52). In the 

language of the Cabecar, it is called suLègLi and they 

say it cures colics. “You crush three stems, put them in 

cold water and drink the juice, without heating it. You 

must drink it every now and then, until your stomach 

feels better” (Palmer, 1992: 104). From the fact that 

the pre-Columbian goldsmiths represented precisely 

this orchid can be inferred that they gave it a special, 

possibly sacred value. Oncidium cebolleta, a species 

that is found from Mexico to northern South America, 

contains alkaloids with hallucinogenic properties, and 

my conclusion is that this orchid played an important 

part in indigenous rituals. 

Hernando Colón, in the account of his father’s fourth 

voyage, written in 1521, describes the interchange 

between the Indians of Cariay (today Port Limón, 

Costa Rica) and the Spaniards: “Seeing that we were 

men of peace, they showed great desire to obtain 

things from us in exchange for their own, which were 

arms, cotton blankets and shirts, and small eagles of 

guanines 6 which they carried hanging from their necks, 

in the same way we carry the Agnus Dei or any other 

relic” (Incer, 1990: 46). From the account of Hernando 

Colón we may deduct again the religious importance 

of the eagles in the culture of those Indians. 

6 Guanines: gold of low fineness alloyed with copper. 


We have information from another culture, close 

to that of the Chibchas that utilized hallucinogenic 

fungi that seems to confirm this theory: “The Sinú 

culture of Colombia (from 1200 to 1600) has yielded 

many enigmatic gold pectorals with mushroom-like 

representations. They may imply the existence of a cult 

using these intoxicating fungi… Many of the pectorals 

have winglike structures, possibly signifying magic 

flight, a frequent characteristic of hallucinogenic 

intoxication” (Schultes et al., 1992: 65). In the Darién, 

the border region between Panama and Colombia, 

the Choco Indians still mix the flowers of Cycnoches 

tonduzii Schltr. with genipab (= Genipa americana 

L., from the Rubiaceae) and rub the mixture on their 

hands to bring luck to the fishermen (Duke, 1956: 

194). Finally, Donald Beaton, gardener of Sir William 

Middleton, quotes George U. Skinner in a letter to 

John Lindley (April 24, 1841): “Laelia superbiens ... is 

one of the few plants whose magnificent flowers attract 

the notice of the Indians of Panama; they carry it about 

with them, and plant it before their doors...”. 

The northern region of Central America before the 

Spanish conquest 

“Zan tlaocolxochitl, tlaocolcuicatl on mani 

Mexico nican ha in Tlatilolco, in yece ye oncan on 

neiximachoyan, ohuaya.” 

(“Only sad flowers, sad songs, are here in Mexico, in 

Tlatilolco, in this place these alone are known, alas” 

in Brinton, 1890: 82-83) 

The zeal of the Catholic Church in its efforts to 

christianize the indigenous populations led to the 

destruction of hundreds of documents that could 

have thrown light on many unknown aspects of the 

prehispanic history and culture of these people. One 

of the saddest episodes occurred in the village of Mani 

(Yucatan) in 1562, when the infamous Franciscan 

Diego de Landa (1524-1579) presided over an Auto 

de Fe in which he caused to be burned some 5,000 

idols and 27 rolls of Maya codices, which he could 

not read and described as “work of the devil”. “We 

found a great number of books... and since they 

only contained superstitions and perfidies of the 

devil, we burned them all...” (Landa, 1978). Eduardo 

Galeano remembers the moment in a dramatic way: 


11

12 

“Fray Diego de Landa throws into the flame, one 

after the other, the books of the Mayans. The inquisitor 

curses Satan, and the fire crackles and devours. Around 

the incinerator, heretics howl with their heads down. 

Hung by their feet, flayed with whips, Indians are doused 

with boiling wax as the fire flares and the books snap, 

as if complaining. Tonight, eight centuries of Mayan 

literature turn to ashes. On these long sheets of bark 

paper, signs and images spoke: they told of work done 

and days spent, of the dreams and wars of a people born 

before Christ... In the center, the inquisitor burns the 

books. Around the huge bonfire, he chastises the readers. 

Meanwhile, the authors, artist-priests dead years or 

centuries ago, drink chocolate in the fresh shade of the 

first tree of the world. They are at peace, because they 

died knowing that memory cannot be burned. Will not 

what they painted be sung and danced through the times 

of the times?” (Galeano, 1985: 137) (Fig. 4C). 

After most of the Mayan manuscripts were lost, our 

remaining sources of information about the knowledge 

and use of orchids by the inhabitants of prehispanic 

northern Central America come to us from the Aztec 

world, whose center of power, Tenochtitlan, lies outside 

of the geographic area of our present study. However, 

several arguments speak in favor of establishing a valid 

relationship between the information that we have from 

the Aztec world and the knowledge that the peoples 

from other parts of Central America had about orchids: 

a) Aztec knowledge about orchids had been 

transmitted to them by the preceding civilizations, 

especially the Maya. The fact that most species of 

Orchidaceae known and used by the Aztecs are 

found in areas that, until today, still show strong 

evidence of the ancient Maya culture gives strength 

to this argument. The following is the geographical 

distribution in the ancient Maya regions of some of 

the species known by the Aztecs: 

• Arpophyllum spicatum La Llave & Lex.: Veracruz, 

Oaxaca, Chiapas, Guatemala 

• Artorima erubescens (Lindl.) Dressler & Pollard: 

Oaxaca 

• Bletia campanulata La Llave & Lex.: Oaxaca, 

Guatemala 

• Catasetum integerrimum Hooker: Veracruz, 

Campeche, Chiapas, Guatemala 

• Euchile citrina (La Llave & Lex.) Withner: 

Veracruz, Oaxaca 

LANKESTERIANA 


• Encyclia pastoris (La Llave & Lex.) Schltr.: 

Veracruz, Oaxaca 

• Govenia liliacea (La Llave & Lex.) Lindl.: 

Chiapas, Guatemala 

• Govenia superba (La Llave & Lex.) Lindl.: 

Veracruz, Guatemala 

• Laelia anceps Lindl.: Veracruz, Oaxaca, 

Guatemala 

• Laelia autumnalis Lindl.: Oaxaca 

• Laelia speciosa (Kunth) Schltr.: Veracruz, Oaxaca 

• Myrmecophila tibicinis (Batem.) Rolfe: Yucatán, 

Quintana Roo, Guatemala 

• Vanilla planifolia Andrews: Veracruz, Oaxaca, 

Yucatán, Quintana Roo, Guatemala 

b) The Mexican tribes extended their cultural and 

economical influence to regions as distant from 

its political center as the Lake of Nicaragua or the 

Nicoya Peninsula in Costa Rica, long before the 

arrival of the Spanish conquerors. In his account of 

the archaeological explorations of Carl Bovallius on 

an island in the Lake of Nicaragua in 1882, Linné 

comments: “The Mexican colony that has been 

found in the neighborhood left few traces, but the 

strangers who came from so far enriched the art of 

these regions with the Feathered Serpent and other 

demons” (Linné, S., 1960: 126). Dr. A. Chapman 

comments that the long distance trade of these 

merchants [the Aztecs] had the Mayans as main 

partners, but that they traveled as far as the border 

between Costa Rica and Panama (Chapman, 1959). 

Braswell gives numerous examples to demonstrate 

the interaction between the Mayans of the classical 

period and the Mexican cultures before the Aztecs 

(Braswell, 2003). Coe affirms that elements of 

the Maya culture had penetrated to the center of 

Mexico during the turbulent times at the end of the 

classical period (Coe & Coe, 1996: 71). The Aztec 

knowledge of the medicinal and economical uses 

of many orchid species, inherited in part from the 

Mayans, spread thus throughout Central America. 

The most important source for the understanding of 

Aztec knowledge about plants and nature is, without 

doubt, friar Bernardino de Sahagún (1499?-1590), 

whose work is recognized as the main chronicle of the 

prehispanic period (Fig. 4D). He arrived in Mexico 

in 1529, as an instructor at the Imperial College of


A B 

C D 

Figure 4. A — Oncidium cebolleta (Jacq.) Sw.: comparison between the labellum and a golden “eagle” of the Costa Rican 

Indians. Illustration by P. Casasa. B — Don Pedro, last Indian king from the Talamanca region in Costa Rica, decorated with 

the ‘eagles’. From the book Costa Rica en Blanco y Negro: 1880-1950, published by the Banco Nacional de Costa Rica, 

1998. C — Guatemala: Mayan hieroglyphs on the famous ‘Leyden-plate’. In http://users.skynet.be/fa039055/forgtgtm. 

htm. The Leyden-plate is a jadeite plaque, engraved on both sides, showing Mayan hieroglyphs and numbers. It was found 

in 1864 in Guatemala. D — Bernardino de Sahagún (1499?-1590). In Catholic Encyclopedia, 2003. 


13

14 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 5. A — Arrival of the Spaniards in Mexico. Florentine Codex. B — Ix chel, the Maya goddess of medicine. Dresden 

Codex. C — Plant of tzacutli, Florentine Codex. Dibble & Anderson, 1963, fig. 665. D — tzacuxóchitl xiuitl (Bletia 

campanulata), Florentine Codex. Dibble & Anderson, 1963, fig. 721b. 


B

Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco (Gómez-Pompa, 1993: 29) 

and dedicated the rest of his life to the observation 

and study of the customs, language and history of its 

ancient people. Since 1540 he dedicated himself with 

intelligence, method and perseverance to the great work 

of his life: the study of the things of Mexico before the 

arrival of Cortés. Between 1547 and 1577 he wrote the 

History of the things of New Spain (Sahagún, 1988). 

“With the permanent help of old men, of his trilingual 

students (Nahuatl, Spanish and Latin) and of scribes, he 

compiled and described everything about the life of the 

ancient Mexicans.... ” (Ballán, 1991: 260). “Schemes of 

friars of his same order moved King Philip II to collect 

all versions and copies of Sahagún’s work, fearing that 

the Indians would remain attached to their beliefs if 

they were preserved in their native tongue. Following 

this order, Sahagún handed over to his superior, friar 

Rodrigo de Sequera, a copy in Spanish and Mexican. 

This version was taken by father Sequera to Europe in 

1580 and is today known as the Manuscript or Copy of 

Sequera, identified as the Florentine Codex” (Tudela, 

1952: 1092). It is beautifully illustrated and owes its 

name to the Medicea Laurenziana Library of Florence, 

where it is conserved (Fig. 5A). The work of Sahagún 

has an extraordinary value because it describes the 

customs and uses of the Aztecs based on witnesses who 

had lived in the century before the Spanish conquest. 

It is in volume XI (Animals, plants and minerals of the 

Indian geography), where we find most information 

about the knowledge and use of orchids by the ancient 

Aztecs (Dibble & Anderson, 1963). All authors who 

have subsequently studied this period have used 

Sahagún as a primary source of reference. 

Orchids in the cultures of Mayans and Aztecs. Called 

by the Mayans sisbic and by the Aztecs tlilxóchitl 

or mecaxóchitl, interest in vanilla (Vanilla planifolia 

Andrews) began in the indigenous prehispanic world 

and continues to our days. Therefore, we will only 

mention vanilla here as a fundamental species in the 

prehispanic orchidology of Central America. We will 

refer to it later in a more extensive form (see next 

chapter, “The history of Vanilla”) (Fig. 5B). 

Besides vanilla, the inhabitants of prehispanic 

Central America used other orchids as medicinal 

plants. Catasetum maculatum, was used among the 

Mayans in Yucatan to heal sores and tumors (Appel 


Kunow, 2003: 115). Balick et al. (2000) mention also 

the medicinal use given by the Mayans in Belize to 

Lockhartia pittieri Schltr., Oncidium cebolleta and 

Sobralia fragans Lindl. (Balick et al., 2000: 163, 

170). Among the Aztecs, Arpophyllum spicatum and 

Encyclia pastoris, were used against dysentery, as 

was years later documented by Francisco Hernández 

(Hágsater et al., 2006: 41). The bulbs of Euchile 

citrina were applied on infected wounds, and infusions 

of Laelia autumnalis were a remedy against cough. 

Also important was the use of several species that 

contain mucilaginous substances to prepare agglutinating 

or adhesive products. “... preferred for its mucilaginous 

characteristics is Encyclia pastoris” (García Peña & 

Peña, 1981: 62), known in Nahuatl as tzacutli. Sahagún 

describes it as follows: “The branches are slender. It 

has stems. Its root is sticky; this is named tzacutli. It is 

an adhesive. I glue it.” (Fig. 5C). “To prepare it, they 

cut the pseudobulbs in slices and dried them in the sun; 

then they stored them and, when the time was right, 

they soaked them in water to dissolve the mucilage and 

give it different uses. This process was in the hands of 

apprentices” (García Peña & Peña, 1981: 62). Tzacutli 

was used as a glue to prepare feather ornaments for 

the robes of the priests and as a mordent for pigments. 

Other species of orchids used with the same purpose 

were: Bletia campanulata (Fig. 5D):“Its foliage is like 

that of the tzacutli. It is tall. [Its blossoms] are chili red, 

rose, dark blue. It is tender, very tender...” (Dibble & 

Anderson, 1963: 211), B. coccinea La Llave & Lex., 

Cranichis speciosa La Llave & Lex., C. tubularis La 

Llave & Lex., Govenia liliacea, G. superba and Laelia 

autumnalis. “Laelia autumnalis and Laelia speciosa, 

were and are still used in the fabrication of candies during 

the festivities of the Day of all Souls; it is probable that 

this practice was not customary in prehispanic times 

but only after the arrival of the Spaniards” (García 

Peña & Peña, 1981: 63). Among the Mayans, the 

pseudobulbs of Myrmecophila tibicinis were used as help 

during childbirth and employed as trumpets and flutes 

(Arditti, 1992: 637). Bateman, in 1838, called this plant 

Epidendrum tibicinis, referring to the Latin word tibicen, 

or trumpeter (Miller, 1959: 353) (Fig. 6A). 

But not everything in life is utilitarian. Richard Evans 

Schultes wrote in 1992: “The role that horticulture has 

played in the ethnobotanical employment of plants is 

not often recognized. It is quite generally presumed that 


15

16 

aboriginal peoples usually do not cultivate plants merely 

to beautify their surroundings. The opposite is true in 

many, if not most societies. In a number of instances, 

it is probable that the species were first ornamentally 

valued but were eventually found to be of more practical 

value as foods, medicines, narcotics, poisons or for other 

economic applications” (cited in Griffiths, 1992). Other 

sources confirm what Schultes said. Nuttall mentions 

the following example: “The most important of all 

the ancient gardens of Mexico was that of Huaxtepec 

which Montezuma had inherited from his predecessor, 

Montezuma the Elder. Placing Pinotetl as the principal 

overseer, he first restored its waterways and then 

dispatched messengers to the tropical coastal region 

with a request to the Lord of Cuetlaxtla for plants with 

roots of the vanilla orchid, of cacao and magnolia trees 

and many valuable vegetables” (Nuttall, 1923: 454). 

Alvarado Tezozomoc, in his Crónica Mexicana, gives 

us a detailed description of the gardens of Huaxtepec. 

According to him, the most primitive gardens of the 

Nahuas were the artificial islands and peninsulas that 

were constructed in lagoons (Alvarado Tezozomoc, 

1873). Additional information has been furnished by 

the accounts of Doctor Cervantes de Salazar, whose 

chronicle of Mexico was published in 1565: “In these 

flower gardens Montezuma did not allow any vegetables 

and fruits to be grown, saying that it was not kingly to 

cultivate plants for utility or profit in his pleasance. He 

said that vegetable gardens and orchards were for slaves 

and merchants” (Nuttall, Z., 1923). Antonio de Solís 

indicates that Moctezuma “did not like fruit trees nor 

eatable plants in his recreations, but said that orchards 

were possessions of ordinary people, seeming more 

proper of princes the delight without utility. All were 

flowers of rare diversity and fragrance [...] bringing into 

his gardens all the genera produced by the benignity of 

those lands” (Solís, 1970: 195) (Fig. 6B). 

Bateman, citing Francisco Hernández, indicates the 

same: “... for Hernández assures us, that in Mexico the 

Indian chiefs set the highest value on their blossoms 

[the orchids], for the sake of their great beauty, strange 

figure, and delightful perfume...” (Bateman, 1837- 

43: 2). Stanhopea hernandezii (Kunth) Schltr. and S. 

tigrina Batem., had great ornamental value during 

the prehispanic period, and were called by the Aztecs 

coatzontecoxóchitl or coatzontemacoxóchitl, because 

their flowers resemble serpent heads: “It is like the head 

LANKESTERIANA 


of a serpent; that is the way it is by nature” (Dibble 

& Anderson, 1963: 211) (Fig. 6C). “[S. hernandezii] 

is sought by the Indian Princes because of its beauty 

and elegance.” (Hágsater et al., 2005: 40). “From 

cozticcoatzontecoxochitl, which some authors have 

identified as Prosthechea citrina, Hernández tells us that 

‘the flowers are used to adorn the wreaths, garlands and 

bouquets whose use is so frequent among the Indians” 

(Hágsater et al., 2005: 41). Artorima erubescens, Laelia 

anceps, L. autumnalis, L. speciosa and Oncidium spp. 

were also used ornamentally (Tab. 1). 

In his notes on the classification of plants by the 

Aztecs, Gates says: “The ornamental plants, the 

flowers or xochitl, made another grand division, often 

with definition of the odor, although beauty was the 

desired feature, even with no odor... Among the 

orchids, coa-tzonteco-xochitl, snake-head flower, an 

Anguloa; another is yellow, the coztic-coa-tzontecoxochitl, 

of the Sobralia” (Gates, 2000). Finally, Acosta 

writes that “the Indians are great friends of flowers and 

in New Spain more than anywhere else in the world…” 

(Acosta, 2003: 265). 

Two centuries later, Friar Francisco Ximénez was 

one of the first to describe the epiphytic growth of 

orchids. In one of his manuscripts, dated in 1722, we 

find a beautiful example of the ornamental value they 

had for the Mayans in Guatemala: “All those flowers, 

although many and diverse, all of them agree to grow 

from little onions, whose roots stick to the bark of the 

oaks as if they were deeply rooted in the earth and they 

grow some leaves somewhat thick, but all different 

from the others. And those little onions taken from 

those trees are transplanted by many Indians to their 

houses, sticking them to another tree and there it roots 

and is conserved and gives its flower. And so they have 

the trees of their houses full of different flowers that 

they bring from the forest” (Ximénez, 1967: 313). 

The history of Vanilla. As a constituent of the native 

flora, Vanilla planifolia occurs naturally in the moist, 

tropical forests of eastern and southern Mexico, Central 

America, and northern South America. In Mexico, 

its northern limits are found in central Veracruz near 

the Gulf Coast, and in Michoacán or Colima on the 

Pacific. The true vanilla now found growing wild 

in parts of the West Indies probably represents an 

escape from cultivation of vines introduced during the


Table 1 – List of the orchids known by Central American Indians during the prehispanic period, with their uses and 

vernacular names. Compiled from García Peña & Peña (1981), Wright (1958), Ximénez (1967), Balick et al. (2000), and 

Appel Kunow (2003). 

Botanical name Vernacular name Language Use 

Arpophyllum spicatum La Llave & Lex. tzauhxilotl Nahuatl Against dysentery 

Artorima erubescens (Lindl.) Dressler & Pollard güitzl Zapotec Ornamental 

Bletia campanulata La Llave & Lex. tzacuxóchitl xiuitl Nahuatl Adhesive 

Ornamental 

Against dysentery 

Bletia coccinea Lex. tonalxóchitl Nahuatl Adhesive 

Ornamental 

Catasetum integerrimum Hook. chitcuuc Maya Adhesive 

Mordent for pigments 

Catasetum maculatum Kunth chitcuuc Maya To cure wounds and tumors 

Cranichis speciosa La Llave & Lex. atzautli Nahuatl Against dysentery 

Adhesive 


Cranichis tubularis La Llave & Lex. acaltzauhtli Nahuatl Adhesive 


Encyclia pastoris (La Llave & Lex.) Schltr. tzacutli Nahuatl Against dysentery 

Adhesive 


Euchile citrina (La Llave & Lex.) Withner cozticoatzontecoxóchitl / auroriqua Nahuatl Treatment of infected wounds 

Govenia liliacea (La Llave & Lex.) Lindl. iztactepetzacuxóchitl Nahuatl Adhesive 


Govenia superba (La Llave & Lex.) Lindl. cozticzacatzacuxóchitl Nahuatl Adhesive 


Laelia anceps Lindl. tzicxóchitl / güichila Nahuatl Ornamental 

Laelia autumnalis (La Llave & Lex.) Lindl. chichiltictepetzacuxóchitl Nahuatl Against cough 

Adhesive 

Ornamental 

Laelia speciosa (Kunth) Schltr. itzmaqua Nahuatl Ornamental 

Lockhartia pittieri Schltr. Medicinal 

Myrmecophila tibicinis (Batem.) Rolfe dac kisin Maya Help during childbirth 

hom-ikim Maya Employed as trumpets 

and flutes 

Oncidium cebolleta (Jacq.) Sw. sulër kili Bribrí Medicinal 

suLègLi Cabécar Hallucinogenic 

Oncidium spp. ru xiquín tucur / ru xiquín choy Maya Ornamental 

Sobralia fragans Lindl. te-lum-pim Maya Medicinal 

Stanhopea hernandezii (Kunth) Schltr. coatzontecoxóchitl Nahuatl Against tiredness 

Ornamental 

Stanhopea tigrina Batem. coatzontemacoxóchitl Nahuatl Ornamental 

chichiltic tepetllavhochitz 

Vanilla planifolia Andrews mecaxóchitl Nahuatl Flavoring 

tlilxóchitl Nahuatl To aid digestion 

sisbic Maya Cordial 

zacanatum shanat Totonac Appetizer 

Aphrodisiac 

Diuretic 

Ritual 


17

18 

colonial period. (Bruman, 1948: 361). Oersted wrote, 

around 1846, that vanilla dominated among the orchids 

of the Atlantic region of Costa Rica (Oersted, 1863). 

The Olmecs (ca. 1500 A. C. – 400 D. C.) who “not 

only engendered Mesoamerica but also brought forth 

the first Mesoamerican empire” (Mann, 2006: 235), 

possibly transferred to the Mayans the use of the seeds 

of cacao (kakawa) for the preparation of a beverage. 

According to Maya mithology, Hunahpú gave cacao to 

the Maya after humans were created from maize by the 

divine grandmother goddess Ixmucané. 

The Mayans perfumed this beverage (which we 

call today chocolate, from the Nahuatl chocolatl) with 

different spices, among them chili and vanilla. “Among 

the plants that are cultivated to season and perfume the 

foods are chili or ají, vanilla ... and other herbs, leaves 

and roots” (Morley, 1961: 189). The early Mayans of 

Mexico were also familiar with vanilla and its uses, their 

name for it being sisbic [or zizbic, as Bruman calls it 7 ] 

(cited in Reinikka, 1995: 15). A Totonac legend says 

that vanilla originated in the deaths of Tzacopontziza 

(‘Morning Star’) and Zkatan-oxga (‘Running Deer’), 

who were killed by the gods for their forbidden love. 

In the desolated place of their sacrifice, a single tree 

grew (Zkatan-oxga) and shortly later a vine embraced it 

(Tzacopontziza). So, the lovers remain together through 

the ages. The Totonac called vanilla zacanatum shanat 

(= black mother vanilla) (Ecott, 2004: 7-8). 

Balick et al. mention the medicinal and ritual use of 

vanilla among the native population of Belize (Balick et 

al., 2000: 171). Duke, in one of his many ethnobotanical 

papers, refers to the use as a perfume of Vanilla fragrans 

(Salisb.) Ames by the Chocoe Indians in the Panamanian 

region of Darien (Duke, 1956: 209). García Peña & 

Peña refer to V. planifolia in the Aztec world: “One of 

the oldest records for the utilitarian character of orchids 

in America belongs to the Aztec kingdom of Itzcoatl 

(1427-1440) in Mexico; it mentions vanilla, the vine 

orchid, collected in the eastern coast. This plant was 

used as payment for tributes during the kingdoms of 

Moctezuma Ilhuiacamina (1440-1469) and Axacayatl 

(1469-1482)” (García Peña & Peña, 1981: 60). “Some 

authors (i.e. Torquemada, 1969) state that vanilla was 

part of the tributes paid to the Aztecs by the Totonacs and 

other Indian tribes (Fig. 6D) as early as during the reign 

of Izcóatl (1427-1440)...” (Hágsater et al., 2005: 47). 

LANKESTERIANA 


Moctezuma (1502-1520) flavored the beverage 

“chocolatl”, a cacao drink, with the ripe fruit of this 

orchid and with honey” (García Peña & Peña, 1981: 

60). Bernal Díaz del Castillo, again referring to 

Emperor Moctezuma, tells us: “... from time to time 

they brought him cups of fine gold, with a certain 

beverage made of cacao, that they said was for success 

with women...” (Díaz del Castillo, 1916: 185). “Then, 

by himself in his house, his chocolate was served: green 

cacao-pods, honeyed chocolate, flowered chocolate, 

flavored with green vanilla” (according to Sahagún in 

Coe & Coe, 1996: 89). “Vanilla was not only the most 

widely used flavoring, but was also recommended to 

aid digestion, and was considered good for the heart, 

the stomach, as an appetizer, diuretic and to attenuate 

viscous humors” (García Peña & Peña, 1981: 61). 

Sahagún says about vanilla: “Mecaxóchitl: Its 

growing place is the hot lands, at the water’s edge. It is 

like a slender cord, a little rough. It is of pleasing odor, 

perfumed. Its scent is dense; one’s nose is penetrated. 

It is potable. It cures internal [ailments]” (Dibble & 

Anderson, 1963: 192 (Fig. 6E). However, according 

to Gates (2000: 133) mecaxóchitl is Piper amalago, 

L. and not Vanilla planifolia. León, J., 2003 (pers. 

comm.) confirms this stating that the illustration does 

not represent an orchid. He also calls it tlilxóchitl: “It 

is cord-like… Its bean is green, but it is black when 

dried… It is perfumed, fragrant, precious, good, 

potable, a medicine. Roasted, this is mixed with 

chocolate” (Dibble & Anderson, 1963: 198) (Fig. 6F). 

According to Reinikka, the first reference to tropical 

orchids in the western hemisphere is the description 

and illustration of vanilla in the Codex Badianus from 

1552 (Reinikka, M. A., 1995: 15) (Fig. 7). 

Francisco Hernández published a manuscript in 

which figured a woodcut of two fruits and a portion of 

the vine of vanilla, under the name Arico aromatico, with 

the native appellation tlilxóchitl (Fig. 8A). Hernández 

writes about three aphrodisiac spices that the Aztecs used 

in their chocolate. The second of Hernández’s reputedly 

aphrodisiac trio was tlilxóchitl (‘black flower’), none 

other than our familiar vanilla (Vanilla planifolia). 

Hernández makes a distinction calling chocolatl the 

beverage that contains only cacao and seeds of pochotl 

(Ceiba spp.) and atexli that was flavored with vanilla 

(Coe, 1994: 104-105). Hernández, following the 

7 According to Bruman, zizbic seems to refer to Vanilla claviculata, an inferior species that is not the vanilla of commerce.

A 


C D 

E F 

Figure 6. A — Indian child playing the ‘trumpet’ with the hollow pseudobulb of Myrmecophila tibicinis. In Batemann, 1837- 

43: 76. B — Gardens ofAncient Mexico. Florentine Codex. Dibble &Anderson, 1963, fig. 679. C — Coatzontemacoxóchitl 

(Stanhopea tigrina). Florentine Codex. Dibble & Anderson, 1963, fig. 719. D — Representation of tributes in the Codex 

Mendoza, in Berdan & Rieff Anawalt, 1997, pl. 46v. E — Mecaxóchitl. Florentine Codex. Dibble & Anderson,1963, fig. 

718. F — Tlilxóchitl. Florentine Codex. Dibble & Anderson,1963, fig. 717. 

B 


19

20 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 7. Mecaxóchitl or Tlilxóchitl (first from the left). Plate 104 of the Codex Badianus. In Ospina, 1997:1161. 


C 


A B 

Figure 8. A — Arico aromatico – tlilxóchitl. Hernández, 1959. B — Sixteenth-century woodcut showing the four temperaments. 

In Coe & Coe, 1996: 127. C — Gathering vanilla. In Dampier, 1998: 121-122. 


21

22 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 9. Vanilla (labeled as Vanilla mexicana). No. 1407 of the illustrations of the botanical expedition of Sessé and 

Mociño in the Torner Collection, Hunt Botanical Institute for Botanical Documentation. 



principles of Galenic theory of curing by contraries, 

so that “hot” fever called for a “cold” drug, continues: 

“Adding the mecaxóchitl flavoring to chocolate not 

only gives it an agreeable taste, but because it, like most 

cacao spices, is ‘hot’ by nature, it ‘warms the stomach, 

perfumes the breath…[and] combats poisons, alleviates 

intestinal pains and colics’, and so on” (Coe & Coe, 

1996: 123). It should be recalled that in Galen’s theory 

and practice, the body contained four humors (black 

bile, yellow bile, phlegm and blood), and that good 

health depended on a balance between them. Each of 

these humors had specific properties — ‘hot’ or ‘cold’ 

and ‘dry’ or ‘moist’. In the European Baroque Age, 

the humoral theory was extended to include all sorts 

of phenomena and conditions, such as the divisions of 

the day, the four seasons, and even the cardinal points. 

Those with too much blood were sanguine, those with 

too much phlegm were phlegmatic, those with too much 

yellow bile were choleric, and those with too much 

black bile were melancholic (Fig. 8B). 

Alonso de Molina began the introduction of 

the present name of vanilla, by translating in his 

dictionary the word tlilxóchitl as “ciertas vaynicas de 

olores” (= certain fragrant little pods) (Molina, 1571: 

148). Referring to the town of Lucu, on the banks of 

the Belize River, Diego López de Cogolludo, in his 

History of Yucatán, indicates that Friar Bartolomé 

de Fuensalida saw there, in 1618, the best achiote 

(annatto tree) he had ever seen, together with fruits 

of vanilla that the natives called cizbiques (López de 

Cogolludo, 1954). The observations of Dampier in 

the second half of the XVII century (see later), about 

the use of vanilla by the natives of Bocas del Toro 

(Panama) let us assume that knowledge about the uses 

of vanilla spread to the rest of Central America after the 

conquest of Mexico. It is possible that this knowledge 

was brought from Yucatan to Panama by the Miskitos, 

who in the XVII century made frequent incursions to 

the territories located to the north and south of their 

dominions. The Miskitos and Sumas of the coasts of 

Nicaragua and Honduras used Vanilla that they called 

diti bainia, to flavor a beverage “made of cacao and 

maize” (Conzemius, 1984: 198). 

That vanilla was brought into Europe by the 

Spaniards in 1510 (as mentioned by Reinikka, Jacquet, 

and other authors) is highly improbable, since the 

first Spanish expedition to the mainland was that of 

Ojeda and Nicuesa in 1508 to Panama, and we cannot 

find any reference to this orchid until the conquest of 

Mexico by Hernán Cortés in 1519. 

The Flemish botanist Charles de l’Ecluse (1526- 

1609), also known as Carolus Clusius, in his Exoticum 

liber decem, provided the first botanical description of 

vanilla in 1605, as Lobus oblongus aromaticus. The 

description is from a plant provided by Hugh Morgan, 

pharmacist to Queen Elizabeth I. (Jacquet, 1994: 78). 

It was this Morgan who first called attention to vanilla 

as a spice that could have other medicinal and culinary 

uses, besides being a flavoring for chocolate. Vanilla 

begins to separate from chocolate and starts a life on its 

own. L’Ecluse made his first experience with American 

plants through the works of Nicolás Monardes (1493- 

1588) 8 , that he had read during his travels to Spain and 

which he later translated into Latin (Laca Menéndez de 

Luarca, 1999: 98). 

In 1658 the term vaynilla appeared in a work by 

William Piso, who added that this name was given by 

the Spaniards.” (Reinikka, 1995: 15). According to 

Piso, who again follows Galenic theory, vanilla is “hot 

in the 3rd degree,” and the mecaxóchitl spice “hot in 

the 4 th degree” and “dry in the 3 rd degree”. Piso had 

taken part, as official surgeon, in the Dutch expedition 

to the north of Brazil under the command of the Count 

of Nassau-Siegen, in 1638. He assumed charge of 

botanical studies insofar as they pertained to medicine 

(Steele, 1964: 14). 

Friar Bernabé Cobo, in his history of the New 

World, published in 1653 (Cobo, 1892) gives a detailed 

account of the necessary procedures to cure the pods 

of vanilla, which he praises as “very precious to put 

into the chocolate”, stating that the best vanilla is that 

which grows in Chiapas (Pérez de Antón, 2005: 122). 

William Dampier observed vanilla plants growing 

in the south of Mexico (1676) and in Bocas del Toro 

(today Panama), in 1681. In his work A New Voyage 

Round the World he mentions that the Indians sold 

vanilla to the Spaniards and describes the method that 

they followed to cure the fruits: “This Cod grows on a 

small Vine which climbs about and supports itself by the 

neighbouring Trees. It first bears a Flower, from where 

8 Monardes, N., 1574, Primera y Segunda y Tercera Partes de la Historia Medicinal de las Cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias 

Occidentales que sirven en Medicina. Sevilla. 


23

24 

the Cod afterwards proceeds. It is first green, but when 

ripe turns yellow. Then the Indians, whose Manufacture 

it is, and who sell it cheap to the Spaniards, gather it and 

lay it in the Sun, which makes it soft. Then it changes 

to a Chestnut colour. They frequently press it between 

their fingers which makes it flat.... These Vines grow 

plentifully at Boccatoro, where I have gathered and tried 

to cure them, but could not, which makes me think that 

the Indians have some Secret that I do not know of to 

cure them... They are commonly sold for Threepence a 

Cod among the Spaniards in the West Indies... for they 

are much used in chocolate to perfume it. Some will use 

them in Tobacco, for they give a delicate scent. Could 

we have learnt the art of it, several of us would have 

gone to Boccatoro yearly and cured them” (Dampier, 

1998: 121) (Fig. 8C). 

Francesco Redi (1626-97), a talented Italian scientist 

and physician to the Medici court, published his 

Experimenta circa res diversas naturales (Redi, 1675), 

a work on ‘diverse natural matters, in particular those 

carried to us from the Indies’. Redi’s work contains 

a detailed illustration of a vanilla pod, and what is 

certainly the first microscopic view of a vanilla seed. 

In 1701, the English traveler Ellis Veryard published 

his Choice remarks, concerning his voyage to Spain 

during the latter half of the XVII century. His account 

of how the Spaniards manufactured their chocolate 

says: “...Next you are to add twenty-five Bainillas ... 

finely powder’d, proceeding to mix...” (Veryard, 1701). 

In 1703, the French botanist Charles Plumier (1646- 

1704), who had seen the plants during his travels to 

the Antilles, described the genus as Vanilla (Plumier, 

1703), although in 1749 Carl von Linné theorized that 

Vanilla was the source, as well as a species, of the 

Orchis genus, prescribing it as a powerful aphrodisiac 

elixir (Reinikka, 1995: 18-19). Robert Miller, in 1739, 

collected seeds and cuttings of Vanilla planifolia near 

Campeche, from which the cultivation in greenhouses 

of this species began in England. 

Denis Diderot (1718-1784), the great French 

encyclopedist, disapproved of the tastiest flavorings 

that people added to chocolate, which did nothing 

but add “fire” to the body. He warned about the use 

of vanilla: “The pleasant scent and heightened taste it 

LANKESTERIANA 


gives to chocolate has made it very popular, but long 

experience having taught us that it is extremely heating, 

its use has become less frequent, and people who 

prefer to care for their health rather than please their 

senses abstain completely.” (Diderot, 1778: 785). The 

aphrodisiac properties of vanilla were also mentioned 

by the German physician Bezaar Zimmerman, who in 

1762 published a treatise entitled “On experiences”, 

in which he claimed that “no fewer than 342 impotent 

men by drinking vanilla decoctions, have changed into 

astonishing lovers of at least as many women” (Siegel, 

2008: 145). Vanilla made its debut in the United States 

in 1789, when the U.S. ambassador to France, Thomas 

Jefferson, had his secretary in Paris ship him a bundle 

of fifty cured beans wrapped in newspaper. Thomas 

Jefferson’s recipe for vanilla ice cream can be found in 

his papers at the Library of Congress (Gand & Weiss, 

2006: 12). 

In 1753, Linné, in his Species Plantarum , described 

vanilla as Epidendron vanilla, and it was his countryman 

Olof Swartz who reestablished the genus Vanilla in 

1799 (Swartz, 1799: 66). Finally, in November 1808, 

Henry Charles Andrews (1794-1830) published the 

description of Vanilla planifolia that is valid today 

in The Botanists Repository of New and Rare Plants 

(Jackson & Andrews, 1808). The description was 

based on a plant cultivated by Charles Greville that 

had flowered the year before (Soto Arenas, 1999: 18). 

A beautiful illustration of Vanilla sp. is included in the 

Torner Collection that contains the illustrations of the 

expedition of Sessé y Mociño to New Spain (Fig. 9). 

In 1835, Lindley separated the genus Vanilla from 

the Orchidaceae and proposed it as the type for a new 

family, the Vanillaceae (Lindley, 1835: 73) 9 . 

Orlando W. Roberts, English traveler along the 

Central American East Coast in the years before the 

independence of the region from Spain, comments 

in his book that the Indians in the region of Darién 

form parties for drinking preparations of cocoa, of 

which they drink immense quantities A few pages 

later he tells that they “also produce vanilla, a valuable 

plant...” (Roberts, 1965: 77, 80). With regard to the 

cultivation of vanilla in the region of the San Juan 

River he writes: “The country from San Juan River to 

9 Bateman, in the introduction to his The Orchidaceae from Mexico and Guatemala, says: “In this list the Vanilla is not included, 

as that plant has recently been separated (no doubt, most judiciously) by Dr. Lindley, from the natural order “Orchidaceae” and 

constituted the type of a new order of its own”.


this point [Bluefields, Nicaragua] abounds in vanilla 

of the finest quality. This plant climbs with ease to the 

top of the highest tree. At a distance the leaves slightly 

resemble those of the vine; the flowers are of a white 

colour, intermixed with red and yellow, when these fall 

off, they are quickly succeeded by the pods, growing 

in bunches not unlike the plantain, and generally of 

the thickness of a child’s finger. The pods are green 

at first, grow yellow, and finally brown; the method 

used to preserve the fruit, is to gather it when yellow, 

before the pods begin to open or burst – it is then laid 

in small heaps for the space of three of four days to 

ferment. The fruit is afterwards spread in the sun to 

dry; and when about half dried, flattened with the hand, 

and rubbed over with cocoa, palm or other oil: - it is 

once more exposed to the sun, to be fully dried, rubbed 

over with oil a second time, put in small parcels, and 

closely covered over with the dried leaves of the 

plantain. [...] The vanilla plant is also found on most 

parts of the Mosquito Shore, and in the neighborhood 

of Breo del Rero and Chiriquí Lagoon; it requires heat, 

moisture, and shade, to bring it to perfection, and when 

used in that state it gives a most delicious flavour to 

coffee, chocolate, etc., forming an important article of 

commerce, especially among the Spaniards” (Roberts, 

1965: 99-100). 

Carl Berthold Seemann, in 1848, indicated that 

“[the] fruit of the Vanilla (Vanilla sp.) and Vanilla 

chica (Sobralia sp. or Selenipedium chica) are 

spices employed in flavoring sweetmeats, chocolate 

and puddings” (Seemann, 1852-1857: 69). Moritz 

Wagner and Carl Scherzer, in 1853, observed Vanilla 

plants growing wild in the region of Miravalles, in 

northwestern Costa Rica: “The parasitic plant of the 

family of the orchids that provides the precious vanilla 

(Epidendron vanilla), with long, slim and aromatic 

ovaries, grows wild in the lower and shady places near 

the banks of the rivers”). And near the Río Grande 

(Pacific Coast): “Very frequent, especially in shady 

places, are several species of vanilla that may be 

distinguished for their thick leaves, their multicolored 

flowers of marvelous forms and their siliquous and 

thin fruits which exhale a delicious aroma” (Wagner 

& Scherzer, 1974: 168, 225). Wells described the 

cultivation and trade of Vanilla in the Honduran 

region of Olancho, and gave it the scientific name 

10 Wells means Vanilla axillaris Mill., a Mexican species described in 1768. 

of Vanilla axillans [sic] (Wells, 1857) 10 . Wells states 

that Vanilla shows preference for two species of host 

trees, “indio desnudo” (Bursera simaruba (L.) Sarg.) 

and “guachipilín” (Casearia sylvestris Sw.), and gives 

a detailed description of plant habitat, flowers, and 

fruits. As to cultivation, Wells mentions a promising 

experimental plantation in the village of Pespire. The 

greatest part of the Vanilla from Olancho was taken to 

the market of Tegucigalpa, although a small amount 

was sent to Trujillo, on the North coast, and to Belize. 

According to Wells, in good localities a diligent 

native could collect between two and four pounds a 

day. Hartwell (1967-1971) includes Vanilla in his 

list of plants used against cancer. And more recently, 

Alan Hirsch, M.D., of Smell and Taste Treatment 

and Research Foundation Ltd., in Chicago, studied 

the relationship between smell and arousal. He found 

that several smells increased blood flow to the penis, 

including lavender, pumpkin pie, doughnut and black 

licorice. However, smelling vanilla caused the greatest 

degree of arousal in older men (Siegel, 2008: 145). 

For over 300 years after its discovery by Hernán 

Cortés, vanilla was only produced in Mexico. 

Cultivation was tried in many countries, but the 

delicate orchid never bore fruit. The mystery was not 

solved until 1838, when the Belgian Charles Morren 

discovered that common insects cannot pollinate the 

flower and that its natural fertilizers, bees from the 

genus Eulaema, do not survive outside Mexico. Morren 

developed the method to pollinate vanilla flowers 

by hand (Morren, 1838). Soon the French began to 

cultivate vanilla in their colonies in the Indic Ocean, 

the Dutch in Indonesia and the British in Jamaica and 

India. Finally, in 1858, Gobley isolated vanillin, the 

crystalline component of vanilla, opening the way to 

industrial production of substitutes for V. planifolia. 

“In spite of competition from other tropical regions, 

in spite of the large-scale commercial production of 

synthetic vanillin, Mexican vanilla has held its own. 

At its best it has a quality unequaled elsewhere, and its 

excellence is recognized by its great demand” (Bruman, 

1948: 372). In the region of Totonicapán, the cultivation 

of Vanilla is an important economic factor. “The 

Totonacs found the way of growing vanilla, planting 

it in acahuales (secondary forests), and learned how to 

guide and prune the plants” (Hágsater et al., 2005: 50). 


25

26 

The following species of Vanilla can be found in our 

region: 

V. hartii Rolfe V. planifolia G. Jackson 

V. helleri Hawkes V. pompona Schiede 

V. inodora Schiede V. sativa Schiede 

V. insignis Ames V. sylvestris Schiede 

V. odorata Presl V. trigonocarpa Hoehne 

V. phaeantha Rchb. f. 

from The codex badIanus To carl von lInné 

“Nature does not proceed by leaps and bounds” 

Carl von Linné 

The Codex Badianus. The first descriptions of orchids 

that we know of for the Americas are in the Aztec 

Herbal of 1552 (Ospina, 1997: 1160), written in Mexico 

with the title Libellus de Medicinalibus Indorum Herbis 

(De la Cruz & Badiano, 1996). Its author was the 

Aztec physician Martín de la Cruz and it was translated 

from Nahuatl into Latin by another native named Juan 

Badiano. It is therefore commonly known as the Codex 

Badianus or Codex de la Cruz-Badianus. There are 

two versions, one says that the work was for Emperor 

Charles V, and the other that the work was conceived 

by Francisco, the son of the Viceroy don Antonio 

de Mendoza, as a gift for Phillip II (by now King of 

Spain), in an effort to demonstrate that the Indians were 

“knowledgeable, capable of learning from Europeans 

and very worthy of support from the Viceroyalty and 

the protection of the King” (Gómez, 2008: 82). De la 

Cruz and Badiano were two outstanding students of the 

Imperial College of Santa Cruz de Tlalelolco, were they 

met Fray Bernardino de Sahagún. 

During the early XVII century, the Latin version 

became part of the library of Cardinal Francesco 

Barberini, and it is therefore also known as Codex 

Barberini (Gómez-Pompa, 1993: 29). In 1990, during 

a visit of Pope John Paul II to Mexico, the manuscript 

was presented as a gift from the Vatican to the Mexican 

people and is since then preserved at the National 

Library of Mexico. The first Spanish version, although 

incomplete, was published in 1955 by Francisco 

Guerra. “It is not only the earliest complete Mexican 

medical text which has thus come to light, but it is 

the only medical text known to be the work of Aztec 

Indians” (Emmart & Sigerist, 1940: xiii). 

LANKESTERIANA 


In the previous chapter (The history of vanilla), 

reference was already made to tlilxóchitl (V. planifolia) 

that, according to this codex, was used, with a mixture 

of other plants, in a prescription for viatores presidium 

(Fig. 7), namely “protection for travelers”. “… 

pulverized herbs wrapped in a magnolia leaf and hung 

around the neck so that the voyager could ‘catch and 

inhale the very redolent odor’ ” (Benzing, 1990: 1). 

Another orchid by the name Tzacouhxochitl (from 

tzacouh = glue and xochitl = flower) was used as an 

adhesive and in a concoction prescribed for timoris vel 

micropsychiae remedium, that could be translated as a 

“remedy against shyness”. This orchid is either Bletia 

campanulata or Catasetum maculatum (Ospina, 1997: 

1160). 

According to Ospina, the illustrations of the Aztec 

Herbal also represent the first attempt in the Americas 

to coordinate the floristic or medical descriptions of 

plants with their ecological circumstances. The plants 

are depicted in full, that is, including flowers, leaves, 

stems and roots, and around the roots there are various 

pictorial symbols that undoubtedly refer to the ecology 

of the plant. Thus, a blue background coloring... 

would indicate that the plant grew near the water...; 

the relationship between plants and ants is shown by 

clear pictures of these insects in the plant’s roots, and 

so on. This Herbal will, therefore, stand as our first 

known reference for future works on the orchids and 

their ecology in the Americas (Ospina, 1997: 1160-61). 

The expedition of Francisco Hernández to New 

Spain (1570-1577). It was in the year of 1570 when 

Spain started her first scientific expedition to the New 

World. In charge was Francisco Hernández (1517- 

1587), with the title of First Physician General of the 

New Indies, Islands and Terra Firma of the Ocean; he 

carried instructions to write a natural history of these 

lands and to “draw the herbs and other natural things” 

(San Pío Aladrén & Puig-Samper, 2000: 11). It is quite 

possible that the works of Badiano and Sahagún had 

a strong influence on Emperor Philip II and led him 

to finance the most import botanical expedition of 

his time (Gómez-Pompa, 1993: 30). Hernández was 

the first European to investigate the flora of Mexico, 

although from a medicinal rather than a botanical 

standpoint (Hemsley, 1887: 117-18). Besides the 

scholar, three illustrators, three scribes, a cosmographer


and several Indian medicine-men took part in the 

expedition. On March 1, 1571, Hernández presented 

his title of Protomédico in the palace of the Viceroy, in 

Veracruz. During the following six years, the expedition 

collected more than 3,000 plants, 500 animals and 35 

minerals. “As the first expedition of natural history ever 

sent out by a government, the Hernández venture is a 

landmark in the annals of botanical science. Although 

he classified his plants largely according to unscientific 

Aztec standards, and his descriptions are often too 

brief or vague, Hernández preserved a body of ethnobotanical 

lore that probably otherwise would have been 

lost” (Steele, 1964: 7) (Fig. 10A). 

In 1577, Hernández returned to Spain, having 

completed a total of six volumes of text and ten volumes 

of illustrations of what he called Rerum Medicarum 

Novae Hispaniae Thesaurus, seu Plantarum, 

Animalium, Mineralium Mexicanarum Historia or 

Natural History of New Spain. The work languished in 

the library of El Escorial and Hernández died in 1587 

without ever having seen it published. “This pattern 

of failure would be repeated many times over, for the 

eyes of Spanish authorities were invariably bigger 

than their stomachs when it came to digesting the vast 

quantities of botanical knowledge unceasingly offered 

up by the Indies” (Steele, 1964: 7). 

In 1580, Philip II ordered the first physician of 

Naples, Dr. Nardo Antonio Recchi, to distil the essence 

of Hernández’s findings. In doing his duty, however, 

Recchi not only excluded all of the natural history that 

seemed of no use in medicine, but ended in publishing 

nothing either (Steele, 1964: 6). Fortunately, Friar 

Francisco Ximénez [who must not be confused with 

the translator of the Popol Vuh] saw the need to furnish 

a medical guide for the haciendas and towns of Mexico 

that had neither physician nor pharmacist, and in 1615 

at Mexico City published the first edition of Hernández 

work. He based it, however, upon the incomplete 

summation by Recchi (Steele, 1964: 6). Recchi died 

before completing his work and his manuscripts 

came into possession of Federico Cesi, Prince of 

Acquasparta (1585-1630), founding member of the 

Accademia dei Lincei, in Roma. Cesi’s intention was 

to continue the publication of the work of Hernández 

with the help of other experts. Johannes Schreck (who 

became a monk in 1628 and took the name of Giovanni 

Terrenti or Terenzio), in charge of the botany, traveled 

Table 2. Orchids in the 1651 edition of the Thesaurus (from 

Jenny, 1993:4). 

Page 38 Tlilxochitl Vanilla 

Page 166 Coatzonte Coxochitl Stanhopea hernandezii 

Page 349 Amazauhtli Oncidium (illustrated 

without flowers, undoubtedly 

from the 

group of Oncidium 

luridum or Oncidium 

cavendishianum) 

Page 368 Chichiltic tepelauhxochitl Laelia cf. speciosa or 

Schomburgkia 

Page 433 Tzauxochitl Laelia or Encyclia 

to Madrid in 1616 on behalf of the Lincei, to study 

Hernández’s manuscripts. In 1628 the Accademia 

finally published the first part of the Thesaurus. The 

same Accademia would publish, in 1651 and under the 

guidance of Francesco Stelluti, an augmented version. 

Before the work by Hernández could be fully valued, 

his manuscripts were destroyed by the great fire at El 

Escorial in 1671. 

Among the plants mentioned in the 1651 edition are 

five species of Orchidaceae, all clearly illustrated and 

described in Latin (Tab. 2). 

In both editions (1628 and 1651) the illustrations 

and descriptions coincide exactly. The Aztec names 

are undoubtedly from Hernández, while the Latin 

equivalents are by Terenzio. Unfortunately, only two 

species can be identified with certainty. The others 

are illustrated without flowers, or with little detail 

(Fig. 10, B—E). Alzate comments in 1791, referring 

to the work of Hernández, about another orchid called 

cozticxochitl (“yellow flower”), that he also calls 

istontle, istontli, iztamaxuchitl and cocotlacotl (Alzate 

y Ramírez, 1791). The Botanical Register, under plate 

#13, Govenia liliacea (La Llave & Lex.) Lindl., states 

that “the first notice we have of the existence of this 

species is from Hernández who, in the Madrid edition 

of his work, calls it by the many-syllabled name of 

‘Iztactepetzacuxochitl Icohueyo’ ” (Sprunger, 1991: 

123). This indicates that Hernández work was still 

known in Lindley’s time. 

Stanhopea hernandezii deserves a special mention. 

The romantic interpretation of many authors that the 

Latin description that appears in the editions of 1628 

and 1651 (Lyncis flore seu Lyncea = Lynx flower, 


27

28 

also Lyncea) was a premonition of Hernández that 

it would be the Accademia dei Lincei that would 

rescue his works from oblivion (such as Bateman 

in his Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala ) is 

opposed by the much more pragmatic opinion of Jenny 

(1993: 5) who maintains that Hernández could have 

no knowledge of the Roman academy and that it was 

Terenzio, member of the Lincei, who invented the 

name. James Bateman (1811-1897) used the flower of 

Stanhopea hernandezii to embellish the frontispiece of 

his Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala (Fig. 10F) 

and went to the extreme of assuring that Hernández 

“ventured to dedicate it, as the loveliest plant of the 

Mexican Flora, to the Lyncean Academicians of Rome, 

by whom it was immediately adopted …” (Bateman, 

1837-43: 7). Bateman forgot that Hernández had died 

when Cesi was barely two years old. 

We do not know if the loss of a great part of 

Hernández’s work was due to neglect or to the zeal of 

the Spanish Inquisition. But it is sad to record that a 

work of such value shared the same fate of the herbal 

of Martín de la Cruz, lost in the vaults of the Vatican, 

or the monumental work of Sahagún, confiscated to 

satisfy religious intolerance. 

A new dark age 

“Many died in the flames and it gave me so much 

pleasure to see them burn that, poking the fire, I said: 

Heretic dogs, minister I am of the Holy Inquisition!” 

Pedro Calderón de la Barca 

The siege of Breda, 1640 

In the second half of the XVI century, the Spanish 

Empire reached its maximum expansion. Phillip 

II could proudly say that the sun did not set in his 

dominions. The American continent excited the 

curiosity of erudites and travelers. But the chronicles of 

Bernal Díaz del Castillo, Francisco López de Gómara, 

Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo and Fray Bernardino 

de Sahagún gave way to a long century of silence and 

darkness. As religious problems exacerbated in Europe, 

the Spanish Inquisition unleashed its aggressiveness 

against the liberty of thought. “... Charles I attempts 

to avoid ideological corruption applying his Index 

of forbidden books [Index Librorum Prohibitorum] 

which his son Philip would extend prohibiting the 

importation of foreign books and the travel of students 

LANKESTERIANA 


to the European universities” (García de Cortázar, F., 

González Vesga, J. M., 1994: 336). In 1571, the Holy 

Office of the Inquisition was established in Mexico, to 

investigate and punish religious crimes. Between 1571 

and 1600, 600 persons were condemned by the tribunal 

of the Inquisition in Mexico, 13 of them to die in the 

flames. (Carmack et el., 1996: 158). 

“The sword, the open grave to bury them alive, the 

stake, awaited those who sold, bought or copied heretic 

books; those who painted or sold defamatory images, 

damaged or broke the images of the saints, those who 

celebrated in their homes clandestine reunions or 

permitted them; those who discussed in public or secretly 

about the Holy Scripts” (Schneider, 2002: 193). 

From a military standpoint, the defeat of the 

Invincible Armada in 1588 was the first of a series of 

disasters that continued during the Thirty Year War 

(1618-1648) and marked the end of Spanish hegemony 

in Europe. With the treaty of Utrecht (1713), Spain 

said farewell to her last continental possessions. The 

finances of the Spanish monarchy looked even worse: 

the bankruptcy of 1557 repeated itself monotonously 

in 1575, 1607, 1627, 1647, 1662 and 1666. The 

peninsula suffers from depopulation (between 1575 

and 1650 the Spanish population diminished by 20 per 

cent) and economic recession. Instead of promoting 

local production, the American gold finances luxury 

purchases in foreign markets. While the rest of Europe 

increased its production, Spain lied in financial 

chaos. The universities served as recruiting centers 

for the imperial bureaucracy. The crown encouraged 

all disciplines related to administration while the 

flames of the autos de fe of the Inquisition strangled 

humanism and religious pressures suppressed scientific 

investigations. 

“Medieval and modern at the same time, the 

imperial society of the XVI and XVII centuries is a 

society in transit... The spirit of exultation of the 

kingdoms of Charles I and Philip II is replaced by 

the prosaic reality of the smaller Hapsburgs... The 

bitterness of military failures, the decline in the liberty 

of thought, growing delinquency, hunger, bureaucratic 

and religious hypertrophy... chained a community 

which had been alive hundred years earlier” (García de 

Cortázar & González Vesga, 1994: 270-71). We must 

therefore not be surprised if, from the last third of the 

XVI to the latter XVII century, the history of orchids


A B C 

D 

E 

Figure 10. A — The questioner. Native drawing of a Spaniard of the XVI century who asked the Indians about their 

traditions, plants and antiquities. It is generally assumed that it represents Francisco Hernández. In Lozoya, 1984. B 

— Coatzonte coxochitl (Stanhopea hernandezii). In Jenny, 1993: 1. C — Chichiltic tepetlauxochitl (Laelia speciosa). 

In Jenny, 1993: 3. D — Tzacuxochitll (Prosthechea vitellina). In Hágsater et al., 2006: 40-41. E — Tzacutli (Bletia 

jucunda). In Hágsater et al., 2006: 40-41. F — Enlarged detail from the frontispiece of the work of Bateman with the 

illustration of Stanhopea hernandezii. 


F 

29

30 

A 

C 

LANKESTERIANA 

E F 

Figure 11. A — The ‘Stelis’ of Tabernaemontanus. In Nieder & Barthlott, 1992: 244. B — Signature of Francisco Antonio 

de Fuentes y Guzmán, as flowery as his ‘Recollection’. C — Peristeria elata Hook. In Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, plate 

3116. D — Carl von Linné (1707-1778). In Coe & Coe, 1996: 18. E — Original site plan for the Royal Botanical Garden 

in Madrid. In San Pío Aladrén et al., 2005: 136. F — Original sketch for the main entrance gate to the Royal Botanical 

Garden in Madrid. In San Pío Aladrén et al., 2005: 137. 


B 

D


in Central America shows a void that lasted almost 125 

years, in what Carlos Fuentes called “the long night 

of El Escorial”. In Steele’s words, “the seventeenth 

century was sterile” (Steele, 1964: 11). \It should not 

surprise us either that the only exceptions during this 

period came from Central Europe. In 1588, the German 

Jacob Theodor, better known as Tabernaemontanus 

(1522-1590), publishes the Neuw vollkommentlich 

Kreuterbuch (“New Complete Herbal”). 

In this work, without indication of origin, a plant 

named Indianisch Mispel or Viscum Indicum is 

illustrated, that according to Nieder & Barthlott is a 

species of Stelis, although, in the opinion of Béhar 

and Pupulin (pers. comm., 2007) its ‘lepanthiform’ 

sheaths could indicate that it is rather a species of the 

genera Trichosalpinx or Lepanthopsis (Fig. 11A). All 

three genera have a wide range of distribution and can 

be found from Mexico and Central America through 

the Caribbean and South America. It is therefore 

clearly speculative to include this curious reference 

of Tabernaemontanus in the history of the orchids 

of Central America. The woodcut was probably 

prepared from a herbarium specimen that could have 

been collected in almost any region of the Americas. 

Tabernaemontanus incurred in an understandable error, 

including an epiphyte orchid in a genus (Viscum) that is 

a parasite. The famous German philosopher Immanuel 

Kant made the same mistake two hundred years later 

when, writing about the cultivation of vanilla, he said 

that you “… only have to tie it unto a tree, from which 

it takes its juice” (Nieder & Barthlott, 1992: 243). 

As the second exception, we already mentioned the 

botanical description of vanilla by l’Ecluse in 1605. 

It was ironically the same Charles de l’Ecluse who 

published, in 1576, a flora of Spain (Rariorum aliquot 

stirpium per Hispanias observatorum historia), just 

as Spain debated about the necessity of expanding the 

index of prohibited books of 1559 (the new index was 

finally published in 1584) (Jacquet, 1994: 78). 

The “English American” — the journey through 

Mexico and Central America of Thomas Gage 

(1625-1637). Thomas Gage (1597?-1656) was one 

of the most peculiar characters that ever visited our 

region. Of Irish origin and born into a traditional 

Catholic family, Gage studied in France and Spain 

in convents of the Jesuits by decision of his parents, 

who wanted him to become — together with his four 

brothers- missionaries for the conversion of England 

(one of the main objectives of the Spanish Jesuits). 

While studying in Valladolid, Gage decided to leave 

the Jesuits and joined the Dominicans, and it was as 

part of a Dominican group on route to the Philippines 

that he arrived in Veracruz in 1625, one the first non- 

Spaniard to do so since the Spanish conquest of the 

territory (despite of the presence of foreigners in the 

Spanish colonies being strictly prohibited by a Royal 

decree). From Mexico he went on to Guatemala and 

entered the order’s mission in the city. Gage lived 

for twelve years in New Spain, for the most part in 

Guatemala and among the indigenous population. 

He came to know the customs, the language, and the 

feelings of the Indians as very few before or after him. 

He returned to England in 1637, traveling through 

Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama and Cuba, and then 

in 1642 publicly abandoned the Catholic Church for 

a Puritanical form of Anglicanism. Gage later called 

himself “the only Protestant that was ever known to 

have traveled to those parts” (in the introduction to his 

book ). He embarked in 1654 as chaplain of Cromwell’s 

expedition to the Antilles and died finally in Jamaica 

in 1656. Gage published in 1648 the account of this 

travels through America in A New Survey of the West 

Indies being A Journal of Three thousand and Three 

hundred Miles within the main land of America. His 

narrative was very popular in his time and one of the 

reasons were the fantastic accounts of Gage (a mixture 

of imagination and truth, full of exact details but also 

of exaggerations, of descriptions of gold mines and 

fabulous treasures). Gage’s work was widely read and 

discussed and translated to several other languages. 

In his work, Gage mentions in several occasions the 

use given to vanilla in relation to the preparation of 

chocolate (see above “The history of Vanilla”). 

The renaissance of science. Slowly, in the last 

decades of the XVI century, Spanish intellectuals 

began to rebel against the disciplinary power of the 

Church. The challenging ‘philosophic letter’ of Juan 

de Cabriada, a militant manifest, openly in favor 

of laboratory experiments, raised in 1687 waves of 

enthusiasm and also scared rejections. With the change 

of the century, methods of direct observation gained 

more and more importance. Fernando VI paid special 


31

32 

attention to the botanical gardens, founding the Royal 

Botanical Garden in Madrid (1755), followed soon 

by the botanical gardens of Valencia, Barcelona and 

Zaragoza. Spain opens its doors to foreign scientists. 

The botanist Loefling, pupil of Linné, brought his 

Spanish colleagues up to date, as reflected in the 

works of Barnades, Mutis or Gómez Ortega (García 

de Cortázar & González Vesga, 1994: 405). In a last 

attempt to maintain ideological repression, an edict by 

the Inquisition in 1759 prohibited the reading of the 

French Encyclopedia. 

Two small works were published in Central 

America, of more descriptive than scientific character, 

in which we find the first descriptions of orchids after 

the obscurantist interregnum. In 1690, the historian and 

poet Francisco Antonio de Fuentes y Guzmán (1643- 

1700) wrote in Guatemala his Recordación Florida, 

discurso historial y demostración natural, material, 

militar y política del Reyno de Guatemala (=Flowery 

recollection, historical discourse and natural, material, 

military and political demonstration of the Kingdom of 

Guatemala), published in Madrid in 1882. Fuentes y 

Guzmán described what is probably a species of the 

genus Laelia: “The herb that, in the manner of a lily, 

grows in the formation of its leaves and is called Zayte 

by the candy makers and Cebollín (= little onion) by 

peasants and shepherds, grows its roots like a potato or 

a truffle, covered by a skin or membrane as subtle as 

the skin of an onion, but tending to be green. Its roots 

are thick as the wire of the blacksmiths. Its interior is 

not covered by skins like the onion, but between fibers 

like a cord it grows white dough of glutinous juiciness. 

This dough is used by candy makers for drops and 

cakes, because it gives them firmness. It is also used by 

carpenters to weld and join the musical instruments and 

to improve the firmness and softness of their voices” 

(Fuentes y Guzmán, 1932: 246-47). But perhaps 

the most curious remark of Fuentes y Guzmán is his 

reference to the epiphytic habit of orchids. Not able to 

understand how a plant grows on a tree, he calls them 

“grafts”. In the last paragraph of his work, Fuentes y 

Guzmán shows the fear still inspired by the Inquisition: 

“All what is written in the first part of our history of the 

Kingdom of Guatemala I submit with utmost catholic 

humiliation to the correction of our mother, the Holy 

Roman Catholic Church, as her obedient son” (Fuentes 

y Guzmán 1932: 418) (Fig. 11B). 

LANKESTERIANA 


Born in Andalusia in 1666, Friar Francisco Ximénez 

(1666-1729) arrived in Guatemala when he was 22 

years of age and became famous for his translation 

of the Popol Vuh, the sacred book of the Quiché, in 

the first years of the XVIII century. The manuscript 

which Father Francisco Ximénez found in his parish at 

Chichicastenango ranks highest among the documents 

composed by the American Indians after they had 

learned to write their own languages by means of 

the Latin letters which the Spanish missionaries had 

taught them. Its author was undoubtedly one of the first 

students who learned from the friars the marvelous art 

of phonetic writing. The Quiché chronicler knew that 

in olden times there was a book which contained the 

traditions and accounts of his people, and, knowing 

them perfectly, he had the happy inspiration of 

recording them. The author of the Manuscript says that 

he writes it because now the Popol Vuh, or the original 

“Book of the People,” as Ximénez calls it, is no longer 

to be seen. We have no facts by which to identify this 

original book other than those which its unknown 

author gives. Nevertheless, from the knowledge that 

we have of the American Indians’ system of writing 

before the Conquest, it seems doubtful that the ancient 

Quiché book could have been a document of set form 

and permanent literary composition. Rather one must 

suppose that it might have been a book of paintings with 

hieroglyphs which the priests interpreted to the people 

in order to keep alive in them the knowledge of the 

origin of their race and the mysteries of their religion. 

The Manuscript of Chichicastenango has no title. It 

begins directly with these words: 

“This is the beginning of the old traditions of 

this place called Quiché. Here we shall write and 

we shall begin the old tales, the beginning and the 

origin of all that was done in the town of the Quiché, 

by the tribes of the Quiché nation.” 

Less known is Ximénez’s Historia Natural del Reino 

de Guatemala (= Natural History of the Kingdom of 

Guatemala), a work written in 1722 but not published 

until 1967 and considered to be the first medical botany 

of Guatemala. Ximénez marvels about the nature that 

surrounds him: “If any flowers resemble our Divine 

Maker with more property, I have no doubt that they are 

the flowers of this America, for there are so many and 

so admirable.” A good observer, Ximénez is one of the 

first to describe the epiphytic character and sympodial


growth of orchids, without understanding the formation 

of fruits and seed. In book XI of his work, About the 

flowers, he dedicates a chapter to orchids under the 

title: “Flowers of the trees”: “No seed is recognized in 

them from that they reproduce, but from one little onion 

new others are born and if one gives once a flower, it 

will not give it again, and it leaves other onions at its 

foot produced from itself and so those plants multiply” 

(Ximénez, 1722: 313). He tells us also how orchids are 

only found in adult trees: “On the other hand, one sees 

an oak growing, that had its bark clean, and suddenly 

out of him comes some genus of those flowers, which 

are without number. And this can only be seen when the 

oak is old” (Ximénez, 1722: 303). 

Ximénez continues describing several species 

of orchids. He mentions the monjitas (= little nuns 

— Lycaste spp.), the flower of Saint Martin (Laelia 

superbiens Lindl.) and the flower of Sacrament 

(“They give it this name because it flowers at the time 

of Lent and they put this flowers on the altars. It is very 

fragrant and out of the onion rise long twigs, about 

a vara 11 long and it all fills with little flowers like a 

real 12 ” (Ximénez, 1722: 314). Ximénez also mentions 

the miniatures: “Others give smaller flowers and still 

others give some that are extremely small.” 

As it is a terrestrial, it does not surprise us that 

Ximénez fails to recognize Peristeria elata (Fig. 11C) 

as an orchid, although it attracts his attention that they 

have not been able to acclimate it to Guatemala: “In 

the fields near the city of Panama grows a herb whose 

flower is a well formed white dove, that is the reason 

that they call this the flower of the Holy Spirit, and it is 

so unique to that land, that it has not been possible to 

take it to another, notwithstanding all efforts that have 

been made...”. Ximénez mentions a total of more than 

12 species, ending with a reference to the great variety 

of orchids existing in the region and to the impossibility 

of describing them all: “There are [so] many others 

that grow on onions that I do not remember any more” 

(Ximénez, 1722: 304). 

Little more can be told about orchids in Central 

America during the XVII and the first half of the 

XVIII centuries. While Sloane and Plumier explored 

the Antilles and England and France increased their 

knowledge about the floras of their colonies, Spanish 

11 vara = unit of length, about 2.8 ft. 

12 real = a silver coin. 

science continued in a profound lethargy. Botanical 

interest slowly extended from the British colonies to 

Tierra Firme. “A few botanical specimens may have 

been garnered by the British buccaneer William Dampier 

(1652-1715).... [who] stopped at Cocos Island and Cabo 

Blanco [Costa Rica] in June and July (respectively) of 

1684 aboard the pirated ship Batchelor’s Delight...” 

(Hammel et al., 2004: 2). During his voyages to the 

Caribbean and Central America, the Scott William 

Houston spent four years (1729-1733) in Cuba, 

Veracruz, Campeche and Jamaica, collecting specimens 

and seeds (Steele, A. R., 1964: 15). There are however 

no orchids among his collections. In the previous chapter 

(The history of vanilla) we already commented about the 

collections of R. Miller in Campeche in 1739. Shortly 

afterwards, the Swede Carl von Linné (1707-1778) 

set the foundation for modern botanical nomenclature. 

“According to present rules, the terminology of orchids 

starts on May 1, 1753... “ (Jacquet, 1994: 96). With 

Linné, “... botanical science came to life, if not yet to 

maturity” (Steele, 1964: 9) (Fig. 11D). 

enlIghTenmenT and Independence 

“Hispaniae Florae nullae nobis innoterunt, 

adeoque plantae istae rarissimae, in locis 

Hispaniae fertilissimis, minus detectae sunt. 

Dolendus est, quod in locis Europa cultioribus, 

tanta existat nostro tempore barbaries botanices.” 

(= Nothing comes to us from the Hispanic 

Flora, because these rare plants that live in the 

fertile regions of Spain are barely taken into 

consideration. It is painful to see that so much 

botanical barbarity exists in such enlightened 

places of Europe) 

Carl von Linné, Bibliotheca botanica, 1751 

The Age of Reason. Fernando VI, who ascended to 

the throne in 1746, proved that Spanish botany only 

needed the support of the crown in order to grow. After 

a petition of Secretary of State José de Carvajal, Linné 

sent to Spain one of his favorite pupils, Pehr Löfling 

(1729-1756). “Löfling cast off to bring light to Darkest 

Spain in May, 1751” (Steele, 1964: 31). As proof that 

the XVIII century desire for “useful knowledge” had 


33

34 

penetrated Spanish consciousness, the government 

decided to send Löfling, together with other experts, 

on an expedition that should explore Venezuela. This 

expedition bore little results, due to the premature 

death of Löfling in the region of the Orinoco river, but 

above all because the Spanish government refused to 

lend or even show Linné the material collected by his 

pupil and especially the manuscripts that he compiled 

during his brief stay in America. To this day, nobody 

knows what happened to Löfling’s herbarium, one of 

the first collections made in America. 

The advantages that Enlightenment saw in utilitarian 

science were expressed by Linné: “Various nations 

consider it a raison d’etat to hide their advantages, 

especially in the distant colonies. But Señor Carvajal 

was too great a statesman to let himself be deceived 

by these motives. He knew that the rich resources of 

nature are inexhaustible and that, using them with the 

necessary knowledge, one had no need to fear their lack. 

He saw how the French and English, in many varied 

ways, had learned to exploit their colonies after having 

learned to know their territories and products in a better 

manner” (Rydén, 1957: 204-205. The quote is from the 

prologue of Linné in his Iter Hispanicum, 1758). 

Though its beginnings were tortuous and slow, 

Spanish botany entered an era of excited ferment in the 

last half of the eighteenth century (Steele, 1964: 46). 

The Royal Botanical Garden of Madrid was founded 

in 1755. On October 17, 1755, Fernando VI signed a 

royal order: “Wishing the King the furtherance of the 

Arts and Sciences, and especially those whose progress 

promise great advantages to the health of his subjects, 

has he come to grant to his Royal Protomedicate the 

use of his garden at Migascalientes with the purpose 

of forming there a Royal Garden and improving in 

these Kingdoms the important study of Botany” (Fig. 

11, E—F). José Quer (1695-1764) was named as its 

first professor of Botany. He would publish, between 

1762 and 1764, the first Spanish flora, in four volumes, 

which was left unfinished at the time of his death (Quer, 

J., 1762, Flora Española o Historia de las plantas que 

se crían en España, Madrid) (De San Pío Aladrén et 

al., 2005: 23). 

Moved by the necessity of reviving the Spanish 

economy and reducing unemployment, the Count 

LANKESTERIANA 


of Campomanes, in his famous Discourse on the 

furtherance of popular industry (1774), mentioned the 

importance of studying natural history. Thus was the 

idea born to send expeditions to the principal regions 

of the empire. In 1777 the expedition of Ruiz and 

Pavón departed for the Viceroyalty of Peru, followed 

in 1787, 1789 y 1799 by those of Sessé and Mociño to 

New Spain, Malaspina to the Pacific and Mutis to New 

Granada. All this research, made during twenty years 

in the most fertile regions of the new continent, has not 

only enriched the domain of science with more than four 

thousand new species of plants; it has also contributed 

greatly to spread the taste for natural history among the 

inhabitants of the country (Steele, 1964: vii, who cites 

Alexander von Humboldt, in his Essai politique sur le 

royaume de la Nouvelle-Espagne (1811). 

Under the influence of the ideas of Enlightenment 

and the political events that shook France and the 

English colonies in North America, Spain experimented 

in the last third of the XVIII century a cultural and 

scientific renaissance that, ironically, would be a 

principal cause for the loss, few years later, of its 

American empire. King Charles IV, great promoter 

of the botanical exploration of America, and his wife 

María Luisa, where honored by Ruiz & Pavón in the 

naming of the genus Carludovica, from the family of 

the Cyclanthaceae (From the Latin Carolus = Charles, 

and Ludovica = Luisa, Louise) 13 . 

The expedition of Alessandro Malaspina to the 

Pacific (1789-1794). On July 30, 1789, after many 

months of careful planning, two small corvettes 

left the port of Cádiz. Commanding some 200 men, 

Alessandro Malaspina (1754-1810), one of the most 

brilliant officers of the Spanish Navy, went ahead with 

the most ambitious project of Spanish enlightenment: 

the scientific exploration of the American coasts and of 

the greater part of the islands of the eastern Pacific (Fig. 

12). Malaspina had been born in Italy but was educated 

in the Company of Naval Guards in Cádiz, which 

was at that time the most prestigious naval school in 

Europe. He took part in the Spanish-English wars and 

in 1782 began a brilliant career in the Spanish Armada. 

Between 1786 and 1788, commanding the frigate 

Astrea, he circumnavigated the globe by order of the 

13 The type species for Carludovica is Carludovica palmata Ruiz & Pavón, the well known “paja toquilla” from which the famous 

‘Panama’ hats are made.


Figure 12. Alessandro Malaspina (1754-1810). Navy Museum, Madrid. 


35

36 

LANKESTERIANA 

A B 

C 

E 

Figure 13. A — The corvettes ‘Descubierta’ and ‘Atrevida’. Navy Museum of Madrid. B — El Viejo volcano from the 

port of Realejo. Drawing by José Cardero (fragment). Museo de América, Madrid. C — Thaddeus Haenke (1761-1817). 

Portrait by V. Grüner, in Real Jardín Botánico de Madrid, 1989: 83. D — Epidendrum iridifolium. Collection and drawing 

by Haenke. In Ibañez Montoya, 1990: 69. E — Louis Neé (ca. 1734-1807). Sketch by Felipe Bauzá, in Real Jardín 

Botánico de Madrid, 1989: 59. F —The naturalists on the island of Naos, Panama. Drawing by José Cardero (fragment). 

In Malaspina, A., 1990: 211. 


D 

F


Royal Company of the Philippines. In a letter from 

September 1788 to the Naval Ministry, together with 

his colleague José Bustamante y Guerra, he explained 

the ideas that inspired him to his expedition: “to 

increase the knowledge about natural sciences (biology, 

botany, zoology and geology), to undertake astronomic 

observations and to ‘construct hydrographical charts 

for the most remote regions of America’ ” (Becquer 

Casaballe, 2003: 2). The government approved his 

proposal as a “scientific and political voyage around 

the world” and gave the order for the construction of 

two corvettes, that were baptized “Santa Justa” and 

“Santa Rufina”, names which Malaspina immediately 

changed to “Descubierta” and “Atrevida”, in honor of 

the ships “Discovery” and “Resolution” of the English 

explorer James Cook (although the second name is not 

the most fortunate of translations) (Fig. 13A). 

The expedition did not have the intention of 

discovering new territories, but of exploring in depth 

those already known. Malaspina, a man of vast 

culture, was therefore very meticulous in the selection 

of the scientists who were to accompany him. The 

most prominent among the botanists chosen for the 

expedition, were Pineda, Haenke and Neé. Malaspina 

professed great admiration for these three men and their 

scientific qualities. In addition to this, Malaspina had 

sought and received the advice of the most prominent 

European men of science of his time, among them 

Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Horticultural 

Society (Soler Pascual, 1999: 29). The artists of the 

expedition were José Cardero, Felipe Bauzá, José Guío 

and Francisco Lindo. 

Antonio Pineda was born in Guatemala in 1751 

and received his education in Spain under the 

guidance of Casimiro Gómez Ortega, soon standing 

out as a naturalist and botanist. He held the position 

of Infantry Lieutenant of the Spanish Royal Guards 

when Malaspina, in 1788, asked for his designation 

as director of the natural history research of the 

expedition. After being appointed in the month of 

December, Pineda proposed as his assistants for 

Botany and Mineralogy Louis Neé, employee of 

the garden of the Royal Boutique, and the chemist 

Florian Coetanfeu. While the gardener, stimulated by 

his precarious position, accepted the offer without 

thinking it over, and tried to obtain substantial 

benefits by tergiversing his curriculum, the chemist 

used the subterfuge of his family to resign from the 

expedition. Finally, Tadeo Haenke was admitted as 

the third expeditionary naturalist” (Puig Samper et al., 

2001: 50). In Central America, Pineda took part of 

the exploration of Panama and somewhat later in the 

ascend to the El Viejo volcano, in Nicaragua, together 

with Haenke (Fig. 13B). While exploring the island of 

Luzon (Philippines) Pineda fell sick and died in June 

of 1792. 

Thaddeus Peregrinus Xaverius Haenke was born in 

Bohemia in 1761. He studied natural sciences in the 

universities of Vienna and Prague. In 1786 Haenke 

was selected as a botanist to participate in the first 

multidisciplinary expedition to the Giant Mountains 

(Krkonoše, Riesengebirge) organized by the Royal 

Czech Society. The results of that expedition were 

published in 1788. This was the most important work 

of Haenke from Bohemia, and he was awarded for it 

a silver medal by the Royal Czech Scientific Society. 

Haenke always wanted to travel to distant places and 

study the botany of new, botanically uncharted areas. 

He was interested in participating in Captain Billings’ 

expedition sponsored by the Russian Catherine II, but 

Billings ultimately did not take any scientists with 

him 14 . In 1789 Haenke was offered the position of a 

botanist in the Malaspina expedition and he eagerly 

accepted the offer. The Austrian Emperor Joseph II 

learned about Haenke, now one of the best botanists 

in all of Austria, and did not want to allow Haenke to 

leave the country. Emperor Joseph II allowed Haenke 

to leave only after the intervention by Professor 

Jacquin, but Haenke had to agree that he would return 

back to Austria after the expedition. By misfortune, 

Haenke arrived in Cádiz one day after the corvettes 

had sailed. This forced him to take another vessel to 

Buenos Aires, crossing the Andes all the way to Chile 

and finally joining the group in Valparaíso. “But this 

contrariety served the purpose of forcing Haenke [...] 

to cross the South American all the way to Santiago 

14 Captain Joseph Billings, an English navigator, had earlier accompanied Captain James Cook on his third voyage to the Pacific, 

and subsequently entered the Russian navy, initially as a lieutenant. In 1785, Empress Catherine II of Russia, acting for her 

government, commissioned Billings to command an expedition to search for the Northeast Passage, forming the “Northeastern 

Secret Geographical and Astronomical Expedition” (1785-94). 


37

38 

de Chile and collecting on the way some 250 species 

of plants” (Puig Samper et al. 2001: 18) (Fig. 13, 

C—D). Haenke’s botanical findings were published 

by Presl in 1827 with the title Reliquiae Haenkeanae 

seu Descriptiones et Icones Plantarum quas in 

America Meridionali et Boreali, in Insulis Phillipinis 

et Marianis Collegit. In 1793, when the expedition 

was preparing for the return voyage to Spain, he stayed 

in El Callao (Peru), wanting to continue his botanical 

explorations. Some years later he established himself 

in Bolivia, from where he continued sending the results 

of his collections. He died in the city of Cochabamba 

in 1816 (Slavik & Ceska, 2002). 

Louis Neé (ca. 1734-1807), French by birth, was 

working in Madrid in the garden of the Royal Pharmacy 

when Pineda proposed him as a member of the scientific 

group. He was accepted and, during the five years of the 

expedition, collected an important herbarium with over 

10,000 specimens (Fig. 13E). Before leaving Madrid for 

Cadiz, where the expedition was to embark, Neé insisted 

in receiving a certain amount of money in advance, 

to cover his travel expenses and for the “subsistence 

of his family, which was left in charge of his wife, 

Doña Francisca Luz”. His request was finally granted 

and, with all financial matters settled, Neé writes: “the 

day of the expedition June 5, I left Madrid for Cadiz 

in the company of Don Antonio Pineda, Don Vicente 

Tofiño and Don Felipe Bauzá. I presented myself to 

the Commander, don Alejandro Malaspina and to don 

José Bustamante, second Commander of the expedition, 

who greeted me with great kindness. Our departure 

took place on July 30, at ten o’clock in the morning” 

(Muñoz Garmendia, & Sanz Álvarez, 1990:31). In the 

course of the expedition, Neé dedicated himself mainly 

to the collection of plants, although he also collected 

other objects, such as shells, minerals and ethnographic 

materials. These collections were made mostly alone, or 

in the company of Antonio Pineda, who was the member 

of the expedition with whom he worked together more 

often. The impression arises that the two botanists, Neé 

and Haenke, did not intend to form a team nor to sum 

efforts for a future joint publication. Each one collected 

on his own and made the descriptions separately, 

without taking part, apparently, in any attempt of 

cooperation. The herbaria were sent separately to Cadiz 

and the distrust went so far that Neé, on March 22, 1979, 

writes to Juan de Lángara: ‘since the valuable collection 

LANKESTERIANA 


has already been made, of which mister Haencke, the 

renowned German botanist and fellow traveler has 

duplicates, be it published in Spain as soon as possible 

so that the foreigners cannot anticipate us in prejudice 

of the national honor and that of the undersigned, who 

has worked so hard to be the first author and discoverer’ 

(Muñoz Garmendía, & Sanz Álvarez, 1990:37). Neé 

was the only of the three botanists to return to Europe. 

Of importance for Mesoamerica are his collections, 

together with Pineda and Haenke, in Panama, Nicaragua 

and Mexico. 

During the period of interest for this study, 

Malaspina’s corvettes sailed from El Callao in Peru 

to Guayaquil in Ecuador, from where they departed 

to Panama in October of 1790. The surroundings of 

the city of Panama and the island of Taboga where 

explored in December 1790 (Fig. 13F). From the 

journal of Luis Neé we have the following dates: 

October, 28: 

Weighing anchor in the port of Guayaquil towards 

Panama. 

November, 16: 

Arrival at Pericó Island, close to Panama. 

November, 17/December, 10: 

Suroundings of Panama, towards Punta Mala, 

Ancón Hill, the coast, convent of the Nuns of 

the Concepción, towards San Lázaro, Coconut 

Orchard, Pericó Island and others surrounding the 

harbor, coastline towards Arenal Grande. 

Excursion of 7 leagues towards Portobelo, on the 

Atlantic coast.. Pineda follows the Cruces River. 

December, 10: 

Weighing anchor from Panama. 

December, 11 / 14: 

Anchoring at Taboga Island. Neé and Haenke 

collect on Taboga Island 

December, 15: 

Setting sail from Taboga Island. 

It was then when Malaspina first studied the possibility 

of building a canal to communicate both oceans. In the 

first months of 1791, the corvettes sailed towards Costa 

Rica and separated. While the Atrevida, after visiting 

the island of Cocos, set a straight course to Acapulco, 

the Descubierta navigated along the Central American 

coast, landing in El Realejo (Nicaragua) and Sonsonate 

(El Salvador), arriving in Acapulco on March 25.


It is again Luis Neé who gives us the dates in his 

journal: 

January 17 / 30: 

Sojourn of the corvette “Descubierta” in the 

harbor of Realejo (Nicaragua). Pineda and Haenke 

explore the surroundings of Realejo and go to the 

El Viejo volcano from January 20 to 22; on the 23, 

Pineda and Malaspina went to the Cardón Island, 

collecting mainly shells; Cayetano Valdés traveled 

to León and to the Telica volcano, collecting 

materials for the Natural History collection. On 

January 30, the “Descubierta” set sail for Acapulco 

(Muñoz Garmendia, & Sanz Álvarez, 1990:338). 

Presl, in his Reliquiae Haenkeanae, gives us the 

following description of the journey of the expedition 

along the Central American coast: 

“Mense DeCeMbre e sinu porTuque guayaquil 

uTerque navis abiiT, CursuM sepTenTrioneM versus 

DirexiT eT in sinu eT porTu panaMa CoMMoraviT. 

planTaruM panaMensiuM FasCiCulus DiligenTiaM 

popularis nosTri in hoC orbis loCo DeMonsTraT. naves 

Malaspina DuCenTe ii. Februarii 1791 aD aCapulCo 

in nova hispania pervenerunT, posTquaM porTuM 

eT urbeM guaTiMala TeTigerunT” [By the month of 

December both ships departed from the gulf and the 

port of Guayaquil, directing their course toward the 

North, and arrived to the gulf and port of Panama. The 

fascicle of the Panamanian plants demonstrates the 

diligence of our people in this place of the world. The 

ships conduced by Malaspina came to Acapulco in New 

Spain on February 2nd, 1791, after having touched the 

port and city of Guatemala] (Presl, 1827). 

After exploring the interior of Mexico and the 

northwest coast of the continent all the way to Alaska, 

the expedition continued in the first months of 1792 

to the Marianne and Philippine islands. In 1793 the 

group was again in Peru and returned finally to Cádiz 

in September of 1794. It is noteworthy that, while 

the expeditions of Malaspina and Sessé and Mociño 

coincided during the year of 1791 along the Mexican 

Pacific coast, history does not record any encounter 

between either groups (Novo y Colsón, 1885). 

Haenke’s herbarium, with over 15,000 specimens, 

was dispersed among numerous European herbaria. 

In 1827, Carl Boriwog Presl compiled an important 

part which was conserved in Prague and Vienna 

and published his Reliquiae Haenkeanae, where he 

enumerated 27 species of orchids. In the second volume 

we find the only illustration of an orchid in our area 

of study, that Haenke named Dendrobium mexicanum 

and Christenson (1991) identified later as Eulophia 

alta (L.) Fawc. & Rendle (Fig. 14A). Among Haenke’s 

collections, Presl described at least four new species 

of orchids, which are widely distributed in our region: 

Oncidium obovatum Presl [= Barkeria obovata (Presl) 

Chistenson], Elleanthus linifolius Presl, Elleanthus 

lancifolius Presl and Vanilla odorata Presl. 

The herbarium of Neé stayed during long years 

in Madrid, in unopened boxes, without anybody 

bothering to study it. It came to the botanical garden 

of Madrid where, fortunately, it could not be reached 

by Pavón, who had an offer from Webb to purchase 

it. Things remained unchanged until recently, in 1980, 

the ‘Ancient General Herbarium’, which had survived 

more or less intact, was diluted in the ‘General 

Herbarium’ (that now holds over 466,000 sheets), 

thanks to an unfortunate and hasty decision of the 

‘conservators’ (Real Jardín Botánico de Madrid, 1989: 

70). Thanks to this, the study of the original specimens 

collected by Neé has become an almost impossible 

task. However, 370 sheets of botanical illustrations 

have survived, which are now one of our main sources 

of information about the collections by the botanists 

of Malaspina’s expedition. Among them we find 

four species of Orchidaceae. One is an illustration of 

Caularthron bilamellatum (Rchb. f.) R. E. Schult., 

collected in Guayaquil (Ecuador). The other three are 

Catasetum sp., from the island of Taboga (Panama), 

Ionopsis utricularioides (Sw.) Lindl. from the port 

of San Blas (state of Nayarit, Mexico) and Laelia sp. 

from the mines of Real del Monte (state of Hidalgo, 

Mexico). By far, the most interesting for us is the 

illustration by José Guío, draftsman of the expedition, 

of a species of Catasetum in the island of Taboga 

(Panama) during the last days of December 1790 and 

given by Neé the number 19. It is probably the first 

botanical illustration of a Central American species 

of Orchidaceae, with the exceptions of those by De la 

Cruz, Sahagún, Hernández and Tabernaemontanus, in 

the XVI century (Fig. 14B). The other two illustrations 

are from species that where not collected within our 

area of study. However, Ionopsis utricularioides (Fig. 

14C) is a common species in all Mesoamerica and 


39

40 

Laelia sp. (Fig. 14D) was collected not far from the 

limits of modern Central America. 

Sharing the fortune of the other Spanish botanical 

expeditions, Malaspina never saw the publication of 

the botanical results of his voyage. His proposal to 

the king for a political reorganization of the empire 

brought him charges of treason to the state. Imprisoned 

in Galicia from 1796 to 1802, Malaspina was liberated 

thanks to mediation by Napoleon but had to leave 

Spain and return to his native Italy, where he died in 

1810. Malaspina’s was doubtless the best organized 

of all Spanish scientific expeditions to America. An 

important factor for this was the fact that it was the only 

one which was structured along strict military lines. 

The Royal Botanic Expedition of Sessé and Mociño 

to New Spain (1787-1803). After the Jesuits were 

expelled from Spain in 1767, an original copy in five 

volumes of the manuscripts of Francisco Hernández 

was found in the library of the Imperial College of 

Madrid. Casimiro Gómez Ortega, director of the Royal 

Botanical Garden, decided to publish the manuscripts, 

but found himself with two problems: the work by 

Hernández was no longer up to date and the original 

drawings were missing. In the meantime, in January 

1785, the Spanish physician Martín de Sessé y Lacasta 

(1751-1808), who served in Cuba in the squadron of 

the Marquis del Socorro, proposed to Gómez Ortega 

the idea of establishing a botanical garden and a 

chair of Botany in the Mexican capital (Fig. 15A). 

As he wrote: “Considering you one of the lovers of 

the flora, I dare to interrupt your occupations with 

the following discourse aimed at making them shine 

and give fruit in this part of the New World” (Letter 

from Sessé to Gómez Ortega, January 30, 1785). The 

idea had already been expressed by Löfling, who in 

a letter to Linné dated June 24, 1753, writes: “I gave 

him [the Marquis of Grimaldi] to think that it would 

be of advantage to go to Mexico, where Hernández 

had been, but ob fata seculi (= for destiny’s fate) he 

left his observations obscure and imprecise” (Muñoz 

Garmendia, & Sanz Álvarez, 1990:25). 

The idea to complete the publication of the work 

of Hernández with documents and drawings that could 

eventually be found in Mexico, and the timely proposal 

of Sessé, where the motives for the promulgation by 

King Charles III of the Royal Order of October 27, 

LANKESTERIANA 


1786. The establishment of the Botanical Garden in 

New Spain, the Chair of Botany (the first in America) 

and the formation of an expedition that should “form 

the drawings, collect the natural productions and 

complete the writings of Francisco Hernández” , was 

ordered (Maldonado Polo, 1996: 25). The expedition 

was therefore organized as an extension of the 

enterprise that had started two centuries earlier. It 

was composed initially by Martín de Sessé, Vicente 

Cervantes, José Longinos Martínez, Juan del Castillo 

and Jaime Senseve. 

The Garden and the Chair of Botany were 

inaugurated in May, 1788 (Fig. 15B). A short time 

later, during the second course of botany (1789), a 

brilliant student stood out who was destined to have 

a prominent role in the expedition at the side of 

Sessé: the Creole José Mariano Mociño (1757-1820) 

(Fig. 15C). In 1787 Sessé had already started his field 

activities, which extended initially until 1794. In 

different excursions, joined by Mociño after 1790, the 

expeditionaries explored the central regions of Mexico, 

including the Pacific Coast and the Gulf of Mexico. 

Other itineraries brought members of the expedition to 

the north of Mexico, California and the coast of the 

Canadian Pacific. Of particular interest to our study is 

the excursion of Mociño to the Gulf coast (1793-1794) 

where he seems to have explored the region to the 

south of Veracruz and adjacent Tabasco. “Southeastern 

Mexico, as far as the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, belongs 

also to biological Central America” (Williams, 1956:1) 

(Fig. 15, D—F; Tab. 3). In the Torner collection of the 

Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation we find 

beautiful orchid illustrations, drawn by the draftsmen 

of the expedition, Juan de Dios Vicente de la Cerda y 

Atanasio Echeverría y Godoy (Fig. 16—18; 19B—C). 

The term given to the expedition expired in October, 

1794. Since the territories of the southern regions of 

the Vicekingdom -the border of Guatemala- had not 

yet been explored, Sessé asked for an extension, which 

was approved by Royal Order of September 15, 1794. 

It was resolved that the expedition should explore, 

for a period of two years, the kingdom of Guatemala 

and simultaneously the Windward islands. Ever since 

the expedition of Malaspina had touched Central 

American lands, clear consciousness existed that these 

territories could not be left out by the members of the 

expedition to New Spain.


A B 

C 

Figure 14. A — Dendrobium mexicanum. In Presl, C., 1827, (2): 102. B — Catasetum sp. Illustration by José Guío in Real 

Jardín Botánico de Madrid, 1989: plate 137. C — Ionopsis utricularioides (Sw.) Lindl. Illustration by José Guío in Real 

Jardín Botánico de Madrid, 1989: plate 1260. D — Laelia sp. Illustration by Francisco Lindo in Real Jardín Botánico de 

Madrid, 1989: plate 198. 

D 


41

42 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

15. a — View of Mexico, 1754. In San Pío Aladrén, 2000: 41. B— Plan of the Botanical Garden in Mexico. In Maldonado 

Polo, 1996: 30. C — José Mariano Mociño (1757-1820). Portrait courtesy of Esthela Sandoval. D — Routes of Sessé 

and Mociño, 1793-94. In Maldonado Polo, 1996: 50. E — Manuscript by Mociño, part of his index of collected plants. In 

San Pío Aladrén, 2000: 59. F — Labels from the Mociño herbarium. In San Pío Aladrén, 2000: 65. 


B 

F

C 


Figure 16. Stanhopea oculata (Lodd.) Lindl. No. 0164 of the illustrations of the expedition of Sessé and Mociño in the 

Torner Collection. Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 


43

44 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 17. Vanilla pompona Schiede. No. 0483 of the illustrations of the expedition of Sessé and Mociño in the Torner 

Collection. Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 



Figure 18. Bletia roezlii Rchb. f. Nº 0091 of the illustrations of the expedition of Sessé and Mociño in the Torner Collection. 

Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 


45

46 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 19. A — Route of Mociño and De la Cerda through Central America. In Maldonado Polo,1996: 74. B — Prosthechea 

baculus (Rchb. f.) W. E. Higgins. No. 1933 of the illustrations of the expedition of Sessé and Mociño in the Torner 

Collection. Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. C — Isochilus linearis (Jacq.) R. Br. Nº 0829, id. 


The expedition split in two and in May, 1795, a first 

group at the command of Sessé sailed from Veracruz 

to explore the islands of Cuba, Santo Domingo and 

Puerto Rico. The second group, lead by Mociño, 

departed in June of the same year from Mexico on a 

southern route. Another of the scientists, José Longinos 

Martínez, started a few days before and arrived in 

Guatemala before Mociño, who encountered multiple 

delays during his trip. Mociño and De la Cerda finally 

arrived in Guatemala in October, 1796. In the first days 

of the year 1797, Mociño and De la Cerda initiated in 

Guatemala a long journey, exploring during the next 

two years the Pacific Coast belt of Central America. 

Their route would take them through El Salvador, 

Honduras and Nicaragua, reaching finally Cartago, in 

Costa Rica. The route from the capital of Guatemala 

to Nicaragua was called the “passage of Nicaragua” 

and passed through Cartago, from where it continued 

to Panama. Mociño and De la Cerda kept always, 

except for small variations, to this route by way of 

Ahuachapán, Sonsonate, San Salvador, Cojutepeque, 

San Vicente, Zacatecoluca, San Miguel and 

Conchalagua, all towns in the territory of El Salvador. 

Then, bordering the Gulf of Fonseca, they traveled 


Table 3. Orchids collected by Mociño during the excursion of 1793-94 (From McVaugh, 2000: 408-424). Not included are 

the unidentified species. 

Name used by Sessé and Mociño Botanical name that is valid today Locality of collection 

Epidendrum acuminatum Prosthechea baculus (Rchb. f.) W. E. Higgins San Andrés Tuxtla 

Epidendrum capitatum Elleanthus cynarocephalus (Rchb. f.) Rchb. f. Volcán de San Martín, Tuxtla 

Epidendrum cornutum Stanhopea oculata (Lodd.) Lindl. Orizaba, Veracruz 

Epidendrum ellipticum Cranichis sylvatica A. Rich. & Gal. San Andrés, Tuxtla 

Epidendrum emarginatum Pleurothallis tubata (?) (Lodd.) Steud. Acayucán 

Epidendrum guttatum Oncidium lankesteri Ames Córdoba, Veracruz 

Epidendrum lamellatum Corallorrhiza macrantha Schltr. Orizaba, Veracruz 

Epidendrum lineare Isochilus linearis (Jacq.) R. Br. San Andrés, Tuxtla 

Epidendrum nutans Nidema boothii (Lindl.) Schltr. Córdoba, Veracruz 

Epidendrum paniculatum Epidendrum diffusum Sw. Córdoba, Veracruz 

Epidendrum pulchellum Encyclia pterocarpa (Lindl.) Dressler San Andrés, Tuxtla 

Epidendrum pusillum Erycina pusilla (L.) N. H. Williams & M. W. Chase Veracruz 

Epidendrum tigrinum Epidendrum raniferum Lindl. Papantla, Veracruz 

Epidendrum vanilla Vanilla pompona Schiede Córdoba, Veracruz 

Orchis pauciflora Comparettia falcata Poepp. & Endl. Córdoba, Veracruz 

through Choluteca in Honduras until they arrived in 

Nicaragua. Following the same route along the coast, 

they were in El Viejo, Realejo, Chinandega, León, 

Nagarote, Mateare and Managua. From this last city 

they directed themselves to the Lake of Nicaragua, 

bordering it along its southwestern margin and 

crossing to the island of Ometepe, passing later 

through Masaya and Granada, and arriving finally 

in the town of Nicaragua (afterwards named Rivas) 

(Taracena, 1983) (Fig. 19, A). Vegetal specimens from 

the Gulf of Nicoya and Cartago have been identified, 

allowing the assumption that the expedition, or part 

of it, continued its route further to the south. The 

return journey followed the same route, and the 

expeditionaries arrived back in Guatemala at the end 

of March, 1798, after having survived the earthquake 

of San Salvador, in February of the same year. 

The most important botanical result of the 

expedition to Central America is the manuscript 

of the Flora de Guatemala, that Mociño intended 

to publish later together with the Flora de México. 

Although the results may seem meager, the relatively 

low number of species described in the manuscript (a 

total of 526) may obey to the fact that the botanists, in 


47

48 

this case Mociño, only treated new species that they 

found on their way, not mentioning those previously 

found during the earlier excursions. “Of strong 

influence must have been also the fact that the Central 

American territories where less explored from the 

botanical standpoint than other regions of New Spain, 

at least less well known to the European explorers in 

the XVIII and the preceding centuries, that impeded 

their [the plants’] identification and knowledge. Thus, 

many plants where stored and not included in the list” 

(Maldonado Polo, 1996: 121-122). 

McVaugh warns: “Botanists of the future, 

if working with the collections of Sessé and 

Mociño… will do well to remember, however, that 

any individual specimens of unknown origin may 

have been collected in Guatemala, in El Salvador, 

in Nicaragua or even in Costa Rica” (McVaugh, 

1977: 49). No trace is left from the drawings made 

for the Flora de Guatemala, most of them having 

been destroyed in the earthquake of San Salvador 

of 1798. Notwithstanding, this work can however 

be considered as the first modern flora of Central 

America. The number of orchids described in this 

flora is pitifully small, and no locality of collection is 

indicated for any of them. A total of two genera and 

10 species are described (Tab. 4; Fig. 19, B—C). 

The authorized term for the extension of the 

expedition expired and it was not until May, 1798, 

that Sessé returned to the Mexican capital. Mociño 

LANKESTERIANA 

Table 4. Orchids included in the Flora of Guatemala of Mociño. 

Name used by Mociño (genus) Name used by Mociño (species) Botanical name valid today 

Serapias “Serapias bulbis ovatis, compressis, 

foliis ensiformibus, nectarii labio 

trifido; lacinia intermedia rugosa 

glandulosa” ? 

Epidendrum emarginatum Pleurothallis tubata (?) (Lodd.) Steud. 

acuminatum Prosthechea baculus (Rchb. f.) W. E. Higgins 

pusillum Erycina pusilla (L.) N. H. Williams & M. W. Chase 

viridiflorum ? 

veracrucense ? 

nervosum ? 

oblongum ? 

ellipticum Cranichis sylvatica A. Rich. & Gal. 

lineare Isochilus linearis (Jacq.) R. Br. 


did the same in February, 1799. New hindrances, 

particularly the war with England, delayed the return 

of the expeditionaries to Spain, that finally took place 

in 1803. 

The last months of the expedition in Mexico 

coincided with the arrival of Alexander von Humboldt 

in the capital of New Spain, in April, 1803. Although 

the name of von Humboldt is not directly relevant to 

us (his collections lie all outside of our area of study), 

it is interesting to note that both Mociño and Cervantes 

met the great German naturalist, before the departure 

of Mociño to Cádiz, in June of that year. After their 

encounter Humboldt wrote: “MM. Cervantes, Sessé 

et Mocino nous feront connoitre sous peu la flore de 

ce pays; mais sur un terrain aussi immense la nature 

est pour ainsi dire inépuisable, et nous possédons sans 

doute plusieurs végétaux mexicains qui ont échappé á 

la sagacité de ces botanistes” (= Messrs. Cervantes, 

Sessé and Mociño made known to us in a short time 

the flora of that country; but in such an immense 

territory nature is -we could say- inexhaustible, and 

we possess without doubt several Mexican vegetables 

which have escaped the sagacity of these botanists) 

(Humboldt & Bonpland 1808: iii). 

The material collected by the expedition arrived 

in Spain during days of great political convulsion. 

Mociño was made responsible for publishing the 

results of the expeditions to Mexico, Guatemala, 

California and the Windward Islands. To do so he


was given the help of the Mexican Pablo La Llave 

(1773-1833) (González Bueno & Rodríguez Nozal, 

R., 2006: 173) But the wartime situation in which 

Spain found itself did not favor the project. The main 

part of the collections (particularly the herbarium) 

came to the “Botanical Office” 15 controlled by 

Pavón, especially after the forced exile of Mociño 

to France in 1813, accused of collaborating with the 

French occupation forces. The attempts by Sessé 

and Mociño to publish a Mexican flora never bore 

fruit (Fig. 20A). Between herbarium specimens and 

botanical drawings made during the expedition, we 

are left with a total of 136 species of Orchidaceae. 

In many cases the species have not been identified. 

In others there is no information about the locality of 

collection, so that we can not be sure if they belong 

to our area of study. 

In spite of the circumstances that prevented the 

publication of the scientific results, there is no doubt 

that the Royal Botanical Expedition to New Spain is 

a milestone in the history of our orchids. 

The dispersal of the botanical collections 

“Misfortunes always pursue men of genius” 

Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote 

Pavón, starting in 1814, and in charge of the 

Botanical Office, began to handle the collections as if 

they were his own, selling specimens of the herbarium 

of the expedition to New Spain and duplicates of that 

of the flora of Peru and Chile, so squandering the 

funds which were under his care. In the meantime, in 

England, the opulent botanist Aylmer Bourke Lambert 

(1761-1842) (Fig. 20B) was named in 1798 as one of 

the first members of the Linnean Society. A passionate 

collector, Lambert amassed, through tenacity and 

wealth, a large library and one of the most important 

herbaria of his time. We do not know how Lambert got 

notice of Pavón’s dealings, but we know that between 

1814 and until 1825 Pavón sold to him more than 

15,000 botanical and zoological specimens that were 

kept at the Botanical Office in Madrid. 

But Lambert was not the only one to receive 

materials from Pavón. As an example, let us mention 

the almost 5,000 specimens which Philip Baker Webb 

received between 1826 y 1827, that today form part of 

the herbarium of the Botanical Institute of Florence, 

as part of a legacy from Webb to the Duke of Tuscany 

(Fig. 20C). 

John Lindley and the Lambert herbarium. Pavón’s 

conduct does not admit excuses. But if we look at this 

case from a practical point of view, the sale of the 

herbarium specimens of the expedition was perhaps 

the best way to bring the botanical richness of New 

Spain into the hands of the botanists of those times 

(although this was surely not the motive of Pavón). 

The main herbarium that was conserved at the Royal 

Botanical Garden in Madrid (probably with about 

half of the original number of specimens) was not 

unpacked until 1930. The specimens were numbered 

and sent on loan to Chicago where, between 1936 

and 1964, all were identified and photographed, 

before being returned to Madrid (McVaugh, 2000: 1). 

In other words: all specimens that were not sold by 

Pavón had to wait over 140 years before they could 

be studied! 

Generous with his colleagues and friends, 

Lambert always gave them free use of his library 

and herbarium. In this manner the great John Lindley 

(1799-1865) (Fig. 21A) was able to study and identify 

many of the specimens that came from Madrid. In 

his monumental work The Genera and Species of 

Orchidaceous Plants (1830-40) Lindley mentions a 

total of 12 species based on material that had been 

sold by Pavón to Lambert.In all of his descriptions we 

find the following note by Lindley ‘Hab. in Mexico; 

Pavon, (exam. s. sp. in Herb. Lambert)’. This note 

was the reason why Pavón was considered, for many 

years, the collector of this species, forgetting that 

he had never been to Mexico. Two of the species 

described by Lindley (Epidendrum fruticosum y 

Epidendrum radicans) have, as the name of their 

author, ‘Pavon ex Lindl.’ This indicates that Lindley 

respected an epithet that had already been suggested 

by Pavón (Fig. 21B). 

Augustin De Candolle and the “Ladies of Geneva” 

The 2,000 illustrations of the botanical expedition to 

New Spain went a different way. Mociño marched 

15 The Botanical Office (“Oficina Botánica”), located in Madrid as a dependence of the Ministry of Justice of the Indies, was 

conceived as a State Center for the study and publication of the American flora. 


49

50 

LANKESTERIANA 

Table 5. Species described by Lindley based on specimens in the Lambert herbarium that had been bought from Pavón. 

Name given by Lindley Botanical name that is valid today 

Epidendrum bidentatum Lindl. Encyclia bidentata (Lindl.) Hágs. & Soto Arenas 

Epidendrum floribundum H. B. K. Epidendrum paniculatum Ruiz & Pavón 

Epidendrum fruticosum Pavon ex Lindl. Epidendrum fruticosum Pavon ex Lindl. 

Epidendrum polyanthum Lindl. Epidendrum polyanthum Lindl. 

Epidendrum radicans Pavon ex Lindl. Epidendrum radicans Pavon ex Lindl. 

Epidendrum raniferum Lindl. Epidendrum raniferum Lindl. 

Epidendrum vitellinum Lindl. Prosthechea vitellina (Lindl.) W. E. Higgins 

Eucnemis brevilabris Lindl. Govenia liliacea (Lex.) Lindl. 

Oncidium funereum Lindl. Oncidium reflexum Lindl. 

Oncidium pauciflorum Lindl. Oncidium pauciflorum Lindl. 

Ponera juncifolia Lindl. Ponera juncifolia Lindl. 

Stanhopea bucephalus Lindl. Stanhopea oculata (Lodd.) Lindl. 

with them to his exile in Montpellier, where he met 

the Swiss botanist Augustin Pyramus De Candolle 

(1778-1841) (Fig. 21C), who was impressed by the 

quality of the work. A short time later Mociño, who 

seemed to have lost all hopes of returning to Spain, 

gave the drawings and the manuscripts of the Flora 

Mexicana to De Candolle, who took them with him 

in 1816 to Geneva. Six months later, in April, 1817, 

he received a letter from Mociño, who was still in 

Montpellier, letting him know that he had received 

permission to return to Spain, and asking him to 

return the collections. Honest until his last days, 

Mociño dared not to go back without the drawings: 

they belonged to the Crown (McVaugh, 1998). 

With the help of more than 120 volunteers, 

most of them ladies of Geneva’s high society, De 

Candolle managed to copy almost 1,200 plates in 

only 10 days. Together with 300 duplicates, that 

were a gift from Mociño, he formed a collection of 

13 bound volumes known today as the Flora of the 

Ladies of Geneva. Many species discovered during 

the expedition to New Spain could be known during 

the XIX century thanks to this work. Since, as we 

shall see later, the original drawings of Mociño 

disappeared from 1817 until 1981, the collection of 

copies and duplicates in Geneva became the only 

source of knowledge about the illustrations of the 

expedition. In De Candolle’s two main works, his 

Regni Vegetabilis Systema Naturae (1817-1821) 

and his Prodomus Systematics Naturales Regni 

Vegetabilis (1824-1873, completed by his son 


Alphonse), more than 300 species of plants were 

described based on the drawings of the expedition. 

Encyclia candollei (Lindl.) Schltr. was dedicated to 

De Candolle. Apparently only 10 species of orchids 

were copied. Most of them have been identified to 

date, although -again- we can not be certain that they 

belong to our area of study, since no localities of 

collection are indicated. The originals of six of these 

copies are still preserved in the Torner Collection of 

the Hunt Institute. 

With the recovered collections, Mociño returned 

to Spain, where the illustrations disappeared after 

his death. In 1981 they were discovered by the 

Table 6. Orchidaceae in the “Flora of the Ladies of 

Geneva” (Torner: Number of the original drawing in the 

collection of the Hunt Institute; Icones: original number 

assigned by Sessé y Mociño; DC: Number assigned by 

De Candolle). 

Botanical name Torner Icones DC 

Bletia roezli 0091 258 1196 

Cypripedium irapeanum 1112 294 1225 

Encyclia lancifolia 0370 253 1225 

Prosthechea radiata 253 1190 

Govenia sp. 258 1196 

Malaxis carnosa 0218 175 1219 

Malaxis unifolia 0219 176 1219* 

Spiranthes cinnabarina 174 1221 

Sacoila lanceolata 173 1220 

Stenorrhynchos aurantiacus 1751 174 1221

A 

C 


Figure 20. A — Front cover of Mociño’s unpublished manuscript for the Flora of New Spain. San Pío Aladrén, 2005: 72. B — 

Aylmer Bourke Lambert (1761-1842). Courtesy of the Oakes Ames Herbarium, Harvard University. C — Dispersal of the 

botanical collections proceeding from the expeditions to Peru and New Spain. San Pío Aladrén & Puig-Samper, 2000: 11. 

B 


51

52 

LANKESTERIANA 

A B 

C D 

Figure 21. A — John Lindley (1799-1865). From a contemporary etching. In Orquídea (Mex.), June 1975: 90. B — Copy of a 

page of the list of specimens sent by Pavón to Lambert, where the epithet radicans was used for the the first time. Courtesy of 

the British Museum of Natural History and of Henry Oakeley. C — Augustin Pyramus De Candolle (1778-1841). Courtesy of 

the Oakes Ames Herbarium, Harvard University. D — José Cecilio del Valle (1777-1834). Hall & Pérez Brignoli, 2001: 168. 



Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation of 

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the private library of 

the Torner family in Barcelona, and acquired for the 

ridiculous sum of 2,000 pesetas (ca. $12) for each 

illustration. As had happened 160 years earlier with 

the herbarium specimens, the illustrations of the 

expedition of Sessé and Mociño went abroad under 

the accommodating eyes of the Spanish government. 

Poor and sick, Mociño died in Barcelona in 1820. 

His friend, the Spanish botanist Mariano Lagasca, 

wrote in November of the same year to De Candolle: 

“Mociño noster sex abhinc mensibus e vita discessit 

in urbe Barcinonensi ... Vir certe melioris fortunae 

dignus” (McVaugh, 1998). 

The history of the expedition to New Spain does 

not have a happy end: Sessé in 1808 and Mociño 

in 1820, died without fulfilling their dream of 

publishing the floras of Mexico and Guatemala. 

Lambert died in 1842 and the provision in his will 

that his herbarium should be kept intact was not 

obeyed. His collections were auctioned in separate 

lots and dispersed all over the world (Anonymous, 

1842). An important part of the materials that Pavón 

had sold to Lambert passed into the hands of the 

British Museum of Natural History, where they 

still remain. Another significant portion is today in 

Geneva. Pavón was finally asked to account for his 

acts in 1831 and three years later the Board of the 

Science Museum of Madrid suspended him from his 

salary. A sad guardian of the treasures brought from 

America by the botanical expeditions of the latter 

XVIII century, he died in disgrace in 1840. 

Mariano de la Paz wrote these words in reference 

to the collections of the Spanish expedition of 1862 

to the Pacific 16 , words that are valid for practically 

all materials that came to Spain as a product of the 

great expeditions of the Century of Light: “These 

precious collections, brought together at so much 

effort, await, as many others of similar origin which 

have been neglected for years in the limbus of 

Science, the doubtful arrival of a naturalist savoir, 

who will glorify their authors, bringing them to 

light, if moths and ants did not get to them first” 

(Real Jardín Botánico de Madrid,1989: 97). 

The Cabinet of Natural History of Guatemala. 

Aside from its scientific achievements, the Royal 

Botanical Expedition to New Spain, bearer of the ideas 

and ideals of the Enlightenment, had a strong influence 

on the social and political environment of Central 

America in the last years of the XVIII century. 

The Royal Economical Society of Friends of the 

Country of Guatemala was founded in 1795, as a 

result of the new ideas that were slowly imposing 

themselves upon the colony. Life in the capital of 

Guatemala went on in this ambience of reforms, in the 

last years of the XVIII century, when the expedition 

arrived, proceeding from the largest and most 

advanced city in America, which was the capital of 

Mexico” (Maldonado Polo,1996: 78-79). Longinos 

Martínez established contacts to the Society, that had 

among its priorities the development of natural history. 

In December 1796, and due to the efforts of 

Longinos Martínez, the Cabinet of Natural History 

of Guatemala was solemnly inaugurated, with the 

presence of the prominence and high authorities of 

the Captaincy General. As we will see, the presence 

this day of José Cecilio del Valle (1777-1834) (Fig. 

21C) was of extraordinary importance. During the 

inauguration, the museum of natural history opened 

its doors to the public and the first pupils were tested: 

Pascasio Ortiz de Letona and Mariano Antonio de 

Larrave. Mociño and Longinos Martínez shared 

their knowledge, carrying out the first physical and 

chemical analysis of the drinking water in the area 

around the city. 

Although the Society was prohibited in 1799, its 

ideas prevailed. And it is no coincidence that it was 

Del Valle who drafted, twenty two years later, the 

declaration of independence of the Captaincy General, 

that was signed in Guatemala on September 15, 1821, 

and that we find the name of Mariano Larrave amongst 

those who signed it. 

At the end of this period we must mention what 

was perhaps the best posthumous homage that Mociño 

received: that of his friend Pablo La Llave, who in 

1832 designated the resplendent quetzal, the mythical 

bird of freedom in Central America since prehispanic 

times, with the name of Pharomachrus mocinno. 

16 The “Spanish Scientific Commission of the Voyage to the Pacific (1862-1866)” explored mainly South America, with the 

exception of a short visit to Taboga Island (Panama), from where no collections of Orchidaceae are recorded. 


53

54 

The new republIcs 

By the law of the seas and the distances, 

America can only belong to itself” 

Fray Servando Teresa de Mier (1811) 

Times of change. After independence in 1821, the 

Central American republics joined the ephemeral 

Mexican empire of Agustín de Iturbide. The Central 

American Federation was constituted in 1825, under 

the name of United Provinces of the Center of America. 

Mexico became a federal republic in 1824, under the 

name of the United Mexican States. 

In those confusing times, the spirit of Enlightenment 

remained present for a short period of time. “On 

October 5, 1825 [José Cecilio del Valle] addressed 

a letter to the Secretary of the Supreme Government 

proposing an expedition, financed by European 

and Guatemalan investors. He even proposed that 

Alexander von Humboldt should come back to 

America, suggesting he start with the Central American 

regions. The German never came back, but a large 

number of botanists started exploring the area during 

the XIX and XX centuries” (Brading, 1991: 639). 

In Mexico, Juan Martínez de Lexarza (1785-1824), 

Pablo de La Llave (1773-1833) and Vicente Cervantes 

(1755-1829) continued the work started by Sessé and 

Mociño, of whose expedition Cervantes had been a 

member. A word about Cervantes: such was his prestige 

in Mexico, where he held the chair of Botany, that the 

Mexican government, although he was a Spaniard, 

maintained him in his position after independence. He 

directed the Chair and the Botanical Garden until his death, 

and was also in charge of the pharmacy of the Hospital 

of San Andres, where he set up an excellent chemical 

laboratory. Cervantes was a brilliant investigator of the 

Mexican flora and described many new species. He kept a 

close scientific relationship with Antonio José Cavanilles, 

the great Spanish botanist, to whom he sent large amounts 

of material, and had also connections with Alexander von 

Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland, whose friendship he had 

made during their stay in Mexico. William Bullock, who 

arrived in Mexico in 1823, visited the Botanical Garden 

and praised its beauty and the perfection with which the 

plants were kept. He met Professor Cervantes and was 

thankful for receiving a total of 31 plants, for which 

Cervantes provided the botanical names. No orchids are 

found in this list (Bullock, 1825: 147-152). 

LANKESTERIANA 


Lexarza’s work, Novorum Vegetabilium Descriptiones, 

was published in 1824-1825. One hundred species 

where described, in conjunction with La Llave and 

Cervantes, as new to science. The Orchidianum 

Opusculum that appeared in the second fascicle of 

1825 includes the descriptions of 50 new species 

of Orchidaceae distributed in 20 genera, of which 

4 proved to be new. Lexarza proposed here a new 

classification of orchids, based on an analysis of their 

seeds and pollen. 

“Lexarza gave promise of making an accomplished 

botanist, but he attempted too much and was cut 

off young. Several of his orchids have not been 

identified in consequence of their descriptions being 

imperfect” (Hemsley, 1887: 122). The Mexican state 

of Michoacán, where most of the plants described 

in the Novorum Vegetabilium Descriptiones were 

collected, lies outside of our limits. It is therefore 

not clear if Lexarza should be included in this story. 

However, there are evidences that he, or La Llave (or 

both) collected plants from other families in the area 

of Veracruz, many of which can also be found in other 

regions of Central America. 

The following species, among others, were 

dedicated to Lexarza: Cypripedium lexarzae Scheidw., 

Macroclinium lexarzanum (Hágs. & González) 

Dodson, Maxillaria lexarzana Soto Arenas & Cabrera 

and Notylia lexarzana Hágs. & González. On the other 

hand, La Llave is remembered in Epidendrum llavei 

Steud. and Schiedeella llaveana Schltr. And both 

honored their friend Cervantes with Rhynchostele 

cervantesii (La Llave & Lex.) Soto Arenas & Salazar. 

The works of Lexarza, De La Llave and Cervantes 

are the last examples of ‘Spanish botany’ in Central 

America. It does not surprise us therefore, that many 

of their collections went the same way as those of the 

great Spanish expeditions of the preceding century and 

ended up lost in the hands of Spanish bureaucracy. 

In 1836, Joaquín Velásquez, assigned to the Mexican 

Legation in Rome, brought with him a small collection 

of dried plants and seeds collected in Guatemala, which 

formed the basis of the Florula Guatimalensis (1840) 

of Antonio Bertoloni (1775-1869) although no species 

of Orchidaceae are mentioned in this work. Bertoloni 

was the most important Italian botanist of his time and 

was also interested in exotic plants that he received 

from his friends. His collections of samples are kept in


the archives of the Botanic Garden of Bologna. 

Those were times of change. The Central American 

Federation was dissolved in 1838. While the newly 

born Central American nations took their first steps 

in republican life, other powers, particularly Great 

Britain and the United States, sharpened their weapons 

to fill the void left by Spain. “All Europe is now, after 

those immense territories were opened, occupied with 

commercial speculations in those directions” (Schott, 

F., Preface by the translator in Bullock, 1825: vi ). 

Central American society, overwhelmed with 

political, economical and social problems of great 

magnitude, could not find time or resources for the 

development of the natural sciences. As Wells wrote 

in 1857: “Since their separation from the Spanish 

authority, the Central American States have been, 

with brief intervals, a sorrow example to all lovers 

of republican institutions. The experiment of selfgovernment 

has proved to be a pitiful failure, after 

thirty years of revolutions and exhausting wars” 

(Wells, 1857: 419). In fact, with the notable exception 

of the trio formed by Martínez de Lexarza, de La Llave 

and Cervantes, we can not talk about a national science 

in Central America until the last quarter of the XIX 

century. The scientific discovery of the natural richness 

of the region was left in hands of foreign explorers, 

collectors and travelers, who would soon start arriving 

at its shores. 

Orchidomania 

“... it was neither to provide us with food or 

raiment, nor to protect us from disease or cold, 

that tropical forests were made to teem with an 

almost endless variety of the tribe [Orchidaceae]: 

either, therefore, in the cheerless spirit of atheism, 

we must suppose them to have been created in 

vain, or we must conclude that their office was 

something other and higher than to minister to 

the mere animal necessities of our nature. No; 

it was to yield us a pleasure of an intellectual 

kind, and so to win our affections from more 

hurtful things, that these most worthless of plants 

were clothed in unrivalled charms; - it was to 

provide a rich banquet in the temple of Flora, 

which, while it yielded the utmost enjoyment to 

her most constant votaries, might, at the same 

time, draw round her innocent table those who 

were more rarely numbered among her guests; an 

entertainment, in short, which might attract the 

man of pleasure by its splendour, the virtuoso by 

its rarity, and the man of science by its novelty and 

extraordinary character. It is, we are convinced, 

on this principle alone that we can attempt to 

understand the ‘Orchido-Mania’, which now 

pervades all (and especially the upper) classes, 

to such a marvellous extent. Not contented with 

the exertions of our foreign connexions, we send 

men expressly to all the points of the compass, to 

swell the number of the species in cultivation; and 

in this zeal for their introduction, the amateur, 

the nurseryman, and the public establishment, 

all vie with each other. The nobility, the clergy, 

those engaged in the learned professions or in the 

pursuits of commerce, seem alike unable to resist 

the influence of the prevailing passion; nay, if we 

may trust a paragraph in a morning paper, it has 

even extended to Windsor Castle itself.” 

James Bateman, in the introduction to 

Orchidaceae of Mexico and Guatemala (1843) 

Around the same time that Pavón was dealing with 

Lambert and selling the botanical samples of the Royal 

Spanish expeditions, enthusiasm for orchids increased 

in England. “Exotic orchids arrived in Europe at a 

propitious moment, an epoch pulsing with an appetite 

and admiration for exotic flora. They represented the 

fascination and loveliness of far-off lands that were 

fast coming closer as colonialists built up the great 

empires of the nineteenth century. It was in such 

conquered territories that orchids were uprooted or 

stripped from trees and rocks, beginning their long 

journey to hothouses and herbaria” (Berliochii, 2000: 

57-58). 

The Royal Horticultural Society was founded in 

1804 by Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820) and a few 

years later started sending out collectors to the tropical 

regions (Fig. 22A). In 1812, Joachim Conrad Loddiges 

(1738-1821), was becoming fairly successful in 

cultivating the ‘Epidendrums’ or ‘air plants’, as nearly 

all the epiphytic species were termed, and increasing 

numbers of their plants began appearing at the newly 

established horticultural exhibitions” (Reinikka, 1995: 

26). The nurseries of Loddiges in Hackney, managed 

after his death by his son George (1784-1846), signaled 


55

56 

the beginnings of commercial orchid cultivation, and 

many plants grown by Loddiges became the types for 

new species, described chiefly by Lindley in Edwards’ 

Botanical Register. 

Through its expanding collection of tropical plants, 

the Royal Horticultural Society contributed to the 

popularization of the orchids among the wealthy 

classes. The fashion of growing orchids as a hobby 

had its real beginning in 1833 when William Spencer 

Cavendish, sixth Duke of Devonshire, discovered a 

plant of Oncidium papilio at one of the aforementioned 

exhibitions (Fig. 22B). 

“A number of commercial nurseries found it highly 

profitable to supply the demand for new species, and 

several hired collectors to travel into the tropical areas 

of the world where they might locate new sources of 

species that had already become horticulturally popular 

– and to collect new species which might stimulate 

further interest and profit” (Reinikka, 1995: 27). A 

new breed of adventurers started exploring the tropics 

in search of new species. The mania for possessing 

orchids raised the prices of all available plants. Great 

auctions were held in London and Liverpool where 

prices of one hundred pounds for a single plant were 

not unusual. “This is the epic phase in the orchid’s 

history, written in the sweat and blood of a group of 

adventurers and explorers – the hunters of wild flowers 

that could sometimes prove every bit as dangerous as 

their animal counterparts” (Berliocchi, 200: 59-60) 

(Fig. 22C). 

The invention, in about 1829, of the “Wardian 

case”, by Dr. Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward unleashed a 

revolution in the mobility of commercially important 

plants. Dr. Ward was a physician with a passion for 

botany who accidentally discovered that fern spores 

were germinating and growing in a bit of soil inside 

of a bottle, thus protected from the contamination of 

the outside air. Ward communicated his discovery 

to George Loddiges, who had a carpenter build him 

closely-fitted glazed wooden cases. The first “Wardian 

cases” were shipped to Australia in 1833, filled with 

British ferns and grasses, and after a voyage of several 

months the plants were found still in good condition 

(Gómez, 2007: 481-482). Wardian cases soon became 

features of stylish drawings rooms in Western Europe 

and the United States. In the polluted air of Victorian 

cities, the fern craze and the craze for growing orchids 

LANKESTERIANA 


that followed owed much of their impetus to the new 

Wardian cases. 

By 1834, ‘orchidomania’ had spread throughout 

England. But orchid cultivation also flourished 

elsewhere. M. Pescatore, of St. Cloud, near Paris, 

was one of the first Europeans outside England to 

grow orchids as a leisure activity, having cultivated 

a large collection of plants for many years – as had 

Consul Schiller of Hamburg, Germany (Reinikka, 

1995: 31). According to Linden, Jean-Pierre Pescatore 

(1793-1855) had ‘la plus riche collection d’Orchidées 

du continent’ (= the richest orchid collection of 

the Continent). Reichenbach dedicated to him the 

genus Pescatoria. Many personalities from other 

countries were instrumental also in the discovery and 

introduction of new species. As orchid cultivation 

gained in fashionability in England, horticulturists in 

Belgium were quick to recognize that trade in tropical 

and subtropical orchids could be profitable. In 1838 the 

passion for orchids had already extended to the United 

States, where John Wright Boott, of Boston, received 

a collection of plants sent to him from England by his 

brother James. Years later (ca. 1870), General John 

F. Rathbone, of Albany, New York, wrote: “I was so 

delighted with the plant and flowers that I caught the 

Orchid fever, which I am happy to say is now prevailing 

to considerable extent in this country, and which I trust 

will become epidemic” (Reinikka, 1995: 31). 

Very soon, scientists and collectors would turn their 

eyes to the natural richness of Central America, thus 

beginning one of the most interesting periods in the 

history of the orchids of this region (Fig. 23A). 

Britannia rules the waves 

“To thee belongs the rural reign 

Thy cities shall with commerce shine 

All thine shall be, shall be the subject main 

And every shore it circles thine.” 

‘Rule Britannia’ from 

Thomas Augustine Arne (1710-1788) 

Orlando W. Roberts, an English merchant who arrived 

at the Gulf of Darién in 1816 and conducted trade with 

the natives of the Central American East coast during 

seven years, wrote an interesting account of his travels 

in his book Narrative of Voyages and Excursions on 

the East Coast and in the Interior of Central America,


published in 1827. Roberts sailed along the coast from 

Panama to Cape Gracias a Dios, in Honduras, and spend 

considerable time with the Miskitos in Nicaragua and 

with the “Valientes” in Panama. His descriptions of 

the natives’ use of cocoa and vanilla are in the chapter 

about The History of Vanilla. But Roberts was also 

important because he was one of the first travelers to 

explore a passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. 

For this, he navigated the San Juan River to the Lake 

of Nicaragua, and went then on to the Pacific. In San 

Juan del Norte, Roberts was detained by the Spanish 

authorities and sentenced to death for being a spy for 

the independentists. Roberts escaped narrowly and was 

later acquitted of all charges (Fig. 23B). 

Immediately after independence, the opening of 

commercial relations with the British created a sudden 

rise in business. Merchants from Belize, who had been 

trading illegally with Guatemala for the preceding 

twenty years, gained access and direct contacts to most 

of Central America” (Wortman, 1991: 227). Britain had 

prevailed in the long-lasting naval war against Spain and 

France between 1790 and 1815 and had almost gained 

a monopoly on world naval trade. The United States, 

whose power increased day by day, responded quickly. 

In 1823 president Monroe formulated the ‘Monroe 

Doctrine’, that stipulated that the American continent 

should not be subject to European colonization and 

that the United States would not tolerate European 

intervention. This doctrine can be resumed in the classic 

expression: ‘America for the Americans’. It was the 

beginning of the fight among the powers on Central 

American soil, a fight that initially favored Great Britain 

and that only in the second half of the century would 

turn slowly in favor of the United States. 

Burdened by great economic problems, the first 

federal president, Manuel José de Arce, embarked on a 

bold revolutionary program. The tax reform eliminated 

unpopular Spanish levies, but left little revenue to 

cover the debt assumed from the colonial and imperial 

governments or to pay for expensive new projects. Arce 

turned to British capitalists to meet the financial crisis, 

but a loan from the London firm of Barclay, Herring & 

Richardson produced only a small amount of cash for 

the federation. Since the government repaid practically 

none of it, the loan did not place an immediate burden 

on the federation’s finances, but the indebtedness 

remained for decades, providing repeated opportunities 

for British diplomats to negotiate favorable concessions 

for British economic interests” (Woodward, 1997). 

Possible routes for the construction of an interoceanic 

canal in Central America began to be explored. “In the 

monumental work in which he describes his voyage 

to the New World from 1799 to 1804, Alexander 

von Humboldt names nine possible routes for an 

interoceanic canal and urges scientific studies in order 

to decide which was the most advantageous, since 

only incomplete studies had been done on some of 

them. Among these routes he names that of Nicaragua, 

to that he assigns the first place, and the route of 

Panama, that he places fourth after those of Atrato and 

Tehuantepec. A real comparative study between the 

various canal routes was not undertaken until many 

years later, but the Panama route was explored in 

1827 by Lloyd and Falmare, in 1831 by Peacock and 

in 1844 by Garella; and that of Nicaragua in 1837 by 

Baily, in 1848 by Oersted and in 1850 by Childs. In 

addition to these explorations there were many projects 

that used information of prior surveys. Among these 

we can cite those of Prince Louis Napoleon in 1846, 

Squier in 1849 and Belly in 1858” (Montiel, 1969). 

Let us remember that Panama had been discovered by 

Christopher Columbus on his 4th trip in 1502. It was 

then that a canal was first envisioned by King Carlos V 

of Spain who ordered the very first topographic studies 

for the construction of a canal through the narrowest 

part of the isthmus (80 kilometers). A Royal Order from 

February 20, 1534 to the Governor of Panama Pascual 

de Andagoya said that “having been informed that the 

River Chagres, that enters into the North Sea, can be 

navigated with caravels for three or four leagues, and 

other three or four in barges, and that from there to 

the South Sea there are another four leagues by land... 

you shall go to see the land from the River Chagres to 

the South Sea and examine what form and order can 

be given to open that land so that, once opened, the 

South Sea can join said river, so that navigation can 

happen, and to explore what difficulties it has, be it 

by the tides of the sea or by the height of the land, and 

what cost in money and men will be necessary, and in 

what time it can be done...” (Ediciones Balboa, 2007: 

5). This was a visionary project but unfortunately such 

an enterprise was beyond the capabilities of the period. 

Andagoya informed his King that, although the canal 

could be built, it would demand more resources than 


57

58 

those available to any ruler of that time (Sosa & Arce, 

1964: 80). 

Basil Hall (1788—1844) a British naval officer from 

Scotland, was probably the first European to set foot in 

our region after the independence from Spain. In the 

years of 1820 to 1822, Hall sailed in the command of 

H.M.S. Conway along the Pacific coast of South and 

Central America. In February of 1822 he anchored 

in Panama, where he stayed for a few days, sailing 

from there to Acapulco, in Mexico. While in Panama, 

Hall discussed with one of the merchants of the place, 

who had particularly studied the question of cutting 

a passage across the isthmus. “He was of the opinion 

that an immense and immediate advantage would be 

gained by making a good road from sea to sea across 

the isthmus; which might be done very easily, and at 

an expense incalculably less than a canal could be cut, 

under the most favourable circumstances...” (Hall, 

1824: 158-159). 

In 1825, an Englishman by the name of John Hale 

signed a colonization agreement with the Costa Rican 

government of Juan Mora Fernández. “The purpose of 

Hale was to form this colony with North American and 

British families…, and in the year 1826 he published a 

pamphlet in the city of New York, with the intention of 

making the new land known to the future settlers, a land 

overflowing with natural richness, which only awaited 

their arrival to become a paradise” (Hale, 1826). 

“The natural history of foreign seas and countries is 

abundantly studied by men who ‘live at home at ease’ 

in the midst of cabinets and books, dependent for their 

specimens of birds, shells, or insects, on the stores 

of dealers in such objects; but the number of those 

who have undergone the arduous personal exertion of 

collecting them, with a scientific spirit, in their native 

haunts, is comparatively few. Of this small number 

the life and adventures of Mr. Hugh Cuming present 

one of the most remarkable instances of record” 

(Dance, 1980: 477). Hugh Cuming (1791-1865) (Fig. 

24A) landed in Central America in 1829, during one 

of his multiple voyages. Born near Kingsbridge in 

Devon, Cuming’s early interest in natural history was 

fostered by well-known naturalist George Montagu 

(1751-1815). Around 1820, Cuming traveled to 

Chile, where he established a sail making business. 

Interested in natural history, he sold his business 

17 The name appears indistinctly as Henchman or Henchmann. 

LANKESTERIANA 


and built a yacht designed with the sole purpose of 

collecting specimens for the British Museum and 

some botanical gardens. It was a schooner which he 

named Discoverer, fitted out expressly for the purpose 

of storing natural objects (Dance, 1980: 478). In 1831 

he returned to England with a huge load of animals, 

plants and shells for several museums and gardens. 

“It may also be mentioned that Hugh Cuming, the 

well-known and extensive collector of objects of 

natural history, collected in Taboga I. and in the Pearl 

Islands, Panama, and Montijo Bay, Chiriquí river, 

around 1829, and there is a set of his plants in the Kew 

Herbarium; but it is impossible to distinguish in many 

cases which were collected within our limits, because 

they are labeled ‘Panamá et Colombia occidentalis’” 

(Hemsley, 1887: 133). According to Dance, Cuming 

collected in our region in the Gulf of Panama, Pearl 

Islands, Gulf of Chiriquí, Puntarenas (Costa Rica), 

El Realejo (Nicaragua) and the Gulf of Fonseca, 

in Honduras (Dance, 1980: 482). At least four of 

Cuming’s specimens from Central America became 

the types for new species described by Lindley: 

Aspasia epidendroides (‘Cuming s.n.’), Oncidium 

(=Chelyorchis) ampliatum (‘Cuming 1312’) (Fig. 

24B), Dichaea panamensis (‘Cuming 1292’) and 

Hexisea (=Scaphyglottis) bidentata (‘Cuming s.n.’). 

All four are still quite common in Central America. 

Cuming collected later in the Philippines and although 

he was barely capable of signing his own name, his 

botanical instinct led him to the discovery of thirtythree 

new species of orchids. He was called, with 

good reason ‘The Prince of Collectors’. For 20 years, 

he acted as a dealer in natural history material, buying 

and selling collections obtained by other naturalists 

in many parts of the world.” Cuming developed a 

reputation for returning “living” plants to England 

(Herman, 1994: 14). “Such men as Cuming live after 

their death, and hence the marvellous increase within 

a very few years, in our knowledge of Nature, and of 

God’s bounty to the world” (Dance, 1980: 495). 

The father of Hugh Low ( 1824 - 1905 ), a 

Scot by birth, established in 1820 one of the most 

prestigious English nurseries in Clapton, near 

London. Young Low followed soon his father’s 

ideals. The firm was one of the first to receive 

orchids from the Tropics. John Henchmann (1814

A 

C 


Figure 22. A — Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820). Portrait by Benjamin West, courtesy of the Hunt Institute for Botanical 

Documentation. B — Oncidium papilio, Edwards Botanical Register, plate 1825. C — Typical British greenhouse: the 

‘epiphyte house’ of Bateman at Knypersley Hall. In Bateman, 1837-43: 18. 

B 


59

60 

A 

B 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 23. A — The Plant Hunter. Drawing by Paul Weber, 1941, from Hamer, 1974 (courtesy of Hedwig Hamer). B — Map 

of Nicaragua by Orlando Roberts. In Roberts, 1965. 



-1893) 17 , working for Low, collected in Mexico 

between 1835 and 1840, especially in the region of 

Veracruz, discovering an important number of new 

species of Orchidaceae: Laelia barkeriana Knowles 

& Westc. (‘Plant cultivated by G. Barker, sent to 

him by J. Henchman from the vicinity of Jalapa’), 

Oncidium luridum var. henchmannii Knowles & 

Westc. (Henchmann s.n.), Maxillaria henchmannii 

Hook. (Henchmann s.n.), Maxillaria cucullata 

Lindl. (‘a native of Equinoctial America, whence 

it is said to have been brought by Mr. Henchman’) 

(Fig. 24C), Humboldtia octomerioides (Lindl.) 

Kuntze (Henchmann s.n.), and Stanhopea tigrina 

Bateman ex Lindl. (‘Henchman s.n., 1835, Habitat 

in Mexico, propè urbem Xalapam’). He also worked 

for George Barker and had been before in Venezuela, 

from where we know of at least one collection, 

Chysis aurea Lindl. (‘in the valley of Cumanacoa, 

in Venezuela, Mr. Henchman s.n.’). 

Much later, in 1864, Captain John M. Dow mentions 

a collector by the name of Macgee, who collected 

orchids for Low in Guatemala, but we have no other 

information about him (Letter from Dow to Skinner, 

Feb. 20, 1864). 

The genus Barkeria was first described by Knowles 

and Westcott in 1838 and named in honour of George 

Barker (1776-1845) of Springfield, England, who 

had imported a plant from Mexico. Barker was a 

pioneer in importing orchids, mainly from Mexico, 

among which many new species were discovered. 

A few of them are: Trichopilia tortilis Lindl. (G. 

Barker s.n., Mexico), Pleurothallis (=Restrepiella) 

ophiocephala Lindl. (Mexico, Loddiges & Barker 

s.n.), Odontoglossum cordatum Lindl. (‘George 

Barker s.n., flowered in cultivation, originally from 

Mexico’), Microstylis excavata Lindl. (Mexico, Mr. 

Barker s.n.), and Laelia furfuracea Lindl. (Karwinski, 

Oaxaca). Barker is undoubtedly an important figure 

in the introduction of orchids from our region to 

Europe, in the early years after the independence 

of the Central American countries from Spain. “As 

a botanist, Mr. Barker was much distinguished. He 

bestowed considerable attention on the cultivation of 

orchidaceous plants, of which he had a collection that 

is believed to have been almost unique, and certainly 

was unsurpassed in value by that of any private 

horticulturist in Europe” (Urban, 1846: 324-325). 

John Ross (?—?), who collected orchids between 

1837-1840 in Mexico, sent many plants to Barker, 

among them several species of Odontoglossum for 

which Schlechter, in 1916, proposed the name of 

Rossioglossum in his honor (Schlechter, 1916: 153). 

The name was formally published as a new genus by 

Garay and Kennedy in 1976. Another species named 

for him was Odontoglossum rossii Lindl., today 

Rhynchostele rossii (Lindl.) Soto Arenas y Salazar 

(‘A charming plant, sent to Mr. Barker from Mexico 

by his collector Mr. Ross, after whom it is named’). 

“Ross started in 1837, but his collection did not reach 

England till the following year. It included the beautiful 

Odontoglossum rossii and Peristeria (Acineta) barkeri, 

the latter being discovered in a dark ravine in the 

neighbourhood of Xalapa” (Anonymous, 1931: 364). 

Other collections by Ross include Peristeria barkeri 

Bateman (Ross s.n., Jalapa), Galeandra baueri Lindl. 

(‘Ross s.n., Mexico’), Laelia majalis Lindl. (‘Habitat 

in Mexico - Schiede, Hartweg, Ross’), Epidendrum 

aloifolium L. and Chysis laevis Lindl. (‘Habitat in 

Mexico - Ross’). 

The British naval expeditions to the coasts of 

Central America, the most important being those of 

H.M. S. Conway (1822), H.M.S. Blossom (1827) and of 

H.M.S. Sulphur (1836), had undoubtedly also scientific 

purposes, but their main goal was the geographical 

exploration and the construction of reliable maps 

preparing for a future domination of the region and the 

control of the canal routes. 

The decade which began in 1840 “is the epoch of 

maximum English power in Central America. Great 

Britain would try to confront the growing power of 

the United States and both nations would choose the 

border region between Costa Rica and Nicaragua as the 

ground where they would test their forces...” (Obregón 

Quesada, 1993: 75). Great Britain, who already had a 

stronghold in Belize, pretended in addition the control 

of the access to the San Juan river. 

“A new period of activity set in, and continued 

almost unbroken for many years; but few of the 

numerous travelers had received a scientific training, 

hence the botanical results were by no means so 

satisfactory as they might have been. Indeed, the 

principal object of many of these travelers was the 

introduction of living plants into European gardens” 

(Hemsley, 1887: 123). 


61

62 

“If we are requested to select the most interesting 

from the multitude of vegetable tribes, we should, 

on the whole, perhaps, be willing to give the 

preference to the natural order of Orchideae. 

Whether we consider general elegance of 

individuals, durability of blossoms, splendid 

colours, delicious perfume, or extraordinary 

structure, it would be difficult to select any order 

superior to Orchideae in these respects, and few 

even equal to them.” 

John Lindley, Collectanea Botanica 

(in Stearn, 1999: 107) 

The increasing interest in the botanical exploration 

of Central America had its counterpart in the enormous 

figure of John Lindley (1790-1865), who in 1830 began 

in England the publication of his famous work The 

Genera and Species of Orchidaceous Plants, describing 

numerous species which were new to science. The 

Austrian botanist Stephan Ladislaus Endlicher (1804- 

1849) published his Genera Plantarum secundum 

Ordines naturales disposita between 1836 and 1841. 

In this work, Endlicher recognized 367 genera of 

Orchidaceae, of which 117 had been established by 

Lindley (Stearn, 1999: 57). Another of Lindley’s 

ventures was the founding, with Joseph Paxton and 

others, of The Gardeners’ Chronicle in 1841, of which 

the horticultural part was edited by Lindley. Lindley’s 

editorship for twenty years ensured the maintenance of 

a high standard which earned it international repute. 

Many species were dedicated to Lindley, of which only 

a few, that are found in the American tropics, shall be 

mentioned: Aspidogyne lindleyana (Cogn.) Garay, 

Barkeria lindleyana Batem. ex Lindl. (Fig. 24D), 

Bletia lindleyana Rchb. f., Catasetum lindleyanum 

Mansf., Cattleya lindleyana Rchb. f., Cyclopogon 

lindleyanus (Link, Klotzsch & Otto) Schltr., Laelia 

lindleyana Nichols., Lepanthes lindleyana Oerst. 

ex Rchb.f., Malaxis lindleyana Rchb. f., Maxillaria 

lindleyana Schltr., Odontoglossum lindleyanum Rchb. 

f. & Warsz., Odontoglossum lindleyi Galeotti ex 

Lindl., Oncidium lindleyi (Lindl.) R. Jiménez & Soto 

Arenas, Phragmipedium lindleyanum (R.H. Schomb. 

ex Lindl.) R.A. Rolfe, Pleurothallis lindleyana Cogn., 

Sobralia lindleyana Rchb. f., Stanhopea lindleyi Zucc., 

and Stelis lindleyana Cogn. 

LANKESTERIANA 

18 According to Wagner (2001: 118), Klee was the first German immigrant to Guatemala. 


Oakes Ames, for many years the leading American 

orchidologist, stated that Lindley ‘laid the foundations 

of modern orchidology’. With that verdict there is and 

has long been unanimous agreement (Stearn, 1999: 66). 

George Ure Skinner (1804-1867) (Fig. 25), 

businessman, diplomat and amateur botanist is 

without doubt the most fascinating character in the 

history of the orchids in Central America during 

the first half of the XIX century. “Son of a Scots 

clergyman, Skinner steadfastly refused to follow 

his father’s vocation or in any way to consider an 

ecclesiastical or academic career. The call he heard 

was from the world of Mammon…” (Berliocchi, 

2000: 72). He arrived in Guatemala in 1831 and 

joined Carl R. Klee, Consul of the Hanseatic Towns, 

with whom he founded the firm of Klee, Skinner & 

Co. 18 He was actively engaged in the political and 

commercial life of the Central American Federation, 

not only pursuing his own interests but as an active 

agent of those of Great Britain. A skilled diplomat, he 

enjoyed the sympathy of most of the Central American 

politicians of that time. This made him a valuable 

adviser of the omnipotent English Consul Frederick 

Chatfield and turned Skinner into one of the principal 

ideologists of English policy in Central America, 

which pretended territorial gains in exchange for the 

unpaid debt resulting from the loan that had been 

granted years before to the government of Manuel 

José de Arce. Klee, Skinner & Co. became the most 

important British company not only in Guatemala but 

in the whole of Central America in the period before 

1850 (Naylor, 1988: 120). 

The only route of these days from Europe to the 

highlands and the capital of Guatemala was via Jamaica 

to Belize, then along the Río Dulce to Izabal (a small 

port on Lake Izabal), and from there by mule over the 

terrible road across the Mountains of the Mico, a 10day 

long ride. This route was used by all travelers until 

the inauguration of the Panama railway. It became then 

much easier to travel to Panama, take the train across 

the isthmus and then a ship to Port San José or Iztapa, 

on the Pacific Coast of Guatemala. 

In relation to Skinner’s and Klee’s activities on Lake 

Izabal, Pérez de Antón (2005: 80) calls our attention 

to what he describes as “the first manifestation of 

Spanglish in Central America”. Klee, Skinner & Co.


A B 

C 

Figure 24. A — Hugh Cuming (1791-1865). From a litograph by Hawkins, 1850. Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — Oncidium 

ampliatum Lindl. From Reichenbachia. C — Maxillaria cucullata Lindl. Curtis’ Botanical Magazine, Plate 3945. 

D — Barkeria lindleyana Batem. ex Lindl. Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, plate 6098. 

D 


63

64 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 25. George U. Skinner (1804-1867). Portrait by George Washington Bronlow (ca.1860). Courtesy of the Hunt Institute 

for Botanical Documentation. 


B 

A 


Figure 26. A — Lycaste skinneri. Field note and sketch by Skinner in a letter to Hooker dated December 26, 1840. The 

alba variety of Lycaste skinneri is the so-called ‘White Nun’, the National Flower of Guatemala. In Hamilton, 1991: 776. 

B — Cattleya dowiana. Painting by Emilio Span. Courtesy of Dr. Ricardo Kriebel. 


65

66 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 27. James Bateman (1811-1897). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. 



built warehouses on the northern shore of the lake 

which, in their correspondence, were referred to as The 

Store. The place prospered and grew until it became 

a small village, which kept the name and is called 

today El Estor. Since his arrival in Guatemala Skinner 

showed interest for its natural beauties, collecting 

birds and insects that he sent to England, persuaded by 

his friend, the ornithologist and writer John Gould. So 

began his relation with Bateman, who convinced him 

to collect orchids. “In his first letters Bateman showed 

Skinner by means of descriptions and a few rough 

sketches what he was looking for; Skinner quickly 

learned all he needed to know how to get started 

(Hamilton, 1990: 1241).” Bateman wrote years later: 

“My letter [to Skinner], dated March 17, 1834, reached 

him in due course, and as he never tired of telling me, 

the day of its arrival was as it were a new birthday, for 

it gave a fresh interest to his life, which never left him 

to his very latest hour” (Hamilton, 1992). 

During more than 30 years he traveled constantly 

between Guatemala and England, dedicating more and 

more time to the orchids. Because of his knowledge 

of the land and his excellent relations, he was a great 

help to other naturalists who explored Central America 

in his time, such as Hartweg, Friedrichsthal, von 

Warscewicz and Salvin. All important orchidologists of 

his time, from Lindley to Bateman and Bentham, were 

his friends, but important above all was his friendship 

with Sir William Jackson Hooker, a Scot like him who 

was later (1841) to be appointed as Director of the 

Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. 

The almost constant political unrest frequently 

interrupted his activities. In 1839 he wrote to Hooker: 

“Such has been the state of this Country that my 

occupations legitimate have been stopped and had 

it not been for my thirst after Orchidaceae long ere I 

[would have] cut my throat” (Hamilton, 1990: 1239). 

Although he collected chiefly in Guatemala, he 

obtained plants from all Central American countries. 

Captain John M. Dow, in a letter to Skinner dated 

December 30, 1861, recollects his excursions with 

Skinner in Nicaragua (El Realejo) and Costa Rica 

(Puntarenas and Barranca). A note by Lindley, in his 

description of Epidendrum clavatum Lindl. seems to 

point to the fact that Skinner collected at some moment 

of his life in Venezuela: “Found in August, 1834, near 

Cumaná [Venezuela], by Mr. Skinner”. 

He also collected in the Bahamas. The ‘Botanical 

Register’, in its note below plate # 61, Epidendrum 

altissimum Jacq., says: “Found in rocky parts of the 

Bahamas by the indefatigable Mr. Skinner, from whom 

I received it in the summer of 1837. ” Skinner tells 

us about his landing on Crooked Island, Bahamas 

and says: “… was much struck with the appearance 

of a rock of lava bearing such curious varieties of 

plants, I made a considerable collection of Orchideae, 

principally Epidendreae….” (in a letter to Hooker, 

February 28, 1837). 

Within his collections, almost a hundred new species 

were found. Some of the types collected by Skinner 

are: Barkeria skinneri (Batem. Ex Lindl.) A. Rich. 

& Gal., Catasetum integerrimum Hook., Clowesia 

russelliana (Hook.) Dodson, Coelia guatemalensis 

Rchb. f., Cycnoches egertonianum Batem., Deiregyne 

pyramidalis (Lindl.) Burns-Bal., Epidendrum 

papillosum Batem., Epidendrum stamfordianum 

Batem., Guarianthe aurantiaca (Batem. ex Lindl.) 

Dressler & N. H. Wms., Guarianthe skinneri 

(Batem.) Dressler & W. E. Higgins, Lycaste skinneri 

(Batem. ex Lindl.) Lindl. (Fig. 26A), Odontoglossum 

uroskinneri Lindl., Oncidium skinneri Lindl., and 

Xylobium elongatum (Lindl.) Hemsl. Two of Skinner’s 

discoveries were later declared as National Flowers. 

The alba variety of Lycaste skinneri, “a thing too 

beautiful for words” (Boyle, 1983: 81) is today the 

National Flower of Guatemala, while Cattleya (= 

Guarianthe) skinneri is the National Flower of Costa 

Rica. “...The invaluable Lycaste skinneri, which 

now enjoys, and, indeed, richly merits an amount of 

popularity - a popularity which is ever in the increase - 

such as has not been accorded to any other orchid with 

which I am acquainted” (Hamilton, 1992: 18). 

At the end of his life he pursued, in an almost 

obsessive way, the collection of the famous Catlleya 

dowiana (dedicated to Captain John M. Dow, of the 

Pacific Steamship Company) (Fig. 26B), which had 

been discovered years before by Warscewicz. With 

this purpose he hired (together with Salvin, for whom 

Arce had previously worked) a Guatemalan collector 

by the name of Enrique Arce, who also collected birds. 

Arce traveled first to Costa Rica and then to Panama, 

on board of Captain Dow’s ship. Dow, generous as 

always, had promised free passage for Arce and his 

equipment and collections (Letter from Dow to Salvin, 


67

68 

February 1, 1864). On Feb. 9, 1864, Arce arrives at 

Puntarenas, travels first to the North, along the Gulf of 

Nicoya, and goes later to the highlands. At the end of 

that year, Arce arrives in Panama. His younger brother 

is his companion on his expedition. “Arce is now 

here... The poor fellow has been very sick with fever, 

and his little brother almost died from the same cause... 

I have advised him Arce not to start on his expedition 

to Chiriquí until he is in a condition to insure his ability 

to go straight through” (Letter from Dow to Salvin, 

December 19, 1864). However, Arce seems to have 

been more successful in collecting birds than orchids. 

Another collector was sent by Skinner to Central 

America. In one of Skinner’s last letters, to Captain 

Dow in Panama on October 17 th , 1866, he said: “By 

this steamer we have sent you a fine young fellow, a 

Mr. Carl Kramer, who is to go on at once to Costa Rica. 

If Arce is still in Panama when this reaches, he will go 

on with him, but Arce has been so dilatory about going 

after the birds and plants we want, that others have been 

beating us in our manor. Cattleya dowiana surpasses 

all the Cattleyas yet known... we must get a batch of 

it.... And I hope you will for Dowiana’s sake take care 

that his [Kramer’s] collections reach us well, … for 

my credit is at stake. I never was beat. …Dowiana 

for ever.” About the naming of Cattleya dowiana we 

follow Veitch: “It was the wish of Warscewicz, the 

original discoverer, that his plant should bear the name 

Lawrenceana, in compliment to Mrs. Lawrence of 

Ealing, a generous patroness of Horticulture, but as his 

specimens miscarried, this fact was not made known 

until after Bateman had named it in compliment to 

Captain J. M. Dow of the American Packet Service, to 

whose kindness orchidists and men of science owe so 

much” (Veitch, 1906: 116-117). 

Skinner’s partner Klee also discovered a new 

species: Epidendrum myrianthum Lindl. (Klee s.n.), 

again collected in Guatemala. 

In December 1866, Skinner arrived in Panama, on 

his way to Guatemala, where he pretended to wrap 

up his business for he wanted to retire in England. 

He crossed the Isthmus in a railcar and still had time 

to collect his last orchids. In those days he wrote to 

LANKESTERIANA 


Veitch: “I have sent home a box, with orders that it 

may be sent to you at once. You will find an Ionopsis 

which may be good, Pleurothallis, and some very 

curious Epidendra” (Hamilton, 1993: 182). A few days 

later, on January 9 th , 1867, he died in Colón, Panama, 

a victim of yellow fever. He was buried at Mount 

Hope Cemetery, in Colón and his tombstone bears the 

following inscription: 

“S.I.M. GEORGII URE SKINNER F.L.S. E. SCOTIA ORTI 

QUEM INTER OCEANOS CUM TRIGANTANOVIES 

TRANSIISSET GUATEMALAM ASCENSURAM DEUS 

MISERECORS MUNDANO EX MARI PORTUM IN OPTATUM 

VOCAVIT DIE JANUARII NONE A.D. MDCCCLXVII 

R.I.P. BEATI MUNDO CORDE CUONIAM IPSI DEUM 

VIDEBRUNT. DEO GRATIAS.” 19 

Lindley dedicated to him the genus Uroskinnera, 

from the Scrophulariaceae. Captain John M. Dow, 

after receiving the sad news of Skinner’s death, wrote 

to his wife (March 30, 1867): “May the mantle of his 

energy and enthusiasm for science rest on his friends 

who still await the call which he received, to rest from 

his labour.” 

After Skinner´s death (Klee had passed away in 

1853), Klee’s son inherited his business interests in 

Guatemala, but had to accept the condition to use 

‘Skinner’ as his second name. He named himself 

therefore Jorge Skinner Klee. His son joined both 

family names and since that time the family name 

Skinner-Klee is common in Guatemala, where 

numerous descendants of both partners still live and 

carry their combined names (Wagner, 2007: 43). 

James Bateman (1811-1897) (Fig. 27) was 

undoubtedly the greatest beneficiary from Skinner’s 

collections. Within ten years of beginning his relation 

with Skinner, “Bateman possessed the finest examples 

of Guatemalan orchids then available in England” 

(Reinikka, 1964: 297). “After several years of enjoying 

the orchidaceous bounty sent to him by Skinner, 

Bateman conceived the brilliant idea of sharing his 

good fortune with the rest of the world… by publishing 

a book with the largest illustrations of orchids ever 

seen…. The title would be The Orchidaceae of Mexico 

19 “In loving memory of George Ure Skinner, F.L.S., born in Scotland, who when he had crossed the oceans thirty-nine times and 

was about to go to Guatemala, was summoned by a merciful God from the wordly sea to a pleasant haven on the 9th of January 

1867. R.I.P. Blessed are the pure in the heart for they shall see God. Thanks be to God.” – Translation by Mary Raymond Daniell, 

great-granddaughter of Skinner. In Hamilton, 1993.


and Guatemala” (Hamilton, 1990: 1242-43). “It is 

this… eccentric but exquisite study – in so gargantuan 

a format as to make no more than 125 copies feasible 

in the first print run – which more than justifies 

Bateman’s place in the pantheon of orchid pioneers” 

(Berliocchi, 2000: 53) (Fig. 28A). 

Skinner was the key element in the creation of 

Bateman’s book, because all the wealth and enthusiasm 

of Bateman would have been of little use without 

Skinner’s plants. Over half of the species illustrated 

by Bateman in his monumental work had their origin 

in collections by Skinner. “… in fact, the inclusion of 

Guatemala in the work must have been due entirely 

to the collections of Skinner” (Williams, 1972: 200). 

Their friendship was strong, and in 1860 Skinner 

took Bateman’s eldest son back to Guatemala, to see 

the source of his discoveries (Herman, 1976: 59). In 

gratitude for his great contributions to botany, Bateman 

proposed Skinner as a member of the prestigious 

‘Linnean Society’ in June 1866. The recommendation 

was accepted shortly before Skinner’s death, on 

December 6 of the same year. Bateman was deeply 

religious and he strongly believed that hybridization 

by man was interfering with the work of God (Rigby, 

2000). Lindley named the genus Batemannia in honor 

of this great British orchidologist. “His enthusiasm for 

orchids remained strong throughout his long life, and 

when he died, at eighty-six years of age, on November 

27, 1897, the orchid world was irreparably saddened 

by the loss of one of his most knowledge and energetic 

pioneers” (Reinikka, 1964: 298). 

William Jackson Hooker (1785-1865), Skinner’s 

friend and from 1841 to 1865 Director of the Royal 

Botanic Gardens at Kew, described in 1831 a beautiful 

terrestrial orchid from Panama as Peristeria elata. 

It had been sent in 1826 by Mr. Henry Barnard, 

a Peruvian merchant, to Mr. Robert Harrison, of 

Liverpool, in whose stove it flowered for the first time 

in England in 1831 (Veitch, 1963: 128). This orchid, 

known popularly as the ‘Holy Ghost Orchid’, is today 

Panama’s National Flower. Although without formal 

botanical training, William Hooker became one of 

the most influential British botanists of his time. He 

had managed a brewery before becoming Professor 

of Botany at Glasgow University (1820-1840). After 

the death of Banks, Kew Gardens was allowed to sink 

into decline. The appointment of William Hooker 

as its Director in 1841 revitalized the gardens and 

herbarium... Hooker published tirelessly, particularly 

in the journals which he edited, Botanical Miscellany 

and The Journal of Botany. He was succeeded by his 

son, Joseph Dalton Hooker (1817-1911). 

In a letter to Hooker (1861) Charles Darwin referred 

to his passion for orchids: “What frightful trouble you 

have taken about Vanilla; you really must not take an 

atom more; for the orchids are more play than real 

work”. 

Karl Theodor Hartweg (1812-1871) (Fig. 29A), 

German by birth, was one of the first collectors hired by 

the Royal Horticultural Society to explore the lands of 

Mexico and Central America. He traveled to Mexico in 

1836. “The principal object of his journey was to collect 

and transmit living specimens or seeds of ornamental 

plants and trees; but he also made large collections of 

dried plants, the numerous novelties of which were 

published by the late Mr. George Bentham [who was 

the President of the Royal Society] between 1839 and 

1842 under the title Plantae Hartwegianae 20 ”. “[He] was 

told in his instructions most clearly to confine himself 

as much as possible to mountainous districts, where 

plants would be found that would not necessarily require 

stove treatment” (Cox, 1955: 265). The contract signed 

September 21, 1836, between Hartweg and John Lindley 

read: “... the greatest object of your mission is to procure 

... plants that are likely to be capable of enduring the 

open air in England and that these objects will be more 

completely attained the more you avoid what is called 

the Tierra caliente and keep to the Tierra fría or the 

upper limits of the Tierra templada” (Yearsley, 2008: 1). 

In Mexico he met Sartorius, in whose estate (El 

Mirador) he made important collections. A few months 

after his visit there, he met Linden in Chiapas, around 

1839-1840. “In a way reminiscent of Stanley’s later 

encounter with Livingstone in the Congo, the two 

explorers met at a bend on the trail leading to Comitán 

[...], respectively exclaiming ‘Hartweg!’ and ‘Linden!´ 

though they had never seen each other before. Their 

paths had nearly crossed several times during the 

previous few years and each knew the other by 

reputation - but chance never brought them together. 

They were to meet again in Colombia in 1842...” 

(Ceulemans et al., 2006: 55). 

20 Bentham, G., 1838-57, Plantae Hartwegianae imprimis Mexicanas adjectis nonnullis Grahamianis enumerat novasque describit. 


69

70 

At the beginning of 1839 he received instructions to 

travel to Guatemala and, on Lindley’s recommendation, 

made contact with Skinner. The political situation 

in Guatemala was dangerous, and Hartweg wrote to 

Skinner asking if it was convenient to undertake the 

journey. “In a few days the post passes through here for 

Guatemala, when I shall write to Mr. Skinner and ask 

his opinion on the subject, as well as the present state of 

the country” (letter to the Royal Horticultural Society, 

March 19, 1839). In a letter to Hooker in April of the 

same year, Skinner relates his answer to Hartweg: “He 

asks if he should come on. I write him, ‘By all means’, 

& have given him letters of introduction to every town 

on the route & moreover sent him dried specimens of 

Orchidaceae that will bring him on in spite of himself.” 

Hartweg arrived in Guatemala, where he met Skinner 

who joined him on many of his collecting trips. “An 

intrepid and indefatigable plant hunter, Hartweg 

possessed both great good sense and intuition… 

earning fame as the collector of the greatest number 

of orchid species in the first half of the nineteenth 

century” (Berliocchi, 2000: 75). 

Among the numerous new species of orchids 

discovered by Hartweg during his five years of 

exploration in Mexico and Central America one 

can mention: Arpophyllum alpinum Hartweg 

ex Lindl. (Hartweg s.n., Mexico), Arpophyllum 

giganteum Lindl. (Hartweg s.n., Guatemala), 

Barkeria spectabilis Batem. ex Lindl. (Hartweg 

s.n., Guatemala), Coelia macrostachya Lindl. 

(Hartweg s.n, Guatemala), Cranichis apiculata 

Lindl. (Hartweg s.n., Guatemala), Cypripedium 

molle Lindl. (Hartweg s.n., México), Rhyncholaelia 

glauca (Lindl.) Schltr. (Hartweg s.n., Mexico), 

Rhynchostele pygmaea (Lindl.) Rchb. f. (Hartweg 

568, Guatemala), Sarcoglottis cerina (Lindl.) P. N. 

Don (Hartweg s.n., Guatemala), Sarcoglottis rosulata 

(Lindl.) P. N. Don (Hartweg s.n., Guatemala), and 

Schiedeella trilineata (Lindl.) Burns-Bal. (Hartweg 

s.n., Guatemala). However, his collections from 

Guatemala seem scanty (only 107 numbers). This 

small harvest leads to the speculation that part 

of Hartweg’s material could have been lost. In 

Guatemala’s rich flora, 107 numbers could easily be 

collected in three or four days. Bentham’s account 

of Hartweg’s collections in Guatemala consists of 

only 24 pages (Williams, 1972: 200-201). 

LANKESTERIANA 


On January 1 of 1841 he departed for South America 

and Jamaica, returning finally in 1843 to England. The 

Royal Horticultural Society was so satisfied with his 

work that he was sent on a second mission to Mexico 

and California. During this final journey he traveled 

together with Heller (Anonymous, 1854: 117). Tired 

of traveling and after a bitter dispute with the Royal 

Horticultural Society regarding his payment, he 

returned to Germany in 1848, where he was named 

Director of the Gardens of the Great Duke of Baden, in 

Schwetzingen. There he died in 1871. 

A great number of orchid species were dedicated 

to Hartweg, among them: Aa hartwegii Garay, 

Anacheilium hartwegii (Lindl.) Pabst, Moutinho & 

Pinto, Fernandezia hartwegii (Rchb. f.) Garay & Dunst., 

Oncidium hartwegii Lindl., Pachyphyllum hartwegii 

Rchb. f., Paphiopedilum hartwegii (Rchb. f.) Pfitzer, 

Phragmipedium hartwegii (Rchb. f.) L.O. Williams, 

Pleurothallis hartwegiaefolia H. Wendl. & Kraenzl., 

Pleurothallis hartwegii Lindl., Prosthechea hartwegii 

(Lindl.) W.E. Higgins, and Telipogon hartwegii Rchb. 

f. Lindley dedicated to him the new genus Hartwegia, 

today a synonym of Domingoa Schltr. 

“From the moment of the dissolution of the Federal 

Republic of Central America in 1838, the situation 

changed dramatically. On one side, Nicaragua became 

conscious of her lack of control over the Caribbean 

coast and on the other, English policy, now opposed 

to the unity of Central America, became more and 

more aggressive. Great Britain ended granting the 

Mosquitoes a protectorate in 1845, confirming what 

had been affirmed some years before, in 1838, when it 

was said that this region was in fact English territory. 

Not contented with this, on January 1 of 1841, the 

superintendent of Belize, Alexander MacDonald, 

who competed in aggressiveness and illegitimate 

acts with the Charge of Affairs and soon General 

Consul of Great Britain in Central America, Frederick 

Chatfield, attacked and seized San Juan del Norte. 

British supremacy reached its highest point in 1848, 

after declaring that San Juan del Norte belonged to the 

Mosquito kingdom and renaming it Greytown” (Bell, 

1989: 65). “...The Nicaraguans were witnesses, as was 

Costa Rica, of the fight among the powers in the region 

[...] Although by 1860 the British recognized that the 

Atlantic coast was Nicaraguan territory (Treaty of 

Managua) they did not withdraw from this area until


the Altamirano-Harrison Treaty of 1905. [...] English 

pressure on Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador to 

secure rights on lands in the proximity of the future 

canal and on the sites which would help to defend 

it was enormous; they pretended from Nicaragua 

the mouth of the San Juan River and the port of San 

Juan del Norte; from Honduras the Bay Islands in 

the Caribbean and the Island of Tigre in the Gulf of 

Fonseca and to have economical control on all three” 

(Obregón Quesada, 1993: 75). 

“[In 1840] ....began a decade of relative tranquility 

and colorless governments, during which the most 

relevant fact was the arrival in San José of the English 

seaman William LeLacheur, who harbored in Caldera 

to repair his ship and to find cargo, since he had lost 

the load of skins that he brought from the north during 

a storm. A coffee grower, Nicaraguan of Guatemalan 

origin, who had established himself in San José, called 

Mariano Montealegre, entrusted him his harvest, with 

instructions to try to sell it in London, based solely 

on LeLacheur’s word of honor. The first shipment of 

coffee to Europe passed through Chile [...] and then, 

via Cape Horn, found its way to London. Over a year 

later, the English seaman returned and handed to 

Montealegre the hefty product of the sale. The London 

market was open” (Cañas, 2000). 

The expedition of H.M.S. Sulphur (1836 to 1842), 

was the third of a series of voyages organized by 

the British Navy for the exploration, mainly for 

cartographic purposes of the American Pacific coast 

and the islands of the South Pacific. It was commanded 

by Sir Edward Belcher (1799-1877) and had been 

preceded in 1822 by the H.M.S. Conway and in 1827 

by the H.M.S. Blossom at the command of Captain 

F. W. Beechey, who explored the Mexican Pacific 

coast (San Blas, Mazatlán and Acapulco, with Lay as 

naturalist). The botanists of the expedition, Andrew 

Sinclair (1796-1861), George Barclay and Richard 

B. Hinds (1812-1847), made important collections in 

Panama, Nicoya (Costa Rica), El Realejo (Nicaragua) 

(Fig. 28B) and the Gulf of Fonseca (Honduras), 

whose botanical descriptions where written by George 

Bentham. The collections of this expedition are kept in 

London (BM), for instance Oncidium ampliatum Lindl. 

(Barclay 2769, Costa Rica). Botanical collections were 

not the priority for the expedition. The orders of the 

Sulphur (Belcher, 1843), read, “Great collections of 

natural history cannot be expected, but ... the medical 

officers must, undoubtedly, be anxious to contribute 

their part to the scientific character of the expedition” 

(Jörgensen, 2003). 

However, Hinds and Barclay found little to interest 

them: “Our visits to the Gulfs of Nicoya and Fonseca 

were not productive, indeed the sameness of an 

unbroken but dreary and profitless forest was nowhere 

more forcibly felt” (Hinds, 1844: 62). 

At least five specimens collected by the expedition 

of the Sulphur were determined as new species by 

Lindley: Epidendrum chinense (Lindl.) Ames (Hinds 

s.n. Guatemala), Ornithocephalus bicornis Lindl. 

(Sinclair s.n., Panama), Scaphyglottis fasciculata 

Hook. (Sinclair s.n., Nicaragua), Oncidium stipitatum 

Lindl. (G.W. Barclay 958, Panama), and Encyclia 

trachycarpa (Lindl.) Schltr. Among the collections 

by Barclay we find Catasetum viridiflavum Hook. 

and Maxillaria acutipetala Hook. with the indication 

‘Central America, Pacific side’. “Belcher (1843), 

Captain during most of the voyage, described the 

journey but put little emphasis on the scientific aspects 

and hardly mentioned the botanists of the expedition. 

The last third of Belcher’s second volume (1843) is 

an article written by Hinds in which he resumes The 

regions of vegetation” (Jörgensen, 2003: 5). 

George Bentham (1800-1884) (Fig. 29B) described 

the collections of Hartweg in Mexico and Guatemala 

in Plantae Hartwegianae (1839-1857) and also 

many of the species of the journey around the world 

of H.M.S. Sulphur. In Kew, Bentham maintained a 

close relationship with Joseph Hooker, son of the 

director and also an excellent botanist, with whom he 

began the publication of Genera Plantarum, a joint 

effort to resume all genera of flowering plants and 

gymnosperms. As an author, Bentham probably wrote 

more descriptions of plants – new to science – than any 

other person in his day. 

Another English collector, William Lobb (1809- 

1863), traveled through the Caribbean, Panama and 

South America, employed by the firm of Veitch in 

Chelsea. Veitch sent Lobb on a collecting expedition 

to South America, and he became the first commercial 

orchid hunter (Black, 1973: 61). Later, he spent several 

months in the neighborhood of Panama and Chagres, 

but according to Hemsley, appears to have dried very 

few plants (Hemsley, 1887: 134). 


71

72 

“The earliest preserved herbarium specimen from 

Belize is attributed to the firm of Messrs. Loddiges 

of England. The specimen, the type of Polystachya 

clavata Lindl. (1842), is preserved at Kew” (Balick et 

al., 2000: 5). 

The expedition of H.M.S. Herald (1844-1851) was 

the fourth of the already mentioned series of voyages 

undertaken by the British Navy to explore the coasts 

of the American Pacific. Carl Berthold Seemann 

(1825-1871) (Fig. 29C), who from his youth had 

had the ardent wish to see foreign countries, devoted 

much of his time to the study of the natural sciences, 

especially botany and anthropology (Anonymous, 

1871: 1678). In 1844 he traveled to Kew, to 

become a botanist. There he met W. J. Hooker, who 

recommended him to succeed Thomas Edmonston, 

who had lost his life accidentally in Ecuador. In 

this way he came to participate in the expedition, 

which explored, among other regions, the isthmus of 

Panama and western Mexico. He arrived in Panama 

the 22 nd of September, 1846 and joined the crew of 

the Herald in January of 1847. “Having paid a visit 

to Acapulco, and measured some of the volcanoes 

of Guatemala, the vessels sailed for Panama, where 

they arrived on the 17 th of January, 1847, and were 

joined by Mr. Berthold Seemann...” (Seemann, 

1852-57: 6). In May Seemann was in Coiba, the 

largest island in the Central American Pacific and 

later his favorite place for the collection of plants. In 

December of the same year he explored the Darién 

and in 1848 Chiriquí. He traveled through Mexico in 

1848 and 1849. “When in 1848 Berthold Seemann 

pointed out that ‘the isthmus of Panama, this part 

of New Granada that, like a bridge, connects the 

two great continents of America, their flora, fauna 

and races’, he became perhaps the first scientist 

to describe Panama as the biological bridge of the 

Americas” (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 31). 

“About this time, Dr. Seemann’s scientific labours 

attracted the attention of the Imperial German 

Academy of Naturalists, and soon after he was made 

a member... ” (Anonymous, 1871: 1678). A short time 

later he was elected Vice-president for life. 

He returned to Panama and met von Warscewicz. 

Seemann wrote: “We spent several days in Taboga, 

the most beautiful island in the bay. A mount rises in 

its center of about 1,000 feet of altitude, cultivated 

LANKESTERIANA 


with orchards and vegetables almost to its summit. 

Small streams run to the valley where, between palms 

and tamarinds, the huts of the natives lie almost 

hidden” (Heckadon Moreno, 1988: 27). He returned 

to England in 1851, with more than 1,000 specimens 

of plants. Between 1852 and 1857, Seemann 

published his The Botany of the Voyage of H.M.S. 

Herald, a book in four volumes, one of which is the 

Flora of the Isthmus of Panama. It is the first flora of 

Central America after Mociño’s Flora de Guatemala 

and Beurling’s Primitiae florae portobellensis, and 

Seemann described there 104 species of orchids. 

In 1853 he started the journal Bonplandia, which, 

though published in Hannover, he edited in London, 

and to which many of the leading botanists of all 

nations contributed. In 1865 he returned to Central 

America, employed by English interests to explore 

and operate gold mines in Nicaragua, where he 

started the operations of the mine of El Javalí, in 

Chontales. 

From Nicaragua he traveled frequently to Panama, 

and although fully occupied with his business affairs, 

he always found time for botanical exploration. At some 

point he must have visited Costa Rica, if we believe 

Endrés, who in 1869 wrote to Captain Dow: “Please do 

let me know whether and when Dr. Seemann will return” 

(letter to Capt. Dow, November 3, 1869). He dreamed 

with going back some day to scientific investigation, but 

died in Chontales in October of 1871, at the age of fortysix, 

another victim of yellow fever. 

Among Seemann’s collections are the type 

specimens of Pleurothallis perpusilla (Seemann 1565, 

Panama) and Masdevallia chontalensis (Seemann 180, 

Nicaragua), both described by Reichenbach. 

Seemann met in Chontales the English geologist 

and naturalist Ralph Tate (1840-1901). “... [Tate] made 

a small collection of plants at Chontales…at about the 

same date as Seemann, and perhaps in company with 

him, for the numbers are often [...] the same in the 

two collections” (Hemsley, 1887: 132-133). Among 

the collections by Tate are Physurus vaginatus Hook. 

and Isochilus linearis R. Br. Dendrobium seemannii, 

L. O. Williams, Taeniophyllum seemannii Rchb. f. 

and Trigonidium seemannii Rchb. f. were dedicated 

to Seemann. The only illustration of Orchidaceae in 

Seemann’s work is that of Cypripedium hartwegii 

Rchb. f. (Fig. 29D).

A 

B 


Figure 28. A — Vignette by George Cruikshank. From Bateman, 1837-43. B — The Port of El Realejo. In Wells, 1857: 64. 


73

74 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 29. A — Karl Theodor Hartweg (1812-1871). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — George Bentham (1800-1884). Courtesy 

of Rudolf Jenny. C — Carl Berthold Seemann (1825-1871). From Gardeners’ Chron., 1871. Courtesy of the Hunt Institute 

for Botanical Documentation. D — Cypripedium hartwegii Rchb. f. In Seemann, 1852-57: pl. XLIV. 


B

The German-Belgian connection 


“To the combined action of forces, to the influence 

of inanimate creation on the animated world of 

animals and plants, to this harmony will I always 

turn my eyes”. 

Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), 

in the journal of his voyage to America, 

June 15 th , 1799 

The botanical explorations of Cuming, Skinner, 

Hartweg, Hinds and Seemann originated in the spirit 

of imperialist expansion which characterized the 

Victorian era. Cuming and Skinner were true examples 

of the English attempts to dominate world trade. 

Hartweg was one of many instruments used by the 

English upper classes to satisfy their enthusiasm for 

orchids as decorative subjects and Hinds and Seemann 

represented the scientific interests of a Great Britain 

that had achieved complete control of the oceans. 

A current of ‘liberalism’ developed in the rest 

of Europe after 1830 that intellectually defended 

freedom of thought and praised technology and the 

natural sciences. The liberals inherited the ideals of 

Enlightenment and the French Revolution and where 

therefore often subject to a fierce political repression. 

It was so that a very different group of European 

adventurers, naturalists and scientists began arriving in 

Central America shortly after independence. They were 

individuals whose countries of origin had no practical 

interest in the new republics: merchants, scientists and 

political expatriates who in only a few years made great 

contributions to the knowledge of the orchids in Central 

America. With their English colleagues they had in 

common their ‘Orchidomania’, both in the horticultural 

and the scientific meaning of the word. Why did 

Germany, and above all Belgium contribute with so 

many illustrious names to the history of orchidology 

during the first half of the XIX century? For Germany 

the answer lies perhaps in a long botanical tradition 

and the influence of Humboldt on the romantic-liberal 

movement of the epoch. In the case of the Belgians, it 

may have been the nationalistic euphoria after the birth 

of Belgium as an independent nation. 

Let us remember that, as a result of the Congress 

of Vienna, the Prince of Orange had been proclaimed 

King of the United Low Countries in 1815. In 1830, the 

French speaking regions of the Low Countries gained 

their independence, forming the Kingdom of Belgium. 

King Leopold I ascended to the Belgian throne in July, 

1831. 

William Bullock (ca. 1773—1849) was en English 

traveler, naturalist and antiquarian. Bullock began as a 

goldsmith and jeweler in Sheefiled. He used his wealth 

to accumulate a large collection of artifacts, antiquities 

and stuffed animals. In the late 1790s Bullock founded 

a Museum of Natural Curiosities in the city, which 

moved to Liverpool in 1801. In 1808 he published 

a descriptive catalogue of the works of art, armory, 

objects of natural history, and other curiosities in the 

collection, some of which had been brought back 

by members of James Cook’s expeditions. In 1809, 

Bullock moved to London and the collection was 

housed in the newly built Piccadilly Egyptian Hall. 

The collection, which included over 32,000 items, was 

disposed of by auction in 1819.In 1822, Bullock went 

to Mexico [becoming so the first European to set foot in 

this country after Thomas Gage in 1625] and brought 

back many artifacts and specimens which in 1824 

formed a new exhibition in the Egyptian Hall, entitled 

Ancient and modern Mexico. This exhibition was the 

first exhibit in Europe of Mexico’s natural history and 

ancient culture after the country’s independence from 

Spain. Included among the curiosities exhibited by 

Bullock were a few birds mounted on artificial palms 

and cacti, and picturesquely arranged around them 

some Mexican mammals (Stresemann, 1954: 86). 

A second visit to Mexico, and to the USA, took place 

in 1827. Bullock’s publications include A concise and 

easy method of preserving subjects of natural history 

(1817), Six months residence and travels in Mexico 

(1824), and Sketch of a journey through the western 

states of North America (1827). 

“In Germany, the news of mysterious Mexico 

having become accessible even to the ordinary traveler 

excited the curiosity of a wealthy nobleman, the Count 

of Sack, chamberlain to the King of Prussia. He had 

recently returned from a voyage to Egypt and Cyprus 

where he had made a small collection of birds and he at 

once felt inclined to visit Mexico, provided that there 

was a collecting naturalist of good reputation to go with 

him. A gardener [...] by the name of Ferdinand Deppe, 

was recommended for this task by Professor Hinrich 

Lichtenstein, director of the Zoological Museum of 

Berlin University (Streseman, 1954: 86). 


75

76 

It was so that Ferdinand Deppe (1794-1861) came 

to Mexico for the first time in 1824, in the company 

of the Count von Sack. However, as soon as they 

reached Mexico, the difficult character of the Count 

made Deppe go his own way, beginning a series of 

travels through the country, collecting birds for the 

Zoological Museum and plants for the Botanical 

Garden of Berlin. In 1828 he traveled to Mexico again, 

this time in the company of doctor Christian Julius 

Wilhelm Schiede (1789-1836), who was a physician 

and a passionate botanist. “They expected to make a 

living in Mexico by selling zoological and botanical 

specimens to European Museums and dealers. [...] But 

they were soon disappointed [...] and although part of 

the material which the two friends had collected up to 

May 7, 1829, had been acquired by the museums of 

Berlin and Vienna, the financial result of their efforts 

was far from what they had expected” (Streseman, 

1954: 88). Both were guests of Sartorius and explored 

in depth the environs of El Mirador and the states of 

Veracruz and Tabasco. Deppe had collected earlier 

in Guatemala, although no collections by him in this 

country have been identified. 

Despite the short time they spent in Mexico, Deppe 

and Schiede discovered a great number of new orchid 

species. Worthy of mention are: Gongora galeata 

(Lindl.) Rchb. f. (Deppe s.n ), Lycaste deppei (Lodd.) 

Lindl. (Deppe s.n.), Stanhopea oculata (Lodd.) Lindl. 

(Deppe s.n.), Vanilla pompona Schiede (Schiede & 

Deppe s.n.), Vanilla sativa Schiede (Schiede & Deppe 

s.n.), Vanilla sylvestris Schiede (Schiede & Deppe s.n.), 

Isochilus major Schltdl. & Cham. (Schiede & Deppe 

1046), Vanilla pompona Schiede (Schiede 1043), 

Campylocentrum schiedei (Rchb. f.) Benth. & Hemsl. 

(Schiede s.n.), Dichaea neglecta Schltr. (Schiede 

1053), Pleurothallis schiedei Rchb. f.. (Schiede, W 

25687), and Lepanthes schiedei Rchb. f. (Schiede s.n.) 

Many species were dedicated to them and Schiede 

was honored with a new genus created by Schlechter: 

Schiedeella (Fig. 30A). Aside from their botanical 

interests, Deppe and Schiede were important 

contributors to the study of Mexican fauna and 

collaborated with the German zoologist Wiegmann, 

an important investigator of tropical amphibians and 

reptiles. Schiede made also interesting observations on 

general aspects of the vegetation in the regions which 

21 Lavater was Swiss consul in Mexico from 1827 to 1832. 

LANKESTERIANA 


he visited (Schiede, 1829-1830). While Deppe returned 

to Germany in 1829, Schiede settled in Mexico, where 

he died in 1836, a victim of typhus. 

Carl Christian Sartorius (1796-1872) was a German 

traveler who arrived in the region of Veracruz shortly 

after the independence of Mexico. Son of a protestant 

priest, he had been in jail and had lost his position as a 

teacher in Germany for political reasons, and decided 

to emigrate to Mexico. The majority of the Spanish 

residents in the region of Veracruz had emigrated to 

Cuba after Mexico’s independence and so Sartorius, 

in company with the Swiss Carl Lavater 21 , was able 

to purchase in 1826 a large part of the ‘Hacienda 

Amazónica’, an estate that had been the property of 

Francisco Arrillaga, with a total area of 12,000 acres. 

Sartorius established his residence in a place called 

‘Paso de los Monos’ (= ‘pass of the monkeys’) , which 

he called ‘El Mirador’ (= ‘the look-out point’). El 

Mirador soon became a place of refuge for all naturalists 

who visited the area and is perhaps the most frequently 

cited Mexican locality of collection during the whole 

XIX century. Sartorius’ political ideals were soon put 

into practice in Mexico. His “ideal city”, as he called 

her, was to be a German city. He built a community 

house, a library, and rooms for research and teaching. 

He publicized his project in Germany and, in 1833, 

the first group of settlers came to Mexico. After one 

year, 45 settlers lived in Sartorius ‘Monte Libre’ (= 

‘free mountain’). But the conditions were very harsh 

and Sartorius’ was soon left alone with his plans. A 

passionate botanist and generous host, Sartorius 

took into his house many of the travelers, especially 

Germans, who explored the Mexican Southeast 

during a good part of the century. Among them were 

Karwinski, Schiede, Deppe, Hartweg, Heller, Galeotti, 

Leibold, Linden, Liebmann and Purpus. Many of them, 

like Sartorius, had left Europe for political reasons. 

Florentin, Sartorius’ son, continued his father’s 

tradition. El Mirador was a meeting place for 

naturalists and botanists until the first years of the 

XX century. Sartorius herbarium is now at the 

Smithsonian Institution and contains specimens 

collected mainly at El Mirador, among which we can 

find Epidendrum viridipurpureum Lindl., Pleurothallis 

tenuissima Rchb. f., Lepanthes pristidis Rchb. f., 

Epidendrum cochleatum L., Epidendrum polybulbon


Sw. and Maxillaria variabilis Batem. A list of species 

collected by Sartorius was published by Reichenbach 

in 1856 under the name of Orchideae Mirandolanae 

(mexicanae) Sartorianae (Reichenbach, 1856). We 

remember El Mirador in Cyclopogon miradorensis 

Schltr., whose description is based on a collection by J. 

A. Purpus 1n 1922 (J. A. Purpus 92, El Mirador). It is 

said that during his short stay in Mexico (1864-1867), 

the unfortunate Maximillian of Hapsburg bought an 

estate called ‘Jalapilla’, adjacent to ‘El Mirador’, with 

the purpose of enlarging his collections of plants and 

butterflies and also to chat and exchange scientific 

information with his neighbor. Maximillian had little 

time to enjoy the beauties of Mexican nature. He died 

in 1867, executed by the troops of Benito Juárez. 

An interesting book about Mexico, Mexico als 

Ziel für Deutsche Auswanderer, was published by 

Sartorius in 1850. An English translation, Mexico 

and the Mexicans, was published in London in 1859. 

In this book (version of 1975), Sartorius writes 

about the tropical forests: “Each tree is covered by 

countless plants, from fungi in the roots to orchids in 

its branches” (Sartorius, 1975: 15) (Fig. 30B). Johann 

Moritz Rugendas (1802-1858), famous romantic 

German painter, was a friend of Sartorius and spend 

three years at El Mirador. The London edition (1859) 

of Sartorius’ book was beautifully illustrated with 

engravings based on Rugendas paintings during his 

stay in Mexico (Fig. 30C). 

Although born in Hungary, Wilhelm Friedrich 

Freiherr von Karwinski von Karwin (1780-1855) 

came to Mexico in 1827 supported by the “Deutsch- 

Amerikanischer Bergwerksverein zu Elberfeld” (= 

‘German-American Mining Company of Elberfeld’) to 

explore the possibilities of securing mining concessions 

in the country but also moved by his botanical interests. 

“Karwinski was educated in Vienna and had become a 

mining engineer of some distinction. After working more 

than a decade in Spain he inherited some property in 

Bavaria and moved there in 1815. He became interested 

in traveling to America, and after unsuccessful attempts 

to associate himself with the Brazilian expeditions 

of Martius… he visited Brazil, apparently at his own 

expense, in 1821-23” (McVaugh, 1980: 141). Of 

interest for our study are Karwinski’s collections near 

Oaxaca and Tehuantepec during his first trip to Mexico 

(1827-1832) where he collected, among others, the type 

of Habenaria clypeata Lindl. and Mormodes pardina 

Batem. The botanical specimens from Karwinki’s 

first trip to Mexico went to the Botanical Garden in 

Munich. “Karwinski’s second trip to Mexico (1841- 

1843) was undertaken when he was 60 years old, under 

the auspices of five different sponsors in St. Petersburg 

(now Leningrad). By the term of this agreement he was 

to look for plants and animals, and also, primarily, to 

search for minerals in commercial deposits. His trip 

was very successful, botanically speaking. He brought 

back more than 2000 gatherings…” (McVaugh, 1980: 

144). The specimens from this trip are mostly in 

Leningrad. Some of his collections of Orchidaceae 

where Cranichis tubulosa Lindl. and Isochilus cernuus 

Lindl.. Reichenbach dedicated to him his Epidendrum 

karwinski Rchb. f., today a synonym of Prosthechea 

bicamerata (Rchb. f.) W.E. Higgins, from a specimen 

collected by Karwinski in Teoxomulco, Oaxaca. 

Lindley named in his honor his Cyrtochilum karwinski 

and Martius his Cattleya karwinski. 

His main explorations during this trip where in the 

northern lowlands of Veracruz, where, during a few 

months, he traveled together with the Danish botanist 

F. M. Liebmann. As Liebmann wrote on February 21 st , 

1841: “Mexico’s present situation makes it to a certain 

extent advisable with combined strengths to brave 

the dangers with which a completely demoralized 

population, anarchy and lawlessness will each day 

confront us…” (McVaugh, 1980: 146). 

The exploratory activities of a surprising group 

of botanists and collectors from a small country that 

had gained its political independence only a few years 

earlier, began with the arrival in our region of Henri 

Guillaume Galeotti (1814-1858), a native of Versailles 

but sponsored by the Vandermaelen brothers, Belgian 

nurserymen. “The two brothers, both passionately 

interested in cartography and the natural sciences, 

were particularly sensitive to the echoes of the voyages 

of von Humboldt. [...] Later, from 1835 to 1840, the 

Vandermalen brothers would finance the expedition of 

botanist and geologist Henri Galetotti...” (Ceulemans 

et al., 2006: 24). 

Galeotti had been born in Paris, from an Italian father 

and a French mother, and followed his father when he 

established himself in Brussels. In 1843 he obtained 

the Belgian citizenship (Touret & Visser, 2004: 84). In 

1835 Galeotti left Hamburg for Mexico, where he spent 


77

78 

five years, collecting mainly in Veracruz, Mexico and 

Oaxaca. Like many others, he was a guest of Sartorius 

in El Mirador. He established botanical stations both 

there and in Zacualpán. In 1838 he climbed Mount 

Orizaba in the company of Ghiesbreght, Funck and 

Linden (Galeotti, 1861: 271-73). Galeotti’s herbarium 

was estimated at 7,000 to 8,000 specimens, containing 

many new species, that were later described by himself 

in conjunction with the French botanist Achille 

Richard. In May of 1836 he wrote from Mexico: “I have 

gathered already a great number of vegetables, many of 

which still lack a scientific denomination; they will fill 

the greenhouses from Messieurs Vandermaelen with 

infinity of beautiful and curious plants” (Diagre, 2004: 

36). After his return to Belgium in 1840, Galeotti was 

elected correspondent of the recently founded ‘Société 

Royale d’Horticulture de Belgique’, a position he held 

until his death in 1858 (Quetelet, 1859: 143). “[Galeotti] 

trusted the description of the orchids to Achille Richard, 

the cacti to Lemaire, the Gramineans to Trinius and the 

ferns to Martens” (Crépin, 1800-1883: 434) (Fig. 31A). 

His herbarium was acquired by the Society and remains 

in Brussels. “[...] He went into business in Schaerbeck, 

but his efforts failed in the wake of the economic crisis 

of 1848; he appears to have possessed little commercial 

acumen” (Ceulemans et al., 2006: 55). 

Some of the species of Orchidaceae collected by 

Galeotti in Mexico are: Barkeria melanocaulon A. 

Rich. & Gal. (Galeotti 5069), Bletia adenocarpa 

Rchb. f. (Galeotti 5345), Cyclopogon luteo-albus 

(A. Rich. & Gal.) Schltr. (Galeotti s.n.), Cyclopogon 

saccatus A. Rich. & Gal. (Galeotti 9124), Epidendrum 

galeottianum A. Rich. & Gal. (Galeotti 5194), 

Epidendrum longipetalum A. Rich. & Gal. (Galeotti 

5238), Epidendrum propinquum A. Rich. & Gal. 

(Galeotti 5265), Masdevallia galeottiana A. Rich. & 

Gal. (Galeotti 5075), Pleurothallis violacea A. Rich & 

Gal. (Galeotti s.n.), Prosthechea chondylobulbon (A. 

Rich. & Gal.) W. E. Higgins (Galeotti s.n.), Schiedeella 

violacea (A. Rich. & Gal.) Garay (Galeotti 5120). 

Two orchid genera were named in honor of Galeotti: 

Galeottia (Fig. 31B) by his friend and colleague 

Richard and Galeottiella by Rudolf Schlechter. 

Achille Richard (1794-1852) (Fig. 31C) had studied 

medicine but his interests inclined soon towards 

Botany, and he became one of the most important 

botanists of his time. In 1819 he published the first 

LANKESTERIANA 


edition of his Eléments de Botanique. The Orchidaceae 

were his favorite family, and his first important work 

in systematic botany was the Monographie des 

Orchidées des îles de France et de Bourbon, in 1828. 

When Galeotti returned from Mexico in 1841, Richard 

took charge of the study and description of the new 

species of Orchidaceae planning to publish, together 

with the former, a monograph of the Mexican species 

of this family. The first part was published in 1845. 

Richard’s death in 1852 and financial problems made 

the publication of the rest of this monograph an 

impossible task (Veyret, 1997: 17). 

The Austrian Carl Bartholomäus Heller (1824- 

1880), professor at the famous ‘Theresianum’ 

academy in Vienna, left England on October 2, 1845 

in the company of Hartweg (Anonymous, 1854: 117), 

and collected in Mexico between 1845 and 1848, 

becoming one of the many guests of Sartorius at El 

Mirador. In 1846 he sent 14 boxes of orchids to Vienna 

(Anonymous, 1846: 216). Among his collections we 

can find the types of Govenia deliciosa Rchb. f. (Heller, 

El Mirador, W-Rchb. 42259), Mormolyca lineolata 

Fenzl. (Heller s.n., El Mirador) and Epidendrum helleri 

Fenzl. ex Hemsl. (Heller s.n). Heller’s accounts of his 

travels through Mexico are of great interest, especially 

the phytogeographical description of the region around 

the Orizaba volcano (Heller, 1847). Before traveling to 

Mexico with Hartweg, Heller had tried to organize an 

expedition on his own, for which he had chosen young 

Benedikt Roezl as his assistant, but the project failed 

due to the lack of financing (Block, 1985: 1201-1202). 

A native of Luxembourg, Jean Jules Linden (1817- 

1898) (Fig. 31D) moved as a young man to Belgium, 

where he became one of the first students of the 

recently founded University of Brussels. At the age of 

nineteen he was entrusted by the Belgian government 

(at the suggestion of Barthélemi Du Mortier, botanist 

and man of state) with his first scientific mission that 

would take him to South America (Linden, 1894: 117). 

Between 1835 and 1837, he explored the Brazilian 

provinces of Rio de Janeiro, Spiritu-Santo, Minas 

Gerais and Sao Paulo. “Unlike many plant hunters 

who went to work purely for commercial reasons, Jean 

Linden had a botanical interest in many species, not 

just the orchid. It is thanks to him that we have so many 

varieties of fern, palm, begonia, bromeliad, and so on” 

(Ceulemans et al., 2006: 7).


His second expedition, in the company of his 

countrymen Funck and Ghiesbreght (who took part as 

a zoologist), departed for Havana in October of 1837 

and went on to Mexico, resting at El Mirador of Carl 

Sartorius. Here he met Galeotti, who had arrived in 

Mexico three years earlier. They proceeded to the east: 

“Linden first went to Yucatan, and thence to the States 

of Chiapas and Tabasco; visiting and exploring the 

districts of Ciudad Real, Cacaté, San Bartolo Titotoli, 

Santiago de Tabasco, Teapa, Puyapatengo, etc. where 

he formed by far the largest collection we have seen 

from those parts of Mexico” (Hemsley, 1887: 126). He 

continued from there to northern Guatemala returning 

then to the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. “In 1839-40, 

a disaster threw the smooth running of the expedition 

into turmoil. Jean Linden fell seriously ill, stricken by 

a violent attack of the vómito negro, which Europeans 

call yellow fever. [...] A natural haemorrhage saved his 

life, but it took a painful three-month recovery before 

he could return to his collecting” (Ceulemans et al., 

2006: 57). Funck and Ghiesbreght re-embarked for 

Brussels in September 1840. Linden was left on the 

American continent and eventually returned home via 

Havana and the United States. 

A third and last expedition, between 1841 and 1844, 

would take him to Venezuela and Colombia (where he 

would meet again with Hartweg), in the company of 

Joseph Schlim and Funck. “No later than October 1845 

- he had been home barely 11 months - he entrusted 

his old traveling companions, Nicholas Funck and 

Louis-Joseph Schlim, with a mission to Venezuela and 

Colombia”. 

“[...] Linden did not leap blindly into the horticultural 

trade but viewed his careers as a long-term proposition. 

He began with an audacious and clever stroke that 

proved vital in bringing himself to public attention. He 

wrote to eminent English botanist, John Lindley, asking 

him to draw up a scientific description of the orchids 

discovered on his recent travels. [Lindley] accepted 

Linden’s proposal and began his work of taxonomy 

which resulted in the publication of Orchidaceae 

Lindenianae, or Notes upon a collection of Orchids 

Formed in Colombia and Cuba by Mr. J. Linden 

(Lindley, 1846). [...] Linden’s maneuver was brilliant. 

[...] This scientific recognition gained him entrance 

to the world of professional botanists as well as 

winning the confidence of growers and orchid lovers” 

(Ceulemans et al., 2006: 105-106). After starting 

business in Luxembourg, he established himself in 

Brussels in 1851, where he found greater possibilities 

to commercialize his plants and where he found clients 

who where willing to pay considerable sums for new 

species, especially orchids. From 1851 to 1861 he was 

the director of the Royal Zoological and Botanical 

Gardens at Leopold Park in Brussels. In addition to 

the great number of species he introduced into Europe, 

Linden had the merit of studying closely the conditions 

in which the orchids grew in nature and to adapt the 

cultural methods in Europe to these conditions, thus 

creating in his greenhouses ‘real’ microclimates for 

the plants he imported. Linden, who maintained close 

relations with English horticulturists, quickly adopted 

the new techniques of the Industrial Revolution and 

built greenhouses of gigantic proportions in Ghent and 

Brussels, becoming soon the favorite supplier of the 

members of the upper classes. Among his clients he 

even counted the Czar of Russia. 

The Linden name is associated with a number 

of important publications: L’Illustration horticole 

(1854-1896), and above all Pescatorea (1860) and 

Lindenia (1885-1906), continued by his son Lucien), 

commonly ranked amongst the most magnificent 

and outstanding works in orchid literature. Some 

of the species the types of which were collected by 

Linden and deserve to be mentioned are: Brachystele 

minutiflora (A. Rich. & Gal.) Burns-Bal. (Linden 

1237), Gongora truncata Lindl. (Linden s.n.), Notylia 

orbicularis A. Rich. & Gal. (Linden 216), Oncidium 

lindenii Brongn. (Linden s.n.), Prosthechea panthera 

(Rchb. f.) W. E. Higgins (Linden 1236), Sarcoglottis 

corymbosa Garay (Linden 1232), Stelis ciliaris Lindl. 

(Linden 203), and Stelis purpurascens A. Rich. & 

Gal. (Linden 211). 

Linden had an enormous influence on European 

orchidology during the last two thirds of the XIX 

century. His nurseries, managed by his son Lucien 

after his death, survived until World War I. “It can be 

said of Jean Linden that, in addition to his scientific 

merits, he also had outstanding commercial talents. 

In him, moreover, scientific discipline, a feeling for 

new discoveries, a love for botanical science and an 

aesthetic sense were harmoniously combined. It is 

these qualities that have made Linden an important 

historical figure” (Ceulemans et al., 2006: 7). 


79

80 

The Belgian Auguste Boniface Ghiesbreght (1819- 

1893) and the Luxembourgian Nicholas Funck (1816- 

1896) explored Mexico (especially the states Tabasco 

and Chiapas) together with Linden. While Funck later 

joined Linden in his third expedition to South America, 

Ghiesbreght returned to Mexico in 1840, where 

he formed important collections. “He introduced 

many fine plants to the nurseries of Van Houtten and 

Verschaffelt” (Anonymous, 1893: 634). Ghiesbreght 

had been hired as the zoologist of the expedition, and 

in 1842 sold insects to the Paris Museum, for 30 francs 

per hundred specimens (Papavero & Ibáñez-Barnal, 

2001: 83). During the years of 1850-1855 he made 

his third voyage to Mexico and his second to Chiapas, 

forgetting the dangers he had encountered before and 

which had almost cost him his life. He died in Mexico, 

at San Cristóbal de las Casas, in February of 1893 

(Anonymous, 1893: 634). Ghiesbreght was perhaps 

the botanist with the greatest knowledge of the flora of 

northern Mesoamerica during the first half of the XIX 

century. Although his collections were primarily of 

plants from other families, he discovered an important 

number of new species of Orchidaceae that were 

described by Richard and Galeotti in the Annales des 

sciences naturelles, a journal whose publication had 

begun some years earlier in Paris, edited by Adolphe 

Théodore Brongniart. Ghiesbreght would become 

Linden’s lifelong friend and collaborator. “Captivated 

by the novelties of a tropical flora, his earliest and latest 

field of research, and apparently his favorite one, was 

the south-eastern-most part of Mexico, comprising the 

states of Tabasco and Chiapas” (Anonymous, 1889: 

585). 

Funck (Fig. 32A), who was Linden’s favorite 

illustrator, also made important contributions to the 

knowledge of the orchids of Central America. “He is 

[...] inextricably linked with the life of Jean Linden. [...] 

His name is also to be found amongst the administrators 

of the Linden companies [...] The friendship between 

the two men was further strengthened when Funck 

and Linden married two Luxembourg sisters, 

Catherine and Anna Reuter, on 9 April 1849 and 13 

October 1845 respectively” (Ceulemans et al., 2006: 

27). Among the types collected by Ghiesbreght 

and Funck, or dedicated to them, are the following: 

Brachystele sarcoglossa (A. Rich. & Gal.) Burns- 

Bal. (Ghiesbreght s.n.), Calanthe calanthoides (A. 

LANKESTERIANA 


Rich. & Gal.) Hamer & Garay (Ghiesbreght s.n.) (Fig. 

32B), Encyclia ghiesbreghtiana (A. Rich. & Gal.) 

Dressler (Ghiesbreght 6, Oncidium ghiesbreghtianum 

A. Rich. & Gal. (Ghiesbreght W 27024), Spiranthes 

cinnabarinus Hemsl. (Ghiesbreght s.n.), Epidendrum 

funckianum A. Rich. & Gal. (Funck s.n.), and Pelexia 

funckiana (A. Rich. & Galeotti) Schltr. (H. Galeotti 

5171). Richard and Galeotti dedicated the genus 

Ghiesbreghtia and Schlechter the genus Funckiella to 

these two great Belgian botanists. 

The German Friedrich Ernst Leibold (1804-1864) 

arrived in Mexico in 1839. As one of many guests 

of Sartorius, he collected mainly in Zacuapán, in the 

neighborhood of El Mirador. Reichenbach named after 

him Leochilus leiboldi and Hemsley mentions many of 

his collections, such as: Epidendrum seriatum Lindl., 

Sobralia macrantha Lindl., Govenia mutica Rchb. f., 

Maxillaria pumila Hook. and the types of Brassavola 

(=Homalopetalum) pumilio Rchb. f. and Lepanthes 

pristidis Rchb. f. Reichenbach described many of the 

species collected by Leibold in Klotzsch’s “Beiträge 

zu einer Aequinoctialflora Amerika’s”(1849). 

Emmanuel Ritter von Friedrichsthal (1809-1842) 

was born in Bohemia and in 1839 traveled through 

Nicaragua and Costa Rica, continuing to Panama, 

Guatemala and Yucatán. “He disembarked in San 

Juan del Norte, in Nicaragua, at the beginning of 

1839, having been before in the Antilles, and after 

exploring the Pacific coast of the other Central 

American countries, arrived in Costa Rica, possibly 

via Puntarenas” (León, 2002: 132). Friedrichsthal drew 

maps, took barometric measurements, investigated the 

conditions of the natural history and ethnography and 

sent reports to his government about the technology, 

industry and commerce of the countries he visited 

(Wurzbach, 1858: 360). “He botanized extensively 

in Costa Rica between 1839 and 1842, along the Río 

San Juan and from Guanacaste to Cartago” (Grayum 

et al, 2004: 2). However, all of his collections at Kew 

are labeled ‘Guatemala’. Friedrichsthal, like many 

others before him, applied the name Guatemala to 

Central America as a whole, probably keeping with 

the customs of colonial times of calling the region 

‘Captaincy General of Guatemala’ or ‘Kingdom of 

Guatemala’. The confusion is clear in the description 

of one of the new species of Orchidaceae known from 

Friedrichsthal’s collections: Maxillaria friedrichsthallii


A B 

C 

Figure 30. A — Schieedella cobanensis Schltr. Drawing by R. Schlechter. In Schlechter,1931, plate 9, illustration 35. 

B — Frontispiece of Sartorius’ work, Mexico and the Mexicans, 1850. C — J. M. Rugendas: The Mirador looking towards 

the Gulf . In Sartorius, 1975: 8. 


81

82 

LANKESTERIANA 

A B 

C 

Figure 31. A — Odontoglossum caerulescens A. Rich & Gal. A drawing by Galeotti with the determination by Richard. In 

Veyret, 1997: 16. B — Galeottia grandiflora A. Rich. & Gal. Illustration by A. Goosens in Cogniaux & Goosens, 1896- 

1907. C — Achille Richard (1794-1852). In Veyret, 1997: 5. D — Jean Jules Linden (1817-1898). From Gardeners’ 

Chronicle, courtesy of the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 


D


A B 

C D 

Figure 32. A — Nicholas Funck (1816-1896). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — Calanthe calanthoides (A. Rich. & Gal.) Hamer 

& Garay. Illustration by Pilar Casasa. C — Maxillaria friedrichsthalii Rchb.f. Illustration by Blanche Ames, courtesy of the 

Oakes Ames Orchid Herbarium, Harvard University. D — Josef Ritter von Rawiez Warscewicz (1812-1866). Courtesy of 

the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 


83

84 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

B C 

Figure 33. A — Map of the Belgian colony in Santo Tomás, Guatemala. In Wagner, 2001: 42. B — Warczewiczella discolor 

Rchb.f. Xenia Orchidacea I, Plate 93. C — Michael Frederik Liebmann (1813-1856). Courtesy of the Botanical Garden & 

Museum, Copenhagen. 



Rchb. f., (Friedrichsthal, AMES 25856) (Fig. 32C). In 

Reichenbach’s description, the locality of collection is 

referred to as: Guatemala, Chontales, in Monte Aragua, 

although it is well known that Chontales is in Nicaragua. 

Other collections by Friedrichsthal include the type of 

Ornithocephalus inflexus Lindl. (Guatemala, am Fluss 

Torre), Gongora quinquenervis Ruiz y Pav. (Guatemala, 

San Juan River (!)) and Schomburgkia tibicinis Batem. 

(Río de Mico, Petén). “Friedrichsthal is considered one 

of the pioneers of expedition photography. Already 

in the year after Daguerre‘s technique was publicized 

[1837], he employed this new technique to depict Maya 

ruins. In 1840, he was the first European to describe 

Chichén Itzá”. 

He must have met Skinner, who in one of his letters 

to Alexander Mac Donald in Belize asks: “Did le 

Chevalier Frederickstal [sic] find much up the river?” 

(Letter from Skinner to Mac Donald, Feb. 26 th , 1841). 

It was, by the way, Mac Donald’s wife who introduced 

from Belize into England the type specimen of 

Brassavola (=Rhyncholaelia) digbyana Lindl., today 

the national flower of Honduras 22 . A different version 

states that the plant was sent by Governor Digby, and 

named in honor of his kinsman, Lord Digby; it had been 

collected by employees of Messrs. Brown, Ponder, and 

Co., of Belize, who dealt in mahagony and logwood 

(Boyle, 1901: 151). A large part of his collection and 

equipment was stolen during a robbery in the province 

of Yucatan, at the southern end of the peninsula of the 

same name. At the end of October 1841 he reached 

Vienna, badly suffering from the serious illness he had 

caught in Latin America and that was to lead to his 

death a few months later. 

“Last Monday George brought here a Pole – a great 

traveller & one of the first botanists in the world. His 

name is Warscewicz.... He talks a mixture of Spanish 

and Polish, & wears a beard, in fact, is all hair, from 

his nose downwards!”. Mrs. Skinner, in a letter to her 

friend Juliana Raymond dated April 15, 1850, described 

with these words her first encounter with Josef Ritter 

von Rawiez Warscewicz (1812-1866) (Fig. 32D). 

Warscewicz was born in Lithuania, of Polish ancestors, 

mostly military (Lückel, 1982: 125), and “received his 

initial training in Botany at Rumzill’s [really Jundzill] 

Botanical Gardens in Poland [actually in Vilnius, 

Lithuania] and at the Berlin Botanic Gardens, and then 

joined a Belgian contingent of settlers [in Guatemala] 

in 1845 to collect plants for the nurseryman Van Houtte 

of Ghent, Belgium” (Milligan & Banks, 1999: 22). 

Van Houtte owned a large garden in Santo Tomás, now 

Matías de Gálvez, Guatemala (Savage, 1970: 275). The 

colonization program in Santo Tomás had started in 1834, 

when the Guatemalan Congress passed a law promoting 

the development of the Departments of Verapaz, 

Livinston and Santo Tomás. Colonization began in 1836 

by the British ‘Commercial and Agricultural Company 

of the Eastern Coast of Central America’ but in 1841 the 

British interests were sold to the Belgian Colonization 

Company (Wagner, 2007: 17-22) (Fig. 33A). 

But the new Belgian colony in Santo Tomás, 

Guatemala, was a complete failure. “They sold him 

the idea that he would find a prosperous town full of 

rich settlers. When he arrived, in February of 1845, 

Warscewicz found that instead of the promised city 

there was only a hamlet of straw huts. Instead of 

rich and active settlers he found immigrants so sick 

that they looked like corpses raised from the dead. 

From the 32 healthy and strong individuals who 

arrived with Warscewicz from Europe to join the 

colony, only our botanist and the group’s physician 

survived” (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998 62). The Belgian 

Colony was officially dissolved by the Guatemalan 

government in 1853 (Wagner, 2007: 33). Thanks 

to Humboldt’s recommendation [Humboldt had 

previously recommended him to the Botanical Garden 

in Hamburg], Warscewicz initiated correspondence 

with Skinner, with whom he did not start off well, 

possibly because they did not meet personally until 

1850 (Skinner was at the time in England). “I have 

had enough of him... (Letter from Skinner to Hooker, 

15.09.1846)”. “...And I am disgusted with Warscewicz 

and almost feel inclined to have nothing more to do with 

him” (Letter from Skinner to Hooker, 15.12.1846). But 

the relations would improve, until Skinner became an 

admirer of the extravagant Pole. 

“From Guatemala, Warscewicz traveled to El 

Salvador, where, due to extensive deforestation, 

he found only few plants. He went on to Nicaragua 

and met there Dr. Oersted, who informed him of the 

best regions for botanical exploration. Together they 

22 The name honors Edward St. Vincent Digby, an orchid grower from Minterne, Dorsetshire, who first received the plant from 

Mrs. Mac Donald. 


85

86 

explored the forests of Nueva Segovia, collecting 

2,000 specimens of orchids”. His next destination was 

Costa Rica, where he arrived in 1848 and then Panama, 

collecting later in several countries of South America. 

From a letter from Warscewicz dated March 15, 

1848 (unknown recipient) we can see how difficult 

his travels were and understand the hardships he 

went through: “My journey by land (500 leagues) 

from Guatemala to Costa Rica was very hard; hunger, 

thirst and other contrarieties bothered me all the time; 

only the wonderful and exuberant vegetation helped 

me endure so critical a situation; this vegetation was 

my constant companion along the way [...] Presently 

I am traveling to Panama and Veraguas... I need 

money to travel and collect with profit - I have been 

waiting for it in vain for already a long time, since 

what I received from my friends and sympathizers in 

Germany in exchange for the considerable shipment 

of seeds, plants and orchids which I sent last year 

from Guatemala was barely enough to ship the plants 

and return the expenses” (Méndez & Monge-Nájera, 

2003: 205). In 1850 he passed again through Costa 

Rica and Panama, returning to Europe after a bad 

attack of yellow fever. There he finally met Skinner, 

who took him into his house because of Warscewicz’s 

ruinous financial situation (“poor fellow, I am afraid 

he will find it difficult to recover his expenses”; Letter 

from Skinner to Hooker, 03.04.1850). After he met 

him, Skinner wrote enthusiastically to Lord Derby: 

“He is strong as iron in constitution, fearless as a 

lion of dangers & enthusiastic beyond description” 

(27.04.1850). 

He spent several months in Berlin as assistant 

to Reichenbach, describing over 300 species of 

orchids. In those days he published a list of orchids 

brought by him from Central America, which he 

offered for sale (Warscewicz, 1850). Not used to 

sedentary work, he embarked for America again in 

1851 and passed a last time through Panama. At the 

end of the year he was in Guayaquil, where he was 

robbed and lost his money and equipment, returning 

finally to Europe in 1853 (Anonymous, 1854a: 96). 

He was offered the position of supervisor at the 

Botanical Gardens of Krakow that he held until his 

death in 1866. “Together with the director Ignacy 

Rafel Czerwiakowski he published Catalogus 

Plantarum (Cracoviae 1864), listing 8,911 taxa 

LANKESTERIANA 


cultivated in the garden, including some 300 species 

of Orchidaceae” (Yearsley, 2004: 159). 

It was undoubtedly in Costa Rica and Panama 

where he collected the greatest number of orchids. In 

Costa Rica he explored chiefly the central region of the 

country and climbed the Barba and Irazú volcanoes. 

In Panama, his favorite collecting sites where the 

highlands of Chiriquí, which he came to consider as 

an orchidological paradise. It is again Skinner, in one 

of his many letters to Hooker, who tells us about the 

newly discovered beauties: “Mr. Warscewicz has sent 

me some 20 boxes of orchids... He is now in Veraguas 

on his way south, but so rich do I observe Costa Rica 

to be, I will persuade him to return and winter in 

Veraguas and Costa Rica... They are splendid examples 

of the richest orchid country in the world” (Letter from 

Skinner to Hooker, 11.07.1848). 

Reichenbach described his collections in 1854 

Orchideae Warscewiczianae Recentiores and in 1866 

under the title of Orchideae Warscewiczianae and wrote: 

“the name of Von Warscewicz shines among those who 

have enlarged in a very considerable form the knowledge 

of orchids (Reichenbach, 1866; 4).” Some of the types 

collected by Warscewicz are: Epidendrum incomptum 

Rchb. f. (Warscewicz s.n., Panama), Elleanthus 

hymenophorus (Rchb. f.) Rchb. f. (Warscewicz s.n., 

Panama), Lacaena spectabilis (Klotzsch) Rchb. f. 

(Warscewicz W-Rchb. 44742), Maxillaria aciantha 

Rchb. f. (Warscewicz s.n., Costa Rica), Maxillaria 

atrata Rchb. f. (Warscewicz s.n., Guatemala), Maxillaria 

ringens Rchb. f. (Warscewicz s.n., Guatemala), 

Mesospinidium warscewiczii Rchb. f. (Warscewicz s.n.), 

Oerstedella centropetala (Rchb. f.) Rchb. f. (Warscewicz 

s.n., Panama), Oncidium warscewiczii Rchb. f. 

(Warscewicz s.n., Costa Rica y Panama), Prosthechea 

brassavolae (Rchb. f.) W. E. Higgins (Warscewicz 

W-Rchb. 64, Panama), and Sobralia warscewiczii Rchb. 

f. (Warscewicz s.n., Panama). Reichenbach named after 

him the genus Warscewiczella and a great number of 

species (Fig. 33B). 

While collecting in Tropical America, Warscewicz 

sent to the Botanical Garden in Krakow a number of 

interesting orchids that unfortunately were lost during 

a severe winter. Those orchids that were rescued, 

were used by Franck, Governor of occupied Poland 

during World War II, as a decoration of his residence 

in Krakow... and were never returned to the Botanical


Garden (Sampolinski, 1963: 214). Warscewicz had 

also interest in hummingbirds, “certainly a choice 

of interests in which he was to be envied” (Standley, 

1925: 354). 

Augustus Fendler (1813-1883) was born in 

Gumbinnen, Prussia, and came to the United States in 

1836 to work variously at a tanyard in Philadelphia, 

a lamp factory in New York, and a gas works in St. 

Louis, until he discovered that a market existed for 

dry plants. George Engelmann, of St. Louis, Missouri, 

trained him as a collector. Fendler began his travels in 

the southwestern United States and collected later in 

Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama and Venezuela. In 1846 

he was in Nicaragua, where he made a small collection 

of plants near Greytown (San Juan del Norte). He went 

on to Panama, in 1850, and his collections of this area 

are preserved at Kew and Missouri. In Panama he 

collected, among others: Oncidium ampliatum Lindl. 

(Fendler 331), Dimerandra emarginata (G. Mey.) 

Hoehne (Fendler 332), Dichaea panamensis Lindl. 

(Fendler 333) and Polystachya foliosa (Lindl.) Rchb. 

f. (Fendler 334). Only three new types of orchids 

are known among Fendler’s collections, although 

all appear to be from Venezuela: Cranichis fendleri 

Schltr., Liparis fendleri Schltr. and Stelis fendleri Lindl. 

He returned to Germany and in the eighteen sixties we 

find him again in the United States, where he worked 

as an assistant to the great botanist Asa Gray. He 

then took up what Gray in dismay called “speculative 

physics”, publishing a thin book, The Mechanism of 

the Universe (1874). Perhaps disappointed with its 

reception, Fendler spent the rest of his days on the 

island of Trinidad, where he died in 1883. 

The Scandinavians 

“Our Genus is Homo and our species is sapiens, 

and Linnaeus gave us our name. Thus we write 

our name Homo sapiens L.” 

Anonymous 

Carl von Linné (1707-1778) is called, with justice, 

“the father of taxonomy”. In his famous Species 

Plantarum of 1753, he set the foundations for modern 

botanical nomenclature. Linné was not only the greatest 

botanist of his century, but also founded a school of 

scientists whose names had enormous relevance in the 

second half of the XVIII and all of the XIX century. 

Among his disciples and followers we find Pehr 

Kalm (1716–1779), who traveled during three years 

studying the plants of the North American colonies; 

the unfortunate Pehr Löfling (1729–1756), who 

participated in the Spanish expedition to the Orinoco 

and Daniel Solander (1733–1782), who was Cook’s 

naturalist during his first voyage around the world 

and introduced to Europe the first collections of plants 

from Australia and the South Pacific, and was also in 

Surinam (Steele, 1964: 13). 

In tropical America one must mention the Dane 

Julius von Roth (1737-1793), who was in Jamaica, 

Puerto Rico and the Lesser Antilles between 1757 

and 1791 and above all the great Swede Olof Swartz 

(1760-1818) who explored Jamaica, Cuba and Haiti 

from 1784 to 1786, later publishing his Flora Indiae 

Occidentalis (1797-1806), where he described many 

new species of orchids. And, although no orchids are 

known among his collections, it is important to name 

here Johann Emmanuel Billberg (1798-1845), a young 

Swedish physician who visited Portobello in Panama 

in 1826 and made there an important collection of 

plants. Nearly 30 years later, after Billberg’s death, 

Beurling published his Primitiae florae portobellensis, 

the first formal list of Panama plants, based upon this 

collection” (Standley, 1928: 42). 

Two descendants of Linné’s great school, both 

Danes, were protagonists in the history of our orchids 

during the first half of the XIX century: 

Michael Frederik Liebmann (1813-1856) (Fig. 

33C), studied in Copenhagen under the great Danish 

botanist Frederik Schouw and departed in 1840 to 

Mexico, thanks to a grant from the King of Denmark, 

to form botanical and zoological collections. In the 

company of a gardener, he soon established himself 

in the region of Veracruz and was one more of the 

numerous guests of Carl Sartorius in his estate 

El Mirador. He seems to have collected also in 

Guatemala 23 . The orchids collected by Liebmann 

were later studied by Kraenzlin (1920) and Louis 

O. Williams (1938-39). He collected in the area 

until 1843, when he returned to Denmark, with 

a herbarium of 40,000 plants and considerable 

zoological collections. In 1845 he was appointed 

professor of botany at the University of Copenhagen 

23 Ames and Correll, 1985: 475, mention a collection of Epidanthus paranthicus (Rchb. f.) L.O. Wms. by Liebmann in Guatemala. 


87

88 

and in 1849 director of the botanical Gardens. Alone 

and in conjunction with other botanists he published 

many new species, but his death at a relatively young 

age meant that many of the natural orders were left 

untouched. One of his most important works, Chênes 

de l’Amerique Tropical (= Oaks of tropical America) 

was unfinished and was later completed by Oersted. 

Some of the specimens collected by Liebmann 

became the types for new species: Dichaea liebmanni 

Rchb. f. (Liebmann s.n., El Mirador), Jacquiniella 

leucomelana (Rchb. f.) Schltr. (Liebmann s.n., 

Mexico), Odontoglossum beloglossum Rchb. f. 

(Liebmann, W-Rchb. 43391, Mexico), and Ponthieva 

campestris (Liebm.) Garay (Liebmann 313, Veracruz). 

According to Hemsley, for almost all we know of 

the botany of Costa Rica we are indebted to Anders 

Sandoe Oersted (1816-1872) (Fig. 34A), who explored 

this country and Nicaragua between 1846 and 1848 

(Hemsley, 1887: 130). He was born at Rudkjobing on 

June 21, 1816 in a family which boasted important 

names in sciences and politics (Lind, 1913: 17). 

“... After several years of teaching and investigation 

in Denmark, he started in 1845 a scientific expedition 

to the Dutch islands in the Caribbean and Jamaica 

(Poulsen, 1848: 876-877). From there he went to 

Nicaragua at the end of 1846, where he arrived first 

at Bluefields and went then to San Juan del Norte. 

It seems that he entered the country [Costa Rica] 

through Puntarenas” (León, 2002: 133). He collected 

intensively in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, especially 

in the great volcanic chain that includes the Irazú, 

Barba and el Viejo volcanoes, forming a collection 

of more than 900 species of superior plants, among 

them some 80 Orchidaceae that were later described 

by Reichenbach in his Orchideae Oerstedianae, that 

form part of his great work on the orchids of Central 

America of 1866. 

He established his headquarters in San Antonio de 

Belén, to the west of the capital (Calvert & Calvert, 

1917: 19-20). In February of 1848 he went to the region 

of Guanacaste. “The purpose of this trip, promoted 

by the government of Costa Rica, was to study the 

possibility of opening a canal that would communicate 

the bay of Salinas with the lake of Nicaragua. Oersted 

presented a plan for the construction of the canal 

(Oersted, 1851), but no further attention was paid to 

the project”. 

LANKESTERIANA 


Oersted describes the two existing roads of that time 

to the Atlantic Ocean: the almost abandoned road from 

Cartago to Matina and Moín, where he notes that in 

the plains of Turrialba the vanillas dominate among the 

forest vegetation and the road of Sarapiquí, by which 

he returns to San Juan del Norte and from there to 

Europe (Oersted, 1863: 3-5) (Fig. 35A). 

He returned to Denmark in 1848 and was later 

appointed professor of botany, succeeding Liebmann 

in this position (Brown, 1872-1873: 4). 

Oersted was a great naturalist and a first class 

observer, who left vivid descriptions of the landscape of 

the different regions of his travels. En 1863 he published 

his work on Central America: L’Amerique Centrale, 

recherches sur sa flore et sa geographie physique 

(=Central America, studies about its flora and physical 

geography). “A posthumous work, ‘Praecursores 

Florae Centroamericana’ published in Copenhagen 

in 1873, contains fragments of articles by Oersted and 

contributions of other authors about his collections of 

mosses, Araceae and others” (León, 2002: 136). 

Among the many species discovered by Oersted, 

all described by Reichenbach, are the following: 

Beloglottis costaricensis (Rchb. f.) Schltr. (Oersted 

s.n., Costa Rica), Bulbophyllum aristatum Rchb. 

f. (Oersted s.n., Central America), Bolbophyllaria 

oerstedii Rchb. f. (Oersted 6746, Nicaragua) (Fig. 

34B), Catasetum oerstedii (= maculatum) Rchb.f. 

(Oersted s.n., Nicaragua), Dichaea oerstedii 

(= glauca) Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., Nicaragua), 

Epidendrum oerstedii Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., Costa 

Rica), Habenaria oerstedii Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., 

Nicaragua), Lockhartia oerstedii Rchb. f. (Oersted 

W-Rchb. 44337, Costa Rica), Oncidium oerstedii 

Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., Nicaragua), Pleurothallis 

segoviensis Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., Nicaragua), 

Polystachya masayensis Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., 

Nicaragua), and Odontoglossum (= ticoglossum) 

oerstedii Rchb. f. (Oersted s.n., Costa Rica). 

Reichenbach honored him in his description of the 

genus Oerstedella. 

So ends the history of orchids in Central America in 

the first half of the XIX century. Some 25 collectors, 

all of them Europeans (with the exception of the 

Mexicans Lexarza and La Llave), discovered in the 

three decades after the independence more than 300 

species of Orchidaceae new to science.


‘manIfesT desTIny’ 

“We may confidently assume that our country is 

destined to be the great nation of futurity” 

John L. O’Sullivan, about 

‘Manifest Destiny’, 1839 

No nation ever existed without some sense of 

national destiny or purpose. Manifest Destiny -- a 

phrase used by leaders and politicians in the 1840s 

to explain continental expansion by the United States 

-- revitalized a sense of “mission” or national destiny 

for many Americans. As Sullivan wrote: “This country 

will conquest or annex all lands. It is its Manifest 

Destiny” (Quesada, 2007). Expansionists were also 

motivated by more immediate, practical considerations. 

Southerners eager to enlarge the slave empire were 

among the most ardent champions of the crusade for 

more territory. Washington policy-makers, anxious 

to compete with Great Britain for the Asia trade, had 

long been convinced of the strategic and commercial 

advantages of San Francisco and other ports on the 

Pacific coastline of Mexican-owned California. 

The Mexican-American war and the decline of 

British hegemony 

“Remember The Alamo!” 26 

Battle of San Jacinto, April 21, 1836 

As soon as Houston’s long awaited order to advance 

was given, the Texans did not hesitate. The shouts of 

“Remember the Alamo” rang along the entire line. 

Within a short time, 700 Mexicans were slain, with 

another 730 taken as prisoners. The battle for Texas was 

won. The independence of Texas from Mexico led to 

annexation and to the Mexican-American war of 1846- 

1848, resulting in the acquisition by the United States 

of the States of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, 

California, Utah, and parts of Colorado, Wyoming, 

Kansas and Oklahoma. Almost one third of the present 

area of the United States, nearly a million square miles 

of territory, changed sovereignty. 

Several botanists were in the expedition that 

was later sent out to survey the Mexican-American 

border, in order to define the limits between both 

countries. Among them was Charles Wright, who 

would afterwards explore Nicaragua and the Antilles. 

However, the true importance of the Mexican- 

American war consisted in the fact that it represented 

the beginning of the end of British hegemony in our 

region. “By mid-century, Americans were competing 

with the British for influence in eastern Nicaragua. 

After the 1849 gold rush in California, interest in 

building a transoceanic canal across Nicaragua was 

intense. The British were seen as adversaries, and a 

series of confrontations took place along the coast, 

including an incident in which an American warship 

bombarded and destroyed Greytown (Bell, 1989: vi).” 

Thus the United States took the first steps of its 

‘manifest destiny’ as a world empire that some fifty 

years later would become the sole arbiter of the fate 

of the Central American countries. During the second 

half of the XIX century, the expansionist ambition of 

the United States would focus increasingly on Central 

America and the Caribbean. With the turn of the 

century, the Spanish-American war, the independence 

of Panama from Colombia (enforced by the United 

States) and the occupation of Nicaragua by the Marine 

Infantry in 1912 converted the Caribbean in a true 

Mare Nostrum of the American navy (Pérez Brignoli, 

2000: 22). 

Political, economical and social life of Central 

America, although still strongly influenced by the 

ideas of European liberalism, gravitated each day 

more strongly into the United States orbit. The most 

important political decisions in the life of the Banana 

republics during the second half of the XIX century 

were made in Washington and in the headquarters of 

the multinational companies in New York and Chicago. 

The history of orchids in Central America was not 

immune to these developments. The European 

monopoly of botanical exploration in the region 

started to fade. The Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew had 

become, during the first half of the XIX century, the 

indisputable center of world orchidology. Although 

Kew has retained, until the present days, a preeminent 

role, its attention began to focus more and more 

on the colonies of the growing British Empire in 

Africa and Asia, and on South America, where North 

American influence was not yet strong. The list of the 

collectors in Panama between 1700 and 1923 and their 

nationalities published by Dwyer leaves no doubt about 

24 The Alamo fell to the Mexican troops of General Santa Ana on March 6, 1836. All survivors were put to the sword. 


89

90 

the increasing American hegemony (D’Arcy & Correa, 

1985: 180 (Fig. 34C)). A gentlemen’s agreement seems 

to have been established, where Monroe’s expression 

‘America for the Americans’ had its counterpart in a 

thought that was never set in writing: ‘the British 

Empire for the British’. 

Two institutions were founded in the United States 

that in the following decades would be leaders in the 

exploration of the Central American territories and 

would have an enormous influence on the scientific 

life of the region. Ironically, both were created by 

British citizens. In 1846 an act of Congress was 

approved to carry out the terms of the will of James 

Smithson (1756-1829), a prominent English scientist 

who, strangely enough, had never visited America. 

Smithson bequeathed his entire estate to the United 

States of America “to found at Washington, under the 

name of the Smithsonian Institution, an establishment 

for the increase and diffusion of knowledge...” 

Henry Shaw (1800-1889) (Fig. 34D), a native of 

Sheffield, England, moved to Saint Louis, Missouri, in 

1819. He had such success in his business that he was 

able to retire at the age of 40. On a trip back to England, 

he was inspired by the grounds of Chatsworth, the 

most magnificent private residence in Europe. When 

he returned to the U.S., he decided to begin his own 

botanical garden. Shaw opened his garden to the 

public in 1859. It grew in the European tradition of 

horticultural display combined with education and 

the search for new knowledge. This institution, now 

known as the Missouri Botanical Garden, is acclaimed 

today as being a leader in botanical investigation, with 

projects in the five continents. 

To the aforementioned institutions we must add the 

important accomplishments in Central America of the 

New York Botanical Garden, created in 1891 by the 

botanist Nathaniel Lord Britton, the foundation in 1893 

of the ‘Columbian Museum of Chicago’, known today 

as Field Museum of Natural History, fundamental to 

the history of the orchids of Central America in the XX 

Century, and the creation in 1894 of the United States 

National Herbarium. 

While Mexico struggled in never ending internal 

fights for power after the disaster of the Mexican- 

LANKESTERIANA 


American war 25 , in which Mexico had lost two fifths of 

its territory, botanical exploration continued. In 1850 

the Royal Horticultural Society sent the Dalmatian 

Mateo Botteri (1808-1877) to collect in Mexico. 

After the financial resources of the Society failed, 

Botteri stayed collecting on his own and selling his 

specimens in London. “His collections of plants were 

very fine and extensive, and there is a full set in the 

Kew Herbarium, chiefly from the neighborhood of 

Orizaba...” (Hemsley, 1887: 133). Botteri settled in 

Mexico and died in the vicinity of Veracruz. According 

to Schlechter (1918: 323), there were many orchids 

among his specimens, although most of them were 

described from collections by others.One of them was 

Cranichis cochleata, common in Veracruz, Chiapas 

and Guatemala, and described years later by Dressler 

as a new species from a collection by M.C. Carlson. 

Frederick Mueller ( - ca. 1855), a native of Alsace, 

came to Mexico in 1853, to collect for the firm of 

Schlumberger in Mulhouse. Hemsley mentions 

several collections by Mueller, all from the region 

of Veracruz, based on a complete set that is at Kew. 

Worthy to mention are Cattleya citrina Lindl. (Müller 

s.n.), Hartwegia purpurea Lindl. (Müller 1414), 

Odontoglossum cordatum Lindl. (Müller 488), 

Spiranthes orchioides Hemsl. (Müller 810), Stanhopea 

bucephalus Lindl. (Müller 503) and Stanhopea tigrina 

Batem. ex Lindl. (Müller 976), as well as the type of 

Lepanthes orizabensis R. E. Schult. & G. W. Dillon 

(Müller s.n., Orizaba, Veracruz). He died in strange 

circumstances. “It is supposed that he was murdered 

and concealed, as he disappeared and was never heard 

of afterwards” (Hemsley, 1887: 134). 

The German dentist Wilhelm Schaffner (1830- 

1882), whom we remember in Cranichis schaffneri 

Rchb. f., settled in Mexico around 1856. Although his 

collections are of great importance, they were made 

outside of the limits of 

Another German, Karl Theodor Mohr (1824-1901), 

better known for his Plant Life of Alabama (1901) 

emigrated from his native country to the United States 

in 1848 and traveled to Panama and Mexico (1857) 

before he established himself as a druggist in Mobile, 

Alabama, where he remained for the rest of his life 

25 General Santa Ana, who had commanded the Mexican troops during the war, had to go into exile. He returned to power in 1853 

until in 1855 he was overthrown by Benito Juárez, who governed until 1872 and would have to face, during his period, the French 

invasion.


A B 

C 

Figure 34. A — Anders Sandoe Oersted (1816-1872). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — Bulbophyllum oerstedii (A. Rich. ) 

Griseb. Illustration by Pilar Casasa. C — Collectors in Panama 1700-1923, and their nationalities. In D’Arcy & Correa, 

1985: 180. D — Henry Shaw (1800-1889). Sketch in a postcard from MLB’s postcard series, courtesy of the Hunt Institute 


D 


91

92 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 35. A — Oersted: altitude profile of the road to Sarapiquí. Plate 1, Oersted, 1863. B — Alligators in San Juan River. In 

Belt, 1874: 9. 



(Wunderlin et al., 2000: 64). Little is known of Mohr’s 

collections in Mesoamerica, except for one specimen 

of Epidendrum propinquum A. Rich. & Gal. (Mohr 

570, Veracruz). 

The California gold rush and the interoceanic canal 

“Boys, by God, I believe I have found a gold mine!” 

James Wilson Marshall, January 12, 1848 

The discovery of gold in California was the spark 

that started the most massive human migration in the 

history of America. Over 90,000 persons traveled to 

California in the two years that followed Marshall’s 

discovery, and over 300,000 in 1854. The gold fever 

in California led to the exploration of shorter routes 

between both oceans. The San Juan River in Nicaragua 

and the Isthmus of Panama became the passages for 

fast travel from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast. One 

must consider that the journey by land from the East 

Coast of the United States to California took five 

months: a truly painful prowess (Guier, 1971: 82). 

Thousands of adventurers (initially North Americans 

and later from all over the world) came to Central 

America, a forgotten region that suddenly became one 

of the areas of greatest traffic in passengers and in the 

focus point of world attention. 

“We arrived in Panama on January 19, 1849, after 

an absence of almost nine months. The stories of the 

recently discovered Californian mines… brought such 

a number of adventurous emigrants that the usual 

facilities of food and lodging collapsed completely” 

(Berthold Seemann, cited in Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 

27). The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty of 1850, although 

permitting England to retain her positions in Belize, 

the Mosquito Coast and the Bay Islands, accepted for 

the first time the U. S. pretensions to control the future 

interoceanic canal. “In this way Great Britain, although 

maintaining all her possessions in Central America and 

still retaining much power during the 1850’s, began 

ceding ground in favor of the United States” (Obregón- 

Quesada, 1993: 115). As the Nicaraguan historian 

José Dolores Gámez wrote ingenuously several years 

later, “the American government, having noticed the 

conduct of the British towards us, came generously to 

our help” (Gámez, 1888). 

Effective control of the area by the United States 

had begun in 1847, with the foundation of the ‘Panama 

Railroad Company’, with the purpose of building a 

railroad between Colón and Panama City. Two years 

later, in 1849, the North American tycoon Cornelius 

Vanderbilt founded the ‘American Atlantic Pacific 

Ship Canal Company’, with the intention of building 

an interoceanic canal in Nicaragua. The San Juan 

River and the Lake of Nicaragua were initially used 

for this passage. Vanderbilt’s first steamers navigated 

the San Juan River in 1851, while the first train 

crossed the isthmus of Panama on January 28, 1855. 

The competition between both routes was strong, but 

as soon as the railroad was built, Panama began to be 

preferred, being much more comfortable and secure 

than the tortuous passage of the San Juan River, full 

of obstacles and immersed, since 1855, in the war 

against Walker (Fig. 35B). Wells (1854) mentions a 

third route, which consisted in an interoceanic railroad 

in Honduras, from the Atlantic coast to the Gulf of 

Fonseca. However, this plan never became reality, 

due to geographic and financial difficulties (Wells, 

1982: 117). The Panama route declined again after the 

completion of the construction of the railroad between 

San Francisco and the Eastern States in 1869 (Reclus, 

1881: 55-56). 

Among the foreign adventurers and the employees 

of the North American companies we find numerous 

names that are relevant to the history of orchids in 

Central America. Botanical exploration of the region 

entered a new era, facilitated by improved routes 

of communication and by the growing commercial 

relations between the Central American republics, 

Europe and the United States. Referring to Costa Rica, 

Evans wrote: “Two events outside [of C. R.]… reversed 

the scientific community’s disinterest… international 

demand for coffee and speculation of a trans-isthmus 

canal in lower Central America” (Evans, 1999: 16). 

Hans Hermann Behr (1818-1904) (Fig. 36A), 

German botanist and entomologist, poet and novelist, 

was born at Colthen in East Germany. After graduating 

in medicine at Wurzburg, he was encouraged by 

his mentors, Karl Ritter and the famous German 

explorer, Alexander von Humboldt, to visit Australia 

(Kraehenbuehl, 2002: 1). Behr visited Australia in 1844 

and settled in 1862 in California, where he was named 

curator of entomology of the California Academy of 

Science. He was responsible, through his contacts in 

Australia, where he had worked with the prestigious 


93

94 

botanist Baron von Mueller, for the introduction 

of Eucalyptus into California. From his Australian 

collections, Schlechtendahl (1847) described as new 

species of Orchidaceae Caladenia behrii y Diuris 

behrii. In 1888, Behr published his Flora of the Vicinity 

of San Francisco. Behr had visited Central America 

around 1849 and collected several specimens of 

orchids in the region of Chagres, Panama, among them 

the type specimen of Scaphyglottis behrii Rchb. f. ex 

Hemsl. (Behr s.n., Chagres, Panama). “As a physician 

he was second to none in medical knowledge and 

kept well posted on the progress in medical science. 

It cannot be said that he loved his profession. Still less 

did he understand the art, so highly developed among 

modern physicians, of making it pay” (Essig, 1965: 

555). 

The English sailor John Melmoth Dow (1827-1892) 

(Fig. 36B) was already introduced in the previous 

chapter. Until 1850 he had transported passengers 

across the isthmus by the Nicaragua route. As captain of 

the steamers Columbus and Golden Age, he inaugurated 

the Central American service of the ‘Panama Railroad 

Company Steamship Line’, traveling from Panama 

to San Francisco, along the western coast of Central 

American. He developed a strong friendship with 

Skinner and Salvin and was responsible for the safe 

transportation of many live orchid plants from Central 

America to England. Of him writes Bovallius: “... since 

long time known for his generosity and indefatigable 

good will towards the researchers of the nature of 

these regions” (Bovallius, 1974: 99). Bateman honored 

Dow with the dedication of his Cattleya dowiana and 

Endrés and Reichenbach did the same with Lycaste 

dowiana. Dow was also interested in marine fauna 

and sent important collections to the Smithsonian 

Institution in Washington. In his navigation diary, on 

October 16, 1854, he wrote: “The health of the Isthmus 

is good, and the railroad is progressing with great 

rapidity...”. However, the health cannot been as good 

as Dow thought, if we believe a popular saying cited 

by Bovallius in his book, in that “under each crosstie of 

the rails lies the body of a Chinese or a white man…” 

(Bovallius, 1974: 34). 

Edouard Placide Duchassaing de Fontbressin 

(1819-1873), a French citizen, was born in the island 

of Guadeloupe and took a medical degree in Paris. He 

LANKESTERIANA 

26 The stems of Selenipedium chica reach often a height of 5 meters. 


returned to practice medicine in that island, and at St. 

Thomas, he made natural history collections from 1844 

to 1848. Because of the revolution in the latter year he 

moved to Panama, where he collected between 1849 

and 1851. “During these years he had a sanitarium at 

Panama, and in his leisure time collected plants in the 

neighborhood of the city and on Taboga Island” (Standley, 

1928: 44-45). Although he did not collect many orchids, 

he is famous for having discovered the largest terrestrial 

orchid in Central America: Selenipedium chica Rchb. 

f. (Duchassaing s.n., Panama) 26 (Fig. 36C). The plants 

collected by Duchassaing where twelve to fifteen feet 

high and had been bought by him from an Indian chief 

(Anonymous, 1923: 69). Duchassaing reported that the 

fruits of S. chica produced a fragrant substance similar to 

that of vanilla. For this reason they were called in Panama 

‘vainilla de árbol’ (= ‘tree vanilla’). The specimens 

collected by Duchassaing were sent to Walpers, from 

whom they were purchased by Grisebach. They were 

the base for Grisebach’s Novitiae flora panamensis 

(Bonplandia 6: 2-12, 1858), where some new species are 

described. Of great importance were also Duchassaing’s 

contributions to the investigation of marine fauna, of 

which he made important collections in Panama. 

Moritz Wagner (1813-1887) (Fig. 36D) and Carl 

Ritter von Scherzer (1821-1903), the former German 

and the latter Austrian, traveled in 1852 through the 

United States, and embarked for Central America in 

the first months of 1853 (Wolkenhauer, 188: 92). 

Wagner, the more important of the two for our story, 

was an experienced traveler, influenced by the ideas 

of Humboldt and Darwin. He received his education 

at the University of Augsburg, worked later as a clerk 

in a trading company in Marseille and went in 1834 to 

Paris, Erlangen and Munich to study natural sciences. 

He visited Algeria in 1836-38, studied geology in 

Goettingen from 1838 to 1842 and explored the 

Caucasus and Armenia in 1842-46. Italy followed in 

1846-49 and Asia Minor, Persia and the Kurdistan in 

1850-51. Wagner & Scherzer arrived at San Juan del 

Norte in April of that year and traveled to Costa Rica 

by way of the rivers San Juan and Sarapiquí. 

The first notice of this route dates back to 1620, 

when Diego de Mercado, at the request of the Spanish 

authorities, who were interested in finding a way 

between the Atlantic and the Pacific because of the


insalubrity of Panama, submitted a report to the 

government in Guatemala in which he stated that he had 

found the desired communication along two different 

routes. “The first one navigating upstream along the 

‘Desaguadero’ [= the Drainage = the San Juan River] 

to the mouth of the Sarapiquí, then upstream for more 

than twenty leagues and from that point to the Royal 

Embarkment (the mouth of the Tempisque River on the 

Gulf of Nicoya). The road was of ‘hard earth and not 

marshy’ and only 15 leagues long...”. The other route 

consisted in what was later known as the Nicaragua 

Canal, sailing the San Juan River upstream to the Lake 

of Nicaragua and building from there a canal to the 

Pacific Coast (Secretaría de Gobierno, 1924: 330-331). 

This road of Sarapiquí was the only communication 

between the central valley of Costa Rica and the 

Atlantic port of Greytown, in Nicaragua, from where 

the ships sailed to the United States and Europe, and 

was of great importance in the history of the botanical 

exploration of the country, until it was replaced by 

the route Puntarenas-Balboa-Colón, after the railroad 

across the isthmus of Panama was built (inaugurated 

in 1855). Steamships sailed from Greytown to 

Southampton (Royal West Indian Mail Steamers) and to 

New York (Atlantic and Pacific Ship Canal Company) 

twice a month. The journey to New York took 7 days, 

to Southampton 32 days. (Molina, 1851: 41). The old 

road to Sarapiquí was replaced in 1880 by the ‘road 

of Carrillo’ 27 , which communicated San José with the 

Sucio River and joined there the new railroad to Port 

Limón. . Finally, the railroad between San José and 

Port Limón was completed in 1890. From the builder 

of both routes, Minor C. Keith (1848-1922), who 

traveled frequently to the Costa Rican Atlantic region, 

we have this description of the tropical rain forest: 

“Their trunks were covered by climbing plants and 

parasites of reddish colors and various shades of green, 

by lichens, fungi, bromeliads, and the most beautiful 

orchids” (Salazar Navarrete, 2004: 126). 

After being in Costa Rica, Wagner and Scherzer 

collected in Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and 

Guatemala, “although very few species were described 

based on specimens collected by Wagner and Scherzer. 

The reason for this could be the loss of the botanical 

collections during the earthquake of El Salvador in 1854, 

when Wagner almost lost his life” (León, 2002: 139). 

Wagner returned to Europe and shortly thereafter, in 1857, 

sponsored by King Maximilian II of Bavaria, returned 

to Panama and Ecuador. He dedicated considerable time 

to the study of the possibility of connecting the two 

oceans, a subject on which he published several articles. 

Moritz Wagner and Carl Scherzer wrote in 1856 The 

Republic of Costa Rica in Central America, published 

in German. Their descriptions of the flora, fauna and 

culture are still very interesting. “No other foreign 

author has described with more sympathy the tiny state 

called by them the most gentle and peaceful among the 

fraternity of the republics of Spanish America, a country 

blessed by Heaven, where nature displays in the slopes 

of the mountains the most wonderful variety of climates 

and products” (Pittier, 1908: 19). 

Descriptions of orchids are frequently found in the 

pages of this book: “Parasitic plants […] climbers, 

vines, pendent vegetables and orchids, which group 

themselves often in the branches in the forms of 

candelabrums, of bouquets or also of stars…” “Higher 

up [on the trunks] begin the tillandsias, ipomeas, 

loranthaceae, agaves, cacti, dendrobiums [sic] […]” 

“The begonias and orchids on the trees […] were here 

of a particular magnificence”. “[…] The ostentatious 

orchids, which -for their rare forms- resemble butterflies 

or humming-birds with extended wings, grow on many 

live or dead trunks” (Wagner & Scherzer, 1856: 122, 

136, 137, 168). Wagner discovered the type of Triphora 

wagneri Schltr. (M. Wagner 1778, Panama) and several 

species were dedicated to him, such as Bulbophyllum 

wagneri Schltr. and Stelis wagneri (Schltr.) Pridgeon & 

M. W. Chase. 

Scherzer would write later his Travels in the free 

states of Central America: Nicaragua, Honduras and 

San Salvador and gained worldwide fame through his 

discovery in 1854 in Guatemala of the manuscript of 

the Popol Vuh by Friar Francisco Ximénez, which he 

published for the first time in Vienna, in 1861 28 . In 1863 

Wagner wrote The province of Chiriquí in Central 

America. No orchid collections by Scherzer are known, 

27 So named in remembrance of Braulio Carrillo (1800-1845), President of Costa Rica between 1835 and 1837 and again between 

1838 and 1842, who first thought of a road to the Atlantic along this route. 

28 Although Scherzer’s publication came first, it was Charles Etienne Brasseur de Bourbourg who gave the manuscript the name of 

Popol Vuh, Le Livre Sacré et les mythes de l’antiquité américaine, and who made it known worldwide. 


95

96 

but his discovery of Anthurium scherzerianum Schott 

(Scherzer s.n., Guatemala) was of high importance for 

European horticulture, of great value as breeding stock 

for numerous ornamental hybrids (León, 2002: 139). 

If you travel to the Mexican village of Santecomapán 

(Veracruz), you will find a street called ‘Calle Don 

Benito’ (=‘Street of Mr. Benito’). Behind this name we 

find one of the less scrupulous orchid hunters in history, 

who during 20 years ransacked the forests of Mexico, 

Central and South America with a passionate mixture 

of ambition and madness: Benedict Roezl (1824-1885) 

(Fig. 37A). Born in Horomerice (Bohemia), he worked 

as a gardener in various European countries. He came 

to Belgium and became head gardener for the Belgian 

Government’s School of Agriculture, after working 

for five years for Louis van Houtte, proprietor of the 

Royal Nurseries in Ghent, where he was in charge of 

the orchid section Yearsley, 1996: 357). “[...] Roezl’s 

first attempt in the horticultural business had failed. 

He then turned his hand to the demanding task of 

collecting, working for himself and for the Londonbased 

Sander” (Ceulemans et al., 2006: 149). He 

emigrated to Mexico in 1854, founding a gardening 

establishment in the capital of the country, associated 

with the German Besserer (Regel, 1885: 330). In 1861 

he established a nursery with European fruit trees in 

Santecomapán, with a French partner, a Monsieur 

Chabé (Block, 1985: 1204). “Nature has emptied here 

its Cornucopia; all illusions of those Europeans who 

come to tropical countries, often destroyed by reality - 

here they become true” (Otto, 1862: 59). 

“When fighting sharpened between the Mexicans 

headed by President Benito Juarez and the forces of 

Emperor Maximilian of Hapsburg, Roezl joined the 

ranks of Juarez and organized the defense of the city 

and port [of Santecomapán]. Because it was anticipated 

that the French allies of Maximilian would land their 

soldiers on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico… Juarez 

sent 200 men from his army to help Roezl. He proved 

to be a good commander. To frighten the superior 

forces of the French and deter them from landing, he 

constructed along the mall an odd defense. On carriage 

wheels he mounted long poles. From a distance, they 

looked like huge cannons. The ruse worked. The 

French … observed this ‘heavily armed’ port and gave 

up the idea of landing there” (Block, 1985: 1205). 

An untiring traveler, Roezl went from Mexico to 

LANKESTERIANA 


Cuba and then to California. In 1868 in Cuba, during 

the demonstration of an agricultural machine that 

he had invented for the production of ramie threads, 

he had lost his left hand that was replaced by an iron 

hook. This gave him great notoriety for the rest of his 

life. The Cubans gave him afterwards the nickname 

‘El Moche’ (= ‘the cripple’). “He established ramie 

plantations in Cuba and built factories for the production 

of threads and fabric from the fibre [...] Roezl was 

named an honorary member of the Havana Academy of 

Science. His portrait was hung in the auditorium of the 

academy, and his original ramie processing machinery 

was exhibited at the Havana Museum” (Block, 1985: 

1206). Boyle amuses us with the story of the collection 

by Roezl of Cattleya skinneri alba. In 1870, Roezl was 

in the neighborhood of Tetonicapan, Guatemala, and 

was ambushed by bandits who held him for ransom in 

a small village. Finally he was set free, and the priest 

of the village invited him to his house. “It stood beside 

the church, hardly less primitive. Roezl glanced at the 

roof of this structure in passing. It has been mentioned 

that the Indians have a pleasant custom of removing 

any orchid they find, notable for size and beauty, to 

set on the church roof or on trees around it. [...] It was 

with curiosity rather than hope, therefore, that Roezl 

scrutinised the airy garden. [...] In one big clump he saw 

something white — looked more closely — paused. 

The plant was Cattleya skinneri certainly. How should 

a white flower be there? All other collectors, perhaps, 

at that time, would have passed on, taking it for granted 

that some weed had rooted amid the clump. But for 

many years Roezl had been preaching that all Cattleyas 

of red or violent tint, so to class them roughly, must 

make albino ‘sports’. [...] A wondrous instinct guided 

him. [...] The end is foreseen. Roezl carried on his White 

Cattleya and sold it to Mr. George Hardy of Manchester 

for 280 guineas” (Boyle, 1901: 59-66). 

Roezl did not return to Santecomapán and donated 

his gardens there to his nephews Frank and Eduard 

Klaboch. He went afterwards to Panama, Colombia 

and Venezuela. From Boyle (1983: 139) we have the 

following anecdote: “The railway fare [from Panama] 

to Colón was sixty dollars at that time, and [Roezl] 

grudged the money. Setting his wits to work, Roezl 

discovered that the company issued tickets from station 

to station at a very low price for the convenience of 

its employees. Taking advantage of that system, he


crossed the isthmus for five dollars...!”. He passed 

again through Panama and Costa Rica and went on 

San Francisco. After being once more in Colombia he 

returned to Europe. In 1872 he came back to America. 

He arrived in Colorado and traveled again to Mexico. 

He continued to Panama and Venezuela. From there 

to Cuba and once again to Veracruz. Again to Panama 

and on to Lima, Bolivia and Ecuador. One last time to 

Colombia, where he collected during six months for 

the Linden nurseries in Gant and Brussels, and finally 

back to Europe. His return was however delayed 

by eight months at the request of the new Mexican 

president, Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada. “The president 

wanted to create in Mexico City the most beautiful 

capital in the world. Tejada envisioned parks, wide 

avenues bordered by Eucalyptus trees, and broad 

plazas with impressive greenery. ‘Don Benito’ Roezl 

was appointed as architect for the project, and his 

success was overwhelming” (Block, 1985: 1208). 

He was possibly one of the collectors who caused 

more destruction, who plundered large regions and 

sent to Europe tons of orchids. It is believed that Roezl 

sent approximately one million plants to Europe, 

about two thirds of them orchids. As Roezl himself 

later admitted, he collected 3,500 orchids in the Sierra 

Madre, 8 tons in Panama and Venezuela, and 27,000 

plants in Colombia. On February 10, 1873, Roezl 

wrote from Caracas: “... the first thing I did was to 

ask for the ‘Flor de Mayo’ (= ‘flower of May’)..., as 

they call here Cattleya mossiae... The answers were 

negative. I was told that it was extinguished in the 

neighborhood of La Guaira, as a result of the massive 

exports to Europe...” (Regel, 1874: 73-74). In 1884 

he visited as an expert the International Gardening 

Exhibition in Saint Petersburg and was awarded the 

Imperial Russian Order of Stanislaus, for his lifelong 

achievements. Finally, he returned to Smichow, 

near Prague, where he died in 1885 and was buried 

in Prague. Many important people attended his 

funeral and even the Kaiser was there. The principal 

horticultural periodicals of Europe applauded the idea 

of an international committee to erect a monument to 

this indefatigable explorer. The monument erected in 

Prague was constructed by Professor Myslbak, a wellknown 

sculptor in that city (Fig. 37B). Among those 

who contributed to the monument were the largest 

European orchid nurseries of that time: Veitch, Sanders 

and Linden, who had benefited mostly from his 

collections (Anonymous, 1890; 3). Strangely enough, 

although Roezl had lost his left hand, the statue shows 

him with both hands! 

Numerous species were described based on his 

collections, most of them by Reichenbach who 

published in 1877 his Orchideae Roezlianae nova seu 

criticae. Among the species that he discovered and 

those dedicated to him, we find: Bletia roezlii Rchb.f. 

, Cattleya roezlii Rchb.f., Dracula benedictii (Rchb.f.) 

Luer, Dracula roezlii (Rchb.f.) Luer, Lepanthes 

roezliana Luer & R. Escobar, Masdevallia benedictii 

Rchb.f., Maxillaria roezlii Rchb. f. ex Linden, 

Miltoniopsis roezlii (Rchb.f.) God. Leb. (Fig. 37C), 

Paphiopedilum roezlii (Rchb.f.) Pfitzer, Pescatoria 

roezlii Rchb.f., Phragmipedium roezlii (Rchb.f.) L.A. 

Garay, Pleurothallis roezlii Rchb.f.., Sobralia roezlii 

Rchb.f., Telipogon benedictii Rchb.f., Telipogon roezlii 

Rchb.f., and Zygopetalum roezlii Rchb.f. 

If anybody wanted to blame orchidology for being 

one of the causes of the destruction of nature, he 

would have in collectors like Roezl his best argument. 

We must however take into account that what today 

is considered a crime, was seen as a prowess during 

the XIX century. Boyle gives a terrifying account of 

the methods by which orchids were collected during 

those years: “[The collector] hires natives, twenty or 

fifty or a hundred, as circumstances advise, and sends 

them out to cut down trees, building meantime a 

wooden stage of sufficient length to bear the plunder 

expected. This is used for cleaning and drying the 

plants brought in. Afterwards, if he be prudent, he 

follows his lumbermen, to see that their indolence 

does not shirk the big trunks – which give extra trouble 

naturally, though they yield the best and largest return. 

It is a terribly wasteful process. If we estimate that 

a good tree has been felled for every three scraps of 

Odontoglossum which are now established in Europe 

that will be no exaggeration. And for many years past 

they have been arriving by the hundreds or thousands 

annually! But there is no alternative. An European 

cannot explore the green wilderness overhead; if 

he could, his accumulations would be so slow and 

costly as to raise the proceeds to an impossible figure. 

The natives will not climb, and they would tear the 

plants to bits. Timber has not value in those parts as 

yet, but the day approaches when Government must 


97

98 

interfere” (Boyle, 1983: 71-72). And similar words 

from Williams: “...the plants are heedlessly torn from 

their natural habitats, which are sometimes ruthlessly 

cleared of the beautiful flowers that cannot be replaced 

in the locality. We are sorry to hear of some of our 

collectors having so little respect for these treasures 

of nature’s production that they gather all they can, 

having no regard for the future, and not even leaving 

a few plants in the locality to increase and multiply 

by shedding their seed to germinate naturally over 

the mountains, rocks, and trees” (Williams, 1885: 

13). “[...] Very few of our present day collectors 

have retained that enthusiasm which allowed their 

predecessors to bear all hardships with joy, all their 

disappointments with serenity. Roezl was one of the 

last representatives of those glorious few who, in all 

respects, were characteristic of his time” (Anonymous, 

1885: 222). 

In 1853, one year before Roezl traveled the first 

time to America, James Veitch acquired the Chelsea 

nurseries from Messrs. Knight and Perry. Veitch’s 

second son, Harry James Veitch (1840-1924) made 

an apprenticeship at the famous French nursery firm, 

Vilmorin-Andrieux & Co., in Paris, and returned in 

1858 to help his father. “His industry and business 

sense rapidly became apparent, and the firm of Messrs. 

James Veitch & Sons soon enjoyed the reputation 

of being the foremost nursery business in the world. 

Harry’s influence in the business extended over almost 

the whole of his long and useful life. “The Veitches 

sent numerous plant collectors to the various parts of 

the world and rendered a great service to botany and 

horticulture by their introduction of new species and 

hybrids” (Reinikka, 1995: 247). Among the Veitch’s 

collectors who visited our region we find Gustav 

Wallis, A. R. Endrés, Gottlieb Zahn, George Downton, 

Carl Kramer and Richard Pearce. A detailed account 

of Veitch’s most important publication, the Hortus 

Veitchii, published in London in 1906, is given in the 

following chapter. 

John Dominy (1816-1892), the nurseries’ chief 

hybridizer, is credited with raising (1854) and flowering 

(1856) the world’s first orchid hybrid (Calanthe × 

Dominii), which lead to the breeding of hundreds 

of new orchids as well as the establishment of a new 

branch of horticulture. This was a highly controversial 

achievement in Victorian Britain as it was regarded as 

LANKESTERIANA 


tampering with nature. “Sir Harry Veitch retired from 

business in 1914. With his brothers John and Arthur 

both deceased, there was no successor in the family, 

and rather than losing the recognized reputation which 

the firm had acquired, he disposed of the nursery and 

sold the land for redevelopment” (Reinikka, 1995: 249). 

Many new orchid species and hybrids were dedicated 

to the Veitches, among them: Cypripedium veitchianum 

C. Lem., Dendrobium veitchianum Lindl., Macodes 

veitchii Boxall, Masdevallia veitchiana Rchb.f., and 

Phalaenopsis veitchiana Rchb.f. 

A word must be said at this point about Karl 

Eduard Ortgies (1829-1916). He was born in Bremen, 

Germany, and chose the career of a gardener. For 

many years, he worked in England in the gardens 

of Chatsworth, Syonhouse and Regents Park, and 

in Belgium, at the Van Houtte establishment. In the 

summer of 1855 he was called to become Chief 

Gardener at the Botanic Garden in Zurich, a call he 

obeyed, although he hated to leave the Establissement 

and the Van Houtte family that had become dear to 

him. The Zurich Botanic Garden, weakly donated, 

was supposed to raise the necessary funds by selling 

plants and seed, without neglecting its scientific duties, 

since it had to provide the University of the canton 

and the Zurich Polytechnikum (only recently founded 

at that time) with the necessary plants for lectures. 

Ortgies was not only able to achieve the necessary 

funds by trade, he also made remarkable profits 

that he was able to use for the renovation of the old 

conservatories, the building of new conservatories, 

water supply, a rock garden for Alpines, and so on. 

Considering his efforts, he received from the High 

Government on his 20 year jubilee the title of an 

Inspector and a considerable raise of his salary. He 

was especially interested in introducing new or rare 

plants, and knew to use his contacts to overseas 

countries. All the many deliveries by Roezl arrived 

at the market by intercession of Ortgies. From Zurich 

he ran a huge import nursery, held many auctions in 

London and had business contacts with the leading 

market gardens of England, Belgium and Germany. 

If Roezl was able to finish his life as a financially 

comfortable owner of a house in tranquility - a fate 

that unfortunately only very few plant hunters have - 

he owes it all to his diligent and true friend Ortgies. 

After Roezl, the deserving traveler Wallis applied for


the help of the proven agent Ortgies. Unfortunately 

Ortgies was able to help him for just a few years, 

since Wallis soon became ill and was ailing slowly 

until he closed his tired eyes forever at the hospital in 

Cuenca, Ecuador. After Wallis, there were Lehmann 

in Colombia and Pfau in Costa Rica; both sent their 

most valuable finds to the Zurich Botanic Garden. In 

between there were Fuchs in Guatemala, Garnier in 

Cuba, Gaibrois and Bruchmüller in Colombia, and 

Besserer in Mexico who also used the agency of 

Ortgies. Several new orchid species were named in 

his honor, among them: Aerides ortgiesiana Rchb.f., 

Anoectochilus ortgiesii Van Geert, Broughtonia 

orgiesiana (Rchb.f.) Dressler, Encyclia ortgiesii 

(Regel) Schltr., Masdevallia ortgiesiana Rolfe ex 

Rolfe, and Microchilus ortgiesii (Rchb. f.) Ormerod. 

The Germans Carl Hoffmann (1833-1859) (Fig. 

37D) and Alexander von Frantzius (1821-1877) 

came to Costa Rica in 1853, bearing letters of 

recommendation from Nees von Esenbeck, President 

of the German Academy and from Alexander v. 

Humboldt for President Juan Rafael Mora. They 

arrived at Greytown (San Juan del Norte) as 

passengers of the brig Antoinette, together with 

a group of German immigrants, and continued to 

Costa Rica along the road of Sarapiquí (Hilje Quirós, 

2007: 71). Frantzius was a reputed professor at the 

Physiological Institute in Breslau and Hoffmann 

was well-known for his practical and literary works 

during the cholera epidemics in Berlin during the 

years of 1848 and 1849 (Anonymous, 18153: 233). 

Soon they began to explore the country with the 

purpose of collecting specimens, mainly botanical. 

Hoffmann was later a physician in the Costa Rican 

army during the war against the troops of pro-slavery 

activist W. Walker, while Frantzius soon became a 

successful businessman and owner of a pharmacy. 

“Hoffmann and Frantzius spent their leisure times, 

the first dedicated to the collection of plants and 

the study of their natural distribution, the second to 

similar studies in mammals and birds” (León, 2002: 

139-140). 

Hoffmann climbed two of Costa Rica’s most 

important volcanoes: on May 5, 1855 the Irazú 

volcano near the city of Cartago, from where 

he described “a magnificent orchid of the genus 

‘epidendron’ with fire-red flowers that did not grow 

as a parasite on the trees but between the rocks on 

the hill…” (Hoffmann, 1856), and in August of 

the same year the Barva volcano, in the province 

of Heredia, where it caused him “extraordinary 

pleasure an extraordinarily rare orchid with its lip 

pointed upward in form of a helmet…” (Hoffmann, 

1858). In his narrative about the excursion to the 

Barva, Hoffmann counts the number of orchids that 

he found: “Of orchids, on the Barva 8 and of those 

4 terrestrials and 4 parasites, and on the Irazú only 

two parasites” (Hoffmann, 1858). 

The collections of Hoffmann, who sent them to the 

herbarium in Berlin, to the renowned botanist Johann 

F. Klotzsch, were described in 1866 by Reichenbach 

as orChiDeae hoFFMannianae (Reichenbach, 1866: 

102). One can find among them the types for three new 

species: Pelexia hoffmannii Rchb. f. (C. Hoffmann 

s.n., Barba in Costa Rica, 1855), Epidendrum 

(=Prosthechea) ionophlebium Rchb. f. (C. Hoffmann 

s.n., Costa Rica: Curidabad, 1857) and Ponera albida 

Rchb. f. (C. Hoffmann s.n., Llanos del Carmen, 1857). 

Among other activities, Hoffmann also published 

a bilingual newspaper, called Costa Rica Deutsche 

Zeitung (=Costa Rican German Newspaper). He 

published the paper, which circulated on each Sunday 

morning, together with two other Germans by the 

names of Kurtze and Streber (Hilje Quirós, 2007: 

81). He dreamed of writing a book with the title Flora 

and Fauna of Costa Rica, but he had to abort this 

idea because of the war and his illness. After the war 

against Walker, he retired to Puntarenas, where he died 

in 1859. His mortal remains were brought to San José 

in 1929, where they were buried with military honors 

(Alfaro, 1963: 51). 

Von Frantzius returned to Germany in 1865, but 

he left a profound impression in Costa Rica. His 

establishment, managed afterwards by José Cástulo 

Zeledón, became the favorite center of reunion for 

foreign and national naturalists. Some of them formed 

a group nicknamed “the drugstore gang” (L.D. Gómez, 

pers. comm.), which had extraordinary importance in 

the development of natural sciences in Costa Rica 

during the last years of the XIX and the first decades of 

the XX century. 

Together with Hoffmann and von Frantzius arrived 

the gardener Julian Carmiol (1807-1885), in the 

company of his brothers Franksius y Robert. He 


99

100 

would stay in Costa Rica for the rest of his life. His 

real name was Julian Carnigohl, a widower whose 

wife had died in Germany a few months earlier. He 

came to Costa Rica with four children, Ana, Berta, 

Franz, and Julio Carnigohl. When they arrived in 

Costa Rica they changed the name to Carmiol. “A 

naturalist by profession, he felt especially attracted 

to horticulture and ornamental plants, as well as 

to wildlife and ornithology...” (Carmiol Calvo, 

1973: 4). He travelled to the Smithsonian Institute 

and to England in 1867, and seems to have had an 

arrangement with Osbert Salvin (one of the editors of 

the Biologia Centrali-Americana), to collect birds and 

butterflies in Costa Rica (Letter from Salvin to Dow, 

November 1, 1867). In a letter to Professor Spencer 

F. Baird of the Smithsonian Institute (April 29, 1862) 

Captain John M. Dow refers to a collection of birds 

from Costa Rica: “The person I bought them from is 

a German gardener living in the outskirts of the city”. 

“Many of the Costa Rican plants that were adopted by 

European floriculturists owe their introduction to this 

humble German gardener” (Pitier, 1908: 21). Carmiol 

also collected herbarium material and birds, which 

he sent to American and European institutions. We 

know, from letters by Baird and Salvin, that in 1867 

he formed a large collection of objects of natural 

history which he personally took to Washington and 

London. Bovallius tells us about Carmiol in his old 

years, during the Swedish biologist’s visit to Costa 

Rica in 1882: “I paid several visits to an old German 

collector and merchant, Carmiol, and I never tired to 

admire his beautiful orchard, where he had collected 

a large amount of rare plants from all regions of Costa 

Rica…. For those who study this […] flora in the 

museums of Berlin and London, the name of Carmiol 

is well known, because many interesting species have 

been sent by him to their collections” (Bovallius, 

1974: 120). 

Among his collections of orchids we find Lycaste 

xytriophora Linden & Rchb.f. and Epidendrum 

campylostalix Rchb.f. Helmuth Polakowsky wrote 

about another orchid, Vanilla sp., in 1876: “I have 

never found vanilla in the market and only in the 

house of a German gardener [J. Carmiol] did I see 

by chance fresh pods, which his people had brought 

him from the forests behind Angostura” (Polakowski, 

1940). As Frantzius wrote: “Nobody has examined 

LANKESTERIANA 


so thoroughly the slopes of the Central American 

mountains” (González, 1921: 87). We remember 

Carmiol in Phaedranassa carmioli Baker, of the 

Amaryllidaceae and Crotalaria carmioli Polakows. of 

the Leguminosae. Besides being a gardener, Carmiol 

owned a restaurant in San José. 

The Moravian Evangelical Church of Herrenhut in 

Saxony, Germany (known as the “Bruedergemeinde”, 

or “Community of the Brothers”) began to send 

missionaries to the Caribbean in the early years of the 

XVIII century, founding an establishment in Suriname 

(Dutch Guyana) in 1735. These missionaries traveled 

along the Antilles and the Central American coast 

and much later founded a mission in the Mosquito 

Coast. “[The missionaries] waged war against the 

native shamans, or sookia (sukia), [...] and today the 

remaining sukia must practice under considerable 

stigma. [...] After living in local communities for 

many years, the missionaries produced the first 

grammars and dictionaries of the Miskito language 

and successfully translated the Bible” (Bell, 1989: 

vii-viii). 

Heinrich Rudolf Wullschlaegel (1805-1864) came 

in 1849 to the mission of the “Bruedergemeinde” 

in Suriname. To communicate with the natives, the 

missionaries had to learn their language, a mixture 

of English, Dutch, Portuguese and African elements, 

known today as Sranan. Wullschlaegel created a 

“Negro English Grammar” and a “German-Negro 

English Dictionary” which were published in 1856 and 

1865 in Germany. Wullschlaegel traveled to Brazil, the 

Antilles and the Mosquito coast. An amateur botanist, 

he made some interesting collections. In Jamaica he 

discovered the type of Lepanthes wullschlaegelii 

Fawc. & Rendle (Wullschlaegel, s.n.) and in Suriname 

Macroclinium wullschlaegelianum (Focke) Dodson 

(Wullschlaegel s.n.). In the Mosquito Coast he 

collected four species of orchids (all on the same day, 

January 5, 1855, and in the same locality: ‘Pearlkey 

Lagoon’), that were described by Reichenbach 

in his ORCHIDEAE WULLSCHLÄGELIANAE 

(Reichenbach, 1866: 104), among which is the type of 

Dichaea trulla Rchb. f. (Wullschlägel s.n.,‘Pearlkey 

Lagoon auf Palmen’). Reichenbach dedicated to 

him in 1863 the genus Wullschlaegelia, from a 

plant collected originally by Swartz in Jamaica and 

described as Cranichis aphylla Sw.


A B 

C 

Figure 36. A — Hans Hermann Behr (1818-1904). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — John M. Dow (1827-1892). Courtesy of 

Cornell University, Ithaca, New York. C — Selenipedium chica Rchb.f. Xenia Orchidacea I, Plate 2. D — Moritz Wagner 

(1813-1887). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. 

D 

101 


102 

LANKESTERIANA 

A B 

C 

Figure 37. A — Benedict Roezl (1824-1885). Contemporary portrait, courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — Statue of Roezl in 

Prague, which shows him with an orchid in his hand and an Indian at his feet. Photograph by Pavel Kindlmann. C — 

Miltoniopsis roezlii (Rchb. f.) God. Leb. Illustration by Pilar Casasa. D — Carl Hoffmann (1833-1859). Photograph by 

William Buchanan, courtesy of Silvia Meléndez. 


D

William Walker in Central America 


“The best field to exercise slavery is tropical 

America...” 

William Walker (Obregón Quesada, 1993: 176) 

After the failure of the Central American 

Federation, the conservatives dominated the political 

life of Central America, under the notorious leadership 

of Rafael Carrera, the Guatemalan dictator. “Several 

liberal attempts to restore the Union, articulated 

usually as a response to British hostilities, ended 

as complete failures” (Pérez Brignoli, 2000: 103). 

Carrera, enemy of the Federation, defeated all his 

adversaries reestablishing the ‘conservative peace’. 

But new and serious turbulences appeared, which 

threatened the region. In 1854, the Liberal party in 

Nicaragua was fighting the Conservative party for 

power and losing. In desperation, they sought out 

William Walker’s military assistance to help them 

topple the Conservatives 29 . In 1855, Walker responded 

and led them in the capture of the city of Granada. 

He double-crossed the Liberals, however, and made 

himself President of Nicaragua in 1856 being quickly 

recognized by the United States government as such. 

“He was a man with a very concrete plan: to conquer 

Nicaragua, then the rest of Central America, to build 

the Canal and to impose slavery” (Obregón Quesada, 

1993: 176). Arrogant as all defenders of the colonial 

interests of the United States, Wells wrote in 1857: 

“From the Mexican highlands to the isthmus of 

Panama, the feeling prevails among all inhabitants 

that, although it will mean the ruin of the race that until 

recently has governed their destinies, they will soon be 

forced to join the flag of the stripes of the Union, and 

continue as satellites in the orbit of the same planet” 

(Wells, 1982: 466). However, Walker’s supporters 

appropriated a transit company steamer owned by 

the American industrialist Cornelius Vanderbilt and 

Vanderbilt retaliated by financing the conservative 

forces against Walker. Walker was overthrown in a 

battle in 1857, and despite his attempts to recapture 

Nicaragua he never again regained control. The British 

captured Walker in Honduras in 1860 during another 

takeover attempt and he was promptly executed by the 

Honduran authorities. 

103 

But the constant wars and political struggles in the 

region where no apparent obstacles for the travelers 

and naturalists who continued arriving in Central 

America. Paraphrasing what Skinner had said years 

earlier, ‘they continued coming in spite of themselves’. 

Orchidomania and their fascination for natural history 

were always stronger than any other consideration. 

Charles Wright (1811-1865) had taken part as 

a botanist in the expedition that had surveyed the 

Mexican-American borders after the war of 1846- 

1848. In 1853, he joined the United States North 

Pacific Exploring Expedition, also known as the 

Ringgold and Rodgers Expedition for its captains. This 

expedition traveled around the world, stopping in such 

places as Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, and the islands 

of the Bering Straits, before arriving in San Francisco. 

Wright spent the winter in California and then asked to 

leave the expedition, which was due to continue south 

around Cape Horn and then to New York. After leaving 

the expedition, Wright took a steamer to Nicaragua, 

where he arrived in February of 1856, collecting for 

about eight weeks. He arrived at San Juan del Sur 

mid-February, 1856 and went to Virgin Bay, which 

was his base for two months. He made excursions to 

the Pacific coast and to an island in Lake Nicaragua. 

While in Nicaragua, Wright also discovered another 

hazard of fieldwork: political unrest. Wright had to 

be careful in the content of his letters to Asa Gray, as 

negative comments about the government would be 

censored. Wright also suspected that more innocent 

letters were also seized from the mail. One letter that 

did get through to Gray describes the trouble that 

Wright had in trying to leave Nicaragua. Rumors were 

flying that outward bound transport would soon be 

halted, so Wright hastily tried to arrange his journey 

to New York. For a time it seemed that no amount of 

money could either secure a berth or charter a ship, but 

eventually Wright was able to arrange transport back 

to the United States. 

Among Wright’s collections in Nicaragua we find 

some orchids, such as Epidendrum imatophyllum 

Lindl., Pleurothallis cardiothallis Rchb. f. and 

Brassavola nodosa Lindl. and also new types: 

Camaridium wrightii Schltr. (Wright s.n., Nicaragua), 

Ornithidum paleatum Rchb. f. (Wright s.n., Nicaragua), 

29 William Walker was born in 1824 in Nashville, Tennessee. After graduating, he worked for a time as a lawyer and became finally 

a soldier of fortune, participating in several political adventures in Mexico and California. 


104 

and Stelis parvula Lindl. (Wright 9, Nicaragua). After 

spending some time in Wethersfield and Cambridge, 

Wright went on the first of a series of travels to Cuba, 

during the period between 1856 and 1867. His work 

was described by the botanist August Grisebach in his 

Plantae Wrightianae e Cuba Orientali, published in 

two parts in 1860 and 1862. 

“The renowned gardens of Herrenhausen, in the 

vicinity of Hannover, Germany, were created in 1866 

by the Duke Johann Friedrich von Calenberg. It was 

there that the famous Wendland dynasty was born, 

a family of gardeners and botanists of enormous 

prestige. The Wendland dynasty began with Johann 

Christoph Wendland (Wendland I) in 1778, continued 

with his son Heinrich Wendland (Wendland II) and 

ended with his grandson Hermann Wendland (1825- 

1903) (Fig. 38A). It was this Wendland III who 

departed from Germany in 1856 on an extended 

voyage through Central America and who returned 

to Herrenhausen with a collection of orchids that 

contained 134 different species. A special greenhouse, 

called ‘Costa Rica-Haus’ was inaugurated exclusively 

for this collection” (Jenny, 1995: 34). It is curious to 

think of Wendland collecting orchids in this country 

at the same time that Juan Rafael Mora led the Costa 

Ricans in the fight against the filibusters. 

The idea of traveling to Central America was born 

during a visit by George U. Skinner to Herrenhausen. It 

was then when Wendland expressed his wish to travel 

to the Tropics. A few weeks later, Skinner wrote from 

London to the Director of Herrenhausen, advising 

to allow Wendland to travel to Central America, and 

inviting him to Guatemala. The journey was authorized 

and Wendland traveled von Hannover to Southampton, 

across the Atlantic to Belize and finally to Guatemala, 

where he stayed for several weeks, enjoying Skinner’s 

hospitality. In the first weeks of 1857 he traveled to El 

Salvador, where he took a ship to Puntarenas (Costa 

Rica), arriving there in March 1857. He soon made 

the acquaintance of Frantzius and Hoffmann, who 

were helpful in organizing Wendland’s excursions to 

the mountains surrounding San José. He collected also 

at the mouth of the Sucio River and in San Ramón, 

in addition to his collections on the road to Sarapiquí 

(Pittier & Durand, 1893: 137). In August 1857 he 

started on his way home, traveling over Sarapiquí and 

the San Juan River to San Juan del Norte (Nicaragua), 

LANKESTERIANA 


where he found a ship to Southampton, arriving back 

in Hannover on September 20 (Knoll, 2005: 3-4). 

Most of the new orchid species discovered by 

Wendland were described by Reichenbach in his 

ORCHIDEAE WENDLANDIANAE (Reichenbach, 

1866: 61). The following shall be mentioned: 

Arpophyllum medium Rchb. f. (Wendland 190, 

Guatemala), Cyclopogon prasophyllum (Rchb. f.) Schltr. 

(Wendland 297, Guatemala), Epidendrum myodes Rchb. 

f. (Wendland 111, Costa Rica), Epidendrum nitens 

Rchb. f. (Wendland 324, Guatemala), Epidendrum 

nubium Rchb. f. (Wendland 33, Guatemala), Erythrodes 

vesicifera (Rchb. f.) Ames (Wendland s.n., Costa Rica), 

Malaxis wendlandii (Rchb. f.) L. O. Wms. (Wendland 

s.n., Costa Rica), Myrmecophila wendlandii (Rchb.f.) 

G.C. Kennedy (Wendland s.n., Guatemala), Pelexia 

gutturosa (Rchb. f.) Garay (Wendland s.n., El Salvador), 

Pleurothallis fuegii Rchb. f. (Wendland s.n., Guatemala), 

Sarcoglottis sceptrodes (Rchb. f.) Schltr. (Wendland 388, 

Guatemala), and Stelis leucopogon Rchb. f. (Wendland 

895, Costa Rica).In 1887, Reichenbach named in his 

honor a new species, imported by Sander & Co. from 

Colombia: Masdevallia wendlandiana Rchb. f. 

Wendland collected in Guatemala, El Salvador and 

Costa Rica. No collections by him are known from 

Nicaragua, a country he probably avoided due to the 

war against Walker. Wendland’s interest in orchids, 

although responsible for very important discoveries, 

was secondary. His main field of knowledge were the 

Palmaceae, a family in which he was considered the 

leading world expert of his time. He made important 

contributions to Oersted during the great Danish 

scientist’s work on Central America. Oersted wrote : 

“I must add that M. H. Wendland, to whom science 

owes so much for his beautiful investigations of the 

American palms, has also gathered a considerable 

herbarium in Central America, part of which he has 

been kind enough to put at my disposal for this work...” 

(Oersted, 1863). 

Born at Park Hatch, Godalming, Frederick Du Cane 

Godman (1834-1919) was a keen student of natural 

history from his earliest days. At Cambridge he became 

an intimate friend of Alfred and Edward Newton and 

of Osbert Salvin (1835-1898), all enthusiastic students 

of bird life. Godman and his friend Osbert Salvin 

were enthusiastic followers of Darwin, and together 

they decided to produce a work that should review


every form of life in a definite part of the world. They 

chose Central America, and this became the lifework 

of these two friends. It was 1879, 36 years before 

the 63 volumes of this vast undertaking, Biologia 

Centrali-Americana, were completed. The two friends 

were editors, securing experts to write on their own 

branches of knowledge, and devoting themselves 

to the birds and butterflies. They had traveled many 

times to Guatemala between 1857 and 1874, preparing 

zoological but also botanical collections. “…there 

are two separate collections of flowering plants in the 

Kew Herbarium– one, consisting of about 250 species, 

dated 1861, and the other, consisting of about 350 

species, dated 1873-74, and ascribed to Mr. Salvin 

alone” (Hemsley, 1887: 136). 

Salvin had the fortune of finding in his wife 

Caroline a magnificent botanical illustrator. He lived 

in Guatemala and appreciated its natural beauties, but 

never could accept the customs of his adoptive country. 

In a letter to his father in January, 1858, he wrote: “... 

George Skinner and I went to Ocatenango... to collect 

orchids... the country is very full of resources... The 

only thing against it is the miserable race of Spaniards, 

but this evil is by degree being diminished by the 

increase in foreigners”. Among his collections is the 

type of Ornithocephalus salvinii Rchb. f. ex Hemsl. 

(Salvin s.n., Barranca Honda, Guatemala) and many 

specimens of the genus Lepanthes. 

The German Carl Kramer had been sent to Japan 

in 1857 and arrived in Costa Rica in 1866, via 

Panama, to search for Cattleya dowiana, which had 

become Skinner’s obsession. Kramer discovered 

the type of Ticoglossum krameri (Rchb.f.) R. 

Rodríguez ex Halbinger, but this seems to have 

been his only success in Central America. In the 

words of Veitch, he resulted “... unsuitable for the 

work” (Veitch, 1906: 55). Odontoglossum krameri 

Rchb. f., Leptorchis krameri Kuntze and Liparis 

krameri Franch. & Sav. were dedicated to him. 

However, Oncidium kramerianum Rchb. f., as many 

wrongly assume, was not dedicated to him but to 

his father, gardener of Herr Jenisch at Flotbeck 

Park near Hamburg, where it first flowered in 1854 

(Veitch, 1963: 47). He lived later for long years 

in Manaos, Brazil, where he was in charge of the 

botanical training of young Erich Bungeroth, who 

would become famous for his collections in Brazil, 

105 

Venezuela and Colombia (Blossfeld, 1965: 113). 

Richard William Pearce (1838-1867) had collected 

for Veitch in South America, and had visited Chile, 

Peru and Ecuador. In Peru he collected the type 

specimens of Masdevallia veitchiana Rchb. f., 

Phragmipedium pearcei (Rchb. f.) Rauh & Senghas 

and Chloraea pearcei Phil. Pearce traveled in 1867 to 

Peru, in search for another shipment of Masdevallia 

veitchiana. “Unhappily -for us as well as for himself- 

he was detained in Panama. Somewhere in those 

parts there is a magnificent Cypripedium with which 

we are acquainted only by the dried inflorescence, 

named planifolium. The poor fellow could not resist 

this temptation. They told him at Panama that no white 

man had returned from the spot, but he went on. The 

Indians brought him back, some days or weeks later, 

without the prize; and he died on arrival” (Boyle, 

1983: 87). He was only 29 years old and died a victim 

of yellow fever. 

The physician Carl Gustav Bernoulli (1834- 

1878) was born in Basel, Switzerland, into a family 

whose ancestors had been famous physicists and 

mathematicians. The family had its origin in Antwerp, 

Belgium, having to flee to Frankfurt in the XVI century 

from the persecutions of the Duke of Alba, and moving 

in 1622 to Basel (Meyer-Holdampf, 1997:21). After 

graduating in medicine in 1857, and strongly influenced 

by the ideas of Alexander von Humboldt, Bernoulli 

traveled in 1858 to Guatemala. He lived most of the 

time in Retalhuleu, where he had a coffee plantation 

and maintained at the same time his medical clinic and a 

pharmacy (Fig. 38B). Anticlerical by nature, he blamed 

the church for the backwardness of Guatemala in those 

days. In 1868 he traveled for a short period of time to 

Europe. During this time he visited the herbariums of 

the botanical gardens of Berlin, Hamburg, Amsterdam, 

London and Paris, always moved by his desire to write 

a flora of Guatemala. In 1872 he sent 5 boxes with his 

botanical collections and other objects of natural history 

to Europe, intended among others for Hooker, Kuhn, 

De Candolle and Reichenbach (Meyer-Holdampf, 

1997: 72, 85). 

After meeting Baron von Tuerckheim, he started 

in 1877 on his last excursion, for which he tried to 

find in Europe a young botanist to travel with him. 

With the help of professor August Heinrich Rudolf 

Grisebach he paid all expenses for the arrival of the 


106 

German botanist Oscar Richard Cario (1856-?), who 

became the companion of his last voyage (Müller, 

1878: 720). He visited the ruins of Palenque and 

took part in the excavation of the temples of Tikal. 

Bernoulli found the temples completely covered by 

vegetation. Impressed by the quality of the wooden 

lintels of the doors of Temple IV, he took them out 

“with permission of the government” (so says the 

Museum of Cultures, in Basel, where the doors arrived 

in 1878, a few months after his death). An important 

number of new species of Orchidaceae were found 

among Bernoulli’s and Cario’s collections. They were 

described chiefly by Schlechter. The following shall 

be mentioned: Deiregyne nelsonii (Greenm.) Burns- 

Bal. (Bernoulli & Cario 644, Guatemala), Erythrodes 

lunifera (Schltr.) Ames (Bernoulli & Cario 669, 

Guatemala), Habenaria tetranema Schltr. (Bernoulli 

325, Guatemala), Lemboglossum majale (Rchb. f.) 

Halb. (Bernoulli 338, Central America), Oncidium 

bernoullianum Kraenzl. (Bernoulli 339, Guatemala), 

Ornithocephalus tripterus Schltr. (Bernoulli & Cario 

667, Guatemala), Pleurothallis bernoullii Schltr. 

(Bernoulli & Cario 499, Guatemala), Ponthieva 

pulchella Schltr. (Bernoulli & Cario 487, Guatemala), 

Stelis cleistogama Schltr. (Bernoulli & Cario 344, 

Guatemala), Stelis ovatilabia Schltr. (Bernoulli & Cario 

s.n., Guatemala), Stelis oxypetala Schltr. (Bernoulli & 

Cario 624, Guatemala), and Stelis tenuissima Schltr. 

(Bernoulli & Cario 590, Guatemala). He kept close 

relationships with the leading American botanists 

of his time. In one of his letters to Joseph Henry, 

Director of the Smithsonian Institution, he claimed: “I 

possess valuable collections of this country... so that 

I can offer to American botanists collections that may 

be interesting to them...”. Asa Gray, Director of the 

Botanical Garden of Harvard University mentioned in 

February, 1848: “Dr. Bernoulli is right saying that the 

Botany of Guatemala is very little known, and that his 

collection will be full of interest” (Meyer-Holdampf, 

1997: 142). Bernoulli died on May 18, 1878 in San 

Francisco, during his return travel to Switzerland, 

from a tropical illness he had contracted in the 

region of Petén. Years later, in 1897, the Bryologia 

guatemalensis ex collectionibus Domin. Bernoulli 

& Cario (1866-1878) was published in the Bulletin 

de l’Herbier Boissier, based on the herbarium of 

Bernoulli and Cario. Schlechter dedicated to Cario 

LANKESTERIANA 


Pleurothallis carioi Schltr. (Bernoulli & Cario 

496) and Stelis carioi Schltr. (Bernoulli & Cario 

s.n.) (Fig. 38C). Bernoulli’s herbarium was sent to 

Donnell Smith in Baltimore for revision. However, 

Donnell Smith returned it untouched since he could 

not dedicate himself to this task due to ill health. The 

herbarium returned to Basel, where it was donated to 

the University by a brother of Bernoulli. 

Sutton Hayes (?-1863), was a doctor and naturalist 

with the El Paso and Fort Yuma Wagon Road 

Expedition in 1857-1858. Born in Columbia County, 

New York, he apparently graduated in medicine in New 

York City. He studied botany for several years during 

a period of living in Paris, France. After leaving the 

Wagon Road Expedition, he developed tuberculosis 

and went to what is now Colon in Panama, collecting 

there extensively until his death in 1863. When he 

stopped in Puntarenas on his way to Panama in 1860, 

Hayes became perhaps the first North American to 

botanize in Costa Rica (Grayum et al., 2004: 7). On 

April 18, 1860, Captain Dow wrote to Professor Baird, 

of the Smithsonian Institute: “Dr. Sutton Hayes, who 

brought me a letter of introduction from you I have 

met twice... He is an indefatigable laborer in his efforts 

to illustrate the botany of the Isthmus, where he has 

located himself ever since the failure of the Darién 

expedition, to which he was attached.” Hayes also 

collected in El Salvador and Guatemala. Again Dow to 

Baird (June 6, 1860): “Dr. Hayes is now in Guatemala, 

pursuing his investigations. He came on board at a port 

in Salvador on my last voyage. He looks bad, and I 

very much question whether he will live to again visit 

this coast”. 

Among his Panamanian specimens we find 

Brassavola nodosa Lindl., Trichopilia sp., 

Lockhartia pallida Rchb. f. (Hayes 106), Cyclopogon 

prasophyllum Schltr. (Hayes 138), Sobralia fenzliana 

Rchb. f. (Hayes 493) and the type of Campylocentrum 

panamense Ames (Hayes 1389). In 1860 he spent 

several months in El Salvador and Guatemala, from 

where his collections of Sobralia macrantha Lindl 

(Hayes s.n., Guatemala), Spiranthes aurantiaca 

(Llave & Lex.) Hemsl. (Hayes s.n., Guatemala) and 

Spiranthes rosulata (W. Baxt.) Lindl. (Hayes s.n., 

Guatemala) are preserved. Hayes contributed in great 

measure to complete the list of plants of Panama that 

had been published some years earlier by Seemann.

The Mexican Empire of Maximilian of Hapsburg 


“The government of the republic will fulfill 

its duty to defend its independence, to repel 

foreign aggression, and accept the struggle to 

which it has been provoked, counting on the 

unanimous spirit of the Mexicans and on the 

fact that sooner or later the cause of rights 

and justice will triumph”. 

Benito Juárez, President of México, 1862 

In 1859, a group of Mexican conservatives 

approached Ferdinand Maximilian Joseph, 

Archduke of Austria, Prince of Hungary and 

Bohemia (1832-1867), offering him the throne of 

Mexico. Although he initially refused, the French 

occupation of the Mexican capital and the pressures 

of Napoleon III convinced him, and he was crowned 

as the Emperor of Mexico in 1864. A passionate 

lover of nature, he organized during his short reign 

a scientific commission that was sent out to explore 

the flora and fauna of Mexico. Among the members 

of this commission Eugene Bourgeau (1813-1877) 30 

had a prominent place. He prepared extensive 

collections of plants that are today at the Natural 

History Museum of Paris. Among his specimens are 

numerous species of Orchidaceae, some of which 

were new to science: Bletia greenmaniana L. O. 

Wms. (Bourgeau 2812), Epidendrum bourgeavii 

Schltr. (Bourgeau 3104), Malaxis lepidota (Finet) 

Ames (Bourgeau 3008), and Pleurothallis bourgeaui 

Kraenzl. (Bourgeau 2469). 

Pierre Marie Arthur Morelet (1809-1892) was a 

French naturalist, born in Lays. Morelet had been 

a member of the commission to Algeria (1841), 

mainly as a natural artist, drawing any natural 

findings. He took particular interest in mollusks, 

which he published many works on, particularly 

the species of Africa. Morelet was appointed as a 

corresponding member of the Mexican scientific 

commission, mainly because he had traveled 

between 1846 and 1848 through southeastern 

Mexico and Guatemala. After visiting Yucatan, 

Morelet came into Guatemala through the Mexican 

state of Tabasco and following the course of the 

Usumacinta River. He traveled through Petén 

107 

and all the way to the highlands of Cobán. After 

visiting the capital of Guatemala he returned to 

Europe. Morelet wrote an interesting account of his 

travels (Morelet, 1876), with beautiful illustrations 

and several references about orchids. Traveling 

with his companion, the faithful seaman Morin, 

Morelet wonders in the neighborhood of Palenque 

about “onion-shaped plants” which cover the tree 

trunks and delights in the aroma of Vanilla. In 

Dolores he notes the “myriads of parasites” in the 

shadow of the forests, among which he mentions 

an orchid species [Stanhopea sp.] white as a lily 

and with a strong benzene aroma which attracts 

swarms of butterflies of the most beautiful species. 

In Lanquin, were he was the guest of the local 

priest, he finds again Vanilla which he became as 

a gift and which he finds commonly in cultivation 

and sees again in Cobán (Morelet, 1876: 194, 222, 

284). As a tribute by Gabriel Bibron and Auguste 

Duméril, Morelet had a species of crocodile named 

after himself: Morelet’s Crocodile or, Crocodylus 

moreletii Bibron & Duméril. Morelet had found 

this crocodile in the swamps of Yucatan. Morelet 

died of natural causes in 1892, in Dijon. 

Ludwig Hahn (?-1873) lived in Mexico from 

1855 and years later formed part of the scientific 

expedition of which Bourgeau was part. Hahn was 

a botanist, and his mission was to study Mexican 

plants, collect them and send them to Europe. This he 

did, but he fell in love with Mexico and never went 

back. He changed his name from Ludwig to Luis and 

became a Mexican citizen. He died in Mexico, we 

believe, in 1873. Luis Hahn was not only a botanist 

but an accomplished musician. He played the piano, 

sang and composed. He wrote a series of pieces 

for piano that he called ‘Recuerdos de México’ (= 

‘Remembrances of Mexico’). Among his collections 

are several orchids, such as Epidendrum equitans 

Lindl., Epidendrum rigidum Jacq., and Habenaria 

lactiflora A. Rich. & Gal. 

After several years of fighting against French 

occupation, the troops of Benito Juárez finally 

captured Maximilian in Querétaro. On June 19, 

1867, he died in front of a firing squad, at the side of 

his generals Miramón and Mejía. 

30 Bourgeau had previously been a botanical collector in Spain, North Africa and the Canary Islands. 


108 

The Spanish Scientific Commission to the Pacific 

1863-1866. The Scientific Commission to the Pacific 

was the most important scientific enterprise of 19th 

century Spain. In the spring of 1862, the Ministry of 

Development decided to add a scientific team to a naval 

squadron that the government of General O’Donnell 

sent to America as part of its Pan-Hispanic politics. 

The group of naturalist travelers was formed by six 

professors of the Natural Science Museum of Madrid 

and two assistants: a taxidermist and an illustrator, and 

photographer. Their mission was to form scientific 

collections that would enrich the Spanish museums and 

contribute to develop the program of acclimatization 

of exotic plants and animals that would be useful for 

the Spanish economy. The expedition visited Brazil, 

Uruguay and Chile, before turning northwards towards 

Ecuador, Central America and California, returning 

to Spain at the end of 1865. Only a small part of the 

collections of the Commission have been studied and 

we cannot confirm the collection of orchid specimens 

by its members. The herbarium of Juan Isern y Batlló 

(1821-1866), the Commission’s botanist, was studied 

in part by José Cuatrecasas and awaits further research 

at the Royal Botanical Garden in Madrid. 

Lindley and Reichenbach: change of the guard 

“Central America has, according to our 

present knowledge, one of the richest orchid 

floras. Fortune not only smiled at me bringing 

into my hands many of the best collections of 

this region, richer than Lindley ever obtained 

them, but I can trust in ... many more shipments 

from there.” 

H. G. Reichenbach (1866, introduction) 

“[...] The British horticulturist and botanist John 

Lindley (1799-1865) is the perfect example of high 

society’s passion for botany in the 1800s” (Ceulemans 

et al., 2006: 107). Lindley was the most important 

orchidologist in the first half of the XIX century and 

described the majority of orchids that were discovered 

in Central America. His close relation with the 

Botanical Gardens at Kew, during a time when British 

power dominated the five continents, brought into his 

hands, for identification, new species from all over the 

LANKESTERIANA 


world. However, during the first years of the second 

half of the century, a new star arose in the name of 

Heinrich Gustav Reichenbach (1824-1889) (Fig. 

38D), who had published in 1852 his dissertation 

on the structure of the pollen masses in orchids and 

had started, in 1854, the publication of his Xenia 

Orchidaceae, which he would complete in 1883. 

Son of the famous botanist Heinrich Gottlieb 

Reichenbach, Reichenbach filius soon began to 

be recognized as Lindley’s protégé, being first his 

assistant and later his competitor in the identification 

of new species. Nonetheless, they were bound by 

a close friendship that lasted until Lindley’s death. 

Reichenbach’s evolution as an orchid expert is evident 

if we observe chronologically the collections which 

were studied between 1830 and 1860 31 .The majority of 

the Central American specimens of Loddiges, Cuming, 

Skinner, Hartweg, Hinds, Sinclair and Barclay were 

identified by Lindley. 

The descriptions of the new species discovered 

by Schiede, Deppe and Linden are divided between 

Lindley and Reichenbach. However, beginning 

with Seemann, and continuing with Friedrichsthal, 

Warscewicz, Liebmann, Oersted, Behr, Duchassaing, 

Roezl, Hoffmann and Wendland, it is almost exclusively 

Reichenbach who studied and identified the Central 

American collections. Many of the new species were 

described by Reichenbach in his Contributions to the 

orchidology of Central America, published in Hamburg 

in 1866. When Lindley died in 1865, Reichenbach 

became the virtual dictator of orchidology, although he 

was not immune from criticism. The botanist George 

Bentham criticized his determinations for ignoring 

structural characteristics other than those of the flower 

and an obituary in the Proceedings of the Linnean Society 

later referred to the ‘many puzzles in his descriptions, 

which of late years had assumed an esoteric character’ 

(Elliot, 1994: 441). When Reichenbach died in 1889, he 

left his enormous herbarium, including all the material 

that had been contributed by other botanists during his 

life, to the Imperial Museum of Vienna. It contained 

more than 700,000 specimens, of which some 52,000 

where orchids. The sheets usually showed very rude 

but very characteristic drawings. Reichenbach’s will 

read textually: “My herbarium and my botanical library, 

31 For chronological comparisons one must take into account that study and identification of species often took place two or three 

years after the date of collection, due to the length of the expeditions and the difficult conditions of travel.


A B 

C 

Figure 38. A — Hermann Wendland (1825-1903). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — Carl Gustav Bernoulli (1834-1878). 

Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. C — Stelis carioi Schltr. Illustration by Blanche Ames, courtesy of the Oakes Ames Orchid 

Herbarium, Harvard University. D — Heinrich Gustav Reichenbach (1824-1889), at age 38. Courtesy of the Hunt Institute 


D 

109 


110 

A 

B 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 39. A — Masdevallia reichenbachiana Endrés ex Rchb.f. Illustration by Pilar Casasa. B — Dichaea viridula Pupulin. 

Drawing by A.R. Endrés. 



my instruments, collections of seeds, I accrue to the 

Imperial Hof Museum in Vienna, under the condition 

that the preserved Orchids and drawings of Orchids 

shall not be exhibited before twenty-five years from the 

date of my death have elapsed...” (Elliot, 1994: 440). 

The immediate stimulus for the making of the will was 

no doubt the incorporation, in 1879, of Robert A. Rolfe 

to the scientific staff of Kew, who within a few years 

had become responsible for the orchids at the herbarium. 

Once Kew realized that it had a competent in-house 

specialist, it ceased to send its orchids to Reichenbach for 

identification. “Seldom has anyone’s reputation suffered 

a reversal so quickly” (Elliot, 1994: 440). The loss of 

all of Reichenbach’s material was a terrible blow for 

science. To aggravate this, the First World War began in 

1914, when the twenty five years stipulated in the will 

had just elapsed. This delayed until the twenties the study 

of the materials that the controversial German botanist 

had accumulated during his life. Oakes Ames had harsh 

words for Reichenbach: “Reichenbach, as I see the 

situation now, rose to eminence as an orchidologist simply 

because of unexampled opportunity. When I review the 

sensations stimulated by his famous herbarium preserved 

at Vienna, I find them far from flattering. The lack of data, 

the indecipherable handwriting, the scrappy specimens 

[…], and the odd bits of paper that bear meager and often 

inadequate information, give rise to disgust…. If we 

compare Reichenbach with Lindley, the former suffers 

prodigiously!… Yet, the Reichenbach herbarium has 

been an almost insuperable obstacle to the progress of 

orchidology for over twenty years, because its founder 

violated the very spirit of science” (in a letter to Charles 

H. Lankester, Oct. 18, 1922). 

Respected as one of the greatest orchidologists of the 

XIX century and hated for being responsible for 25 years of 

obscurantist interregnum, Reichenbach will nevertheless 

always have a preeminent place in the history of the orchids 

of Central America. A new genus, Reichenbachanthus 

Barb. Rodr., and a great number of species were dedicated 

to Reichenbach: Barbosella reichenbachiana (Endrés 

ex Rchb.f.) Schltr., Chondrorhyncha reichenbachiana 

Schltr., Elleanthus reichenbachianus Garay, Epidendrum 

reichenbachianum Schltr., Habenaria reichenbachiana 

Barb. Rodr., Laelia reichenbachiana Wendl. & 

Kraenzl., Lycaste reichenbachii Gireoud ex Rchb.f., 

Malaxis reichenbachiana (Schltr.) L.O. Williams, 

Masdevallia reichenbachiana Endrés ex Rchb. f. (Fig. 

111 

39A), Odontoglossum reichenbachianum F. C. Lehm., 

Pleurothallis reichenbachiana Schltr., Sievekingia 

reichenbachiana Rolfe, and Stanhopea reichenbachiana 

Roezl ex Rchb.f. 

‘Señor’ Endrés 

“... one of those collectors who cared more for 

science than for sovereigns”. 

H. G. Reichenbach (1883) 

Little is known about the origins and life of Augustus 

R. Endrés ( 1838-1875). “His last name is Spanish, yet he 

wrote his notes in English. He was referred to as a ‘halfcaste’ 

(Veitch, J. H., Hortus Veitchii, 1906), a label that 

may indicate parentage of a North American or European 

and a Latin American” (Atwood & Mora de Retana, 

1999). Gómez (pers. comm.) tells us that Endrés was 

Austrian and that his last name is more or less common in 

Austria and Switzerland. Bateman, while complaining 

about the lack of new Odontoglossum from Costa Rica, 

changes the spelling of his name: “In Mexico, from 

which much novelty was expected, little has been added 

to the number of Odontoglossum previously known, and 

the same may be said of Costa Rica, notwithstanding the 

vigorous exertions of Mr. Endries” (Bateman, 1874). 

Now we have reasons to believe that he was French, 

from the region of Alsace, but much of his life remains 

a mystery. The quality and precision of the botanical 

descriptions and illustrations (most of them in pencil) that 

were attached to his herbarium specimens is astounding, 

which leads to the assumption that he had a solid academic 

training, which he probably received in England. His 

use of the English language, precise and cultivated, 

points in the same direction (Fig. 39B). He came to 

Central America in 1866, recommended by Skinner and 

employed by Bateman to collect orchids in Guatemala 

and Costa Rica (Anonymous, 1913: 341). It is possible 

that Skinner recommended him after the disappointment 

he suffered with Enrique Arce, a Guatemalan collector 

who had not met Skinner’s expectations in the search for 

Cattleya dowiana. Endrés came the first time to Costa 

Rica in 1866, and remained for several months in the 

Atlantic lowlands, until he arrived at San José in May of 

1867. He had disembarked in Greytown and came to San 

José following the route of Sarapiquí. 

While Endrés was in Costa Rica, Gottlieb Zahn 

traveled in Central America, 1869-1870. The main 


112 

object of his journey was the introduction of the rare 

Miltonia endresii, discovered by Warscewicz about 

1849, but that had previously resisted all attempts at 

introduction. Zahn was equally unsuccessful with this 

plant. In 1869 he was proceeding to Costa Rica, when 

he perished by drowning” (Anonymous, 1913: 263). 

We remember him in a bromeliad, Guzmania zahnii 

(Hook. f.) Mez. Endrés was hired in 1871 by the firm of 

Veitch to replace Zahn and collected Miltonia endresii, 

Cattleya dowiana, Masdevallia reichenbachiana and 

others, then considered of little horticultural value. For 

some reason, Veitch did not consider Endrés a successful 

collector. “The mission, which terminated in April 1873, 

was expensive and scarcely a success” (Veitch, 1906: 

61). Endrés lived in San José and San Ramón, and 

collected in all accessible regions of Costa Rica, from 

Ojo de Agua to the mountains of Talamanca, the region 

of Dota, hills of Candelaria and Aguacate, San Ramón, 

Sarapiquí, etc. (Fig. 40A). He sent a great amount of 

materials to Reichenbach. “The rich collections prepared 

by Endrés have remained unstudied and wait for their 

identification in Reichenbach’s herbarium” (Schlechter, 

1918: 351). During these years, Endrés collected in the 

company of George Downton (?-1895), a British citizen 

who came to Central America in 1871, also hired by 

Veitch. Downton traveled to England escorting the first 

shipments of Endrés. After traveling to Chile in October 

of 1871, he terminated his contract in 1873 and settled 

in Central America, where he joined a firm of coffee 

planters and died in 1895 (Anonymous, 1913: 263). 

Among the many new species discovered by Endrés 

we find the types of Barbosella prorepens (Rchb. 

f.) Schltr. (Endrés 271, Costa Rica), Pleurothallis 

endotrachys Rchb. f. (Endrés s.n., Costa Rica) and 

Stelis endresii Rchb. f. (Endres W 18468, Costa 

Rica). The following species were dedicated to 

him: Anathallis endresii (Luer) Pridgeon & M. W. 

Chase, Chondroscaphe endresii (Schltr.) Dressler, 

Epidendrum endresii Rchb.f. (Fig. 40B), Habenaria 

endresiana Schltr., Kefersteinia endresii Pupulin, 

Lepanthes endresii Luer, Maxillaria endresii Rchb.f., 

Mesospinidium endresii (Kraenzl.) Garay, Miltonia 

endresii Nichols., Telipogon endresianum Kraenzl. 

and Zootrophion endresianum (Kraenzl.) Luer. Rudolf 

Schlechter dedicated to him the genus Endresiella, 

today a synonym of Trevoria. From at least one of 

his specimens, we know that he collected also in 

LANKESTERIANA 


Panama. A specimen of Rodriguezia leochilina Rchb. 

f. (Goniochilus leochilinus (Rchb. f.) M. W. Chase) 

in Vienna bears a label in Reichenbach’s handwriting 

which says: “Rodriguezia? - Panama - Endres”. 

Besides collecting orchids, Endrés at some point 

collected birds. A collection was received in 1867 at 

the Smithsonian Institution of which Lawrence wrote: 

“A small but important collection of hummingbirds has 

been received this summer, collected by A. R. Endrés in 

Costa Rica” (Lawrence, 1882: 308). Another mystery is 

a series of specimens allegedly collected by Endrés in 

Peru and Brazil. There is no information about travels 

by Endrés to these countries, but in the collection of 

Orchidaceae at the Natural History Museum in London 

we find 19 specimens apparently collected by Endrés in 

Peru and one in Brazil. In the database of the herbaria 

of Harvard University Endrés is also mentioned as a 

collector in Costa Rica and Peru. ¿Did Endrés visit these 

countries, or did he receive plants from there (from other 

collectors) while he was in Costa Rica? 

To understand the enigma of A. R. Endrés in the 

history of the orchids of Central America, the attempt 

must be made some day to research his life, starting 

with all the material that is kept at Vienna. This will 

help in understanding the relations between Endrés 

and Reichenbach, probably not always fortunate if 

we consider the difficult character and egotism of the 

great German orchidologist. Curiously, Reichenbach 

ignored during his life many of the specimens which he 

received from Endrés, which in many cases proved to 

be new genera or species. The material kept at Vienna 

was studied later, among others, by Ames, Schlechter, 

Kränzlin, Garay, Luer, Dressler, Dodson and Pupulin. 

Perhaps it was all a deference of Reichenbach to Endrés, 

who, according to Luer, “judging from the numerous 

notes indicating figures, intended pages and volumes, 

[...] was apparently preparing a publication” (Luer, 1995: 

133). Endrés collected in Costa Rica until 1874 or 1875. 

This same year he traveled to Colombia, where he was 

murdered in Riohacha (Swinson, 1970: 123). According 

to Jorge Munera, Endrés, whom he calls ‘one of the 

greatest collectors’, was shot to death in a street of this 

small town on the Caribbean coast of Colombia (Munera, 

2005). Reichenbach never kept the promise expressed in 

the Gardener’s Chronicle obituary (Fig. 40C). Life and 

death of A. R. Endrés remain as one of the best guarded 

secrets in the history of Central American orchids.

Other travelers in Central America (I): 1839-1870 


Put everything into your pocket! 

Baron Hügel’s advice to botanists 

There are several very interesting accounts of travels 

through Central America, written by persons who came 

for various motives (never primarily as botanists), but 

which contain some interesting descriptions, which 

shall be commented hereafter. 

John Lloyd Stephens (1805-1852), born in 

Shrewsbury, New Jersey, traveled in 1834 through 

Europe, Palestine and Egypt, in the company of 

Frederick Catherwood, an Englishman who would 

illustrate most of his travel journals. In 1839, Stephens 

and Catherwood decided to explore Central America. 

United States President Van Buren, in order to 

support the expedition, gave Stephens a diplomatic 

commission. He visited Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, 

Costa Rica and Nicaragua and dedicated his main 

efforts to the explorations of the Mayan ruins of 

Copán (Honduras), where Catherwood made beautiful 

illustrations. In Guatemala, he made the acquaintance 

of George U. Skinner: “[...] I went to the house of 

Mr. Zebadous ... There I met Mr. Chatfield, General 

Consul of Her British Majesty, and Mr. Skinner, who 

had arrived during my absence”. In another chapter he 

mentions the firm of Klee and Skinner, who “where 

the most important foreign merchants in Guatemala” 

(Stephens, 1971: 277, 222). Stephens became later 

one of the directors of the American Ocean Steam 

Navigation Co. He was in Panama with the purpose of 

exploring the terrain for the construction of a railroad 

through the isthmus and was later president of the 

Panama Railroad Company, which would become so 

important for the botanical exploration of the region. 

Ephraim George Squier (1821-1888) (Fig. 40D) 

“came to Nicaragua in the year of 1849 as charge 

d’affairs of the United States and while occupying this 

diplomatic position rendered valuable services fighting 

England’s expansionistic tendencies in the Mosquito 

Coast. The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty of 1880 between 

the United Stated and Great Britain, which guaranteed 

effectively for half a century Central America’s 

independence, was signed mainly through his efforts. An 

enthusiastic promoter of the opening of an interoceanic 

canal, he contributed, through his studies and research, 

greatly to broaden the geographical and geological 

113 

knowledge relative to the Central American Isthmus. 

He returned to Central America in 1853 to direct studies 

for the Honduran Interoceanic Railway Company, of 

which he was Secretary and whose interests he had 

been promoting in Europe; but this railway project was 

later abandoned” (Fernández Guardia, 1972: 265-266). 

Squier traveled through Nicaragua, El Salvador and 

Honduras, but it was Nicaragua the country he knew 

best. He wrote an important book about this country, 

which was published in 1860 (cited here is the Spasnish 

version of 1972). In several passages of his book, Squier 

describes the trees of the forest, full of ‘parasites’, in 

many cases surely orchids. “The pendent branches 

full of parasites...” “From there on the countryside [...] 

is full of ‘jicarales’ (Crescentia spp.) covered to such 

extent with parasitic plants that they almost conceal the 

branches of these trees”. He also mentions a narrative 

by his friend Julius Froebel about his ascent to the Telica 

volcano, near León, in which he writes: “On the highest 

rim of the crater I found an orchid, whose crimson stems 

are similar to some varieties of our German orchids” 

(Squier, 1972: 319, 404, 436). 

Julius Froebel (1805-1893), nephew of Friedrich 

Froebel the celebrated educational reformer and 

founder of the kindergarten system, had been 

sentenced to death in 1848 for his participation of 

the German Revolution of that year, and fled to the 

United States. He arrived in Nicaragua in 1850, where 

he made important studies about the language of the 

Sumo Indians. His studies of Mayan architecture and 

linguistics are still used extensively. In 1857 he was in 

Belize, studying the suitability of British Honduras for 

German emigration. 

Friedrich Wilhelm Adolph Marr (1819-1904) was 

born in Magdeburg, Germany, a son of the famous 

actor Heinrich Marr. The discovery of the Californian 

gold mines and the projects for an interoceanic canal 

in Nicaragua or Panama awakened his interests, and 

in 1852 he traveled to New York and from there to 

Nicaragua and Costa Rica. While in Nicaragua, he 

practiced as an improvised physician. In Costa Rica 

he became an engineer and finally a merchant, until he 

returned to Germany in 1853, with a commission by 

the Costa Rican government to bring German colonists 

to the country. He failed in this purpose and returned 

to Costa Rica in 1854, where he established himself 

as a merchant in Puntarenas. He returned to Hamburg 


114 

in 1859 and died in 1904 in extreme poverty. Marr 

published in 1863 a book about his journey, in which 

he presents beautiful descriptions of the nature that he 

encountered in the Central American countries (Marr, 

1863). It is sad that his racist tendencies diminished 

the value of his writings. In several parts of his book, 

Marr writes about the orchids that he encountered on 

his way: “On the big trees often thirty or more orchid 

species had found a host, in the most bizarre forms 

and sizes.” “On the riverbanks, the powerful vines 

that fall into the water, the wild plantains, the green 

physiognomies of the orchids!” “There I turned my 

eyes to the giants of the forest, to the wildly entangled 

vines, the bizarre forms of the orchids, the fabulous 

fans of the wild palms…” (Marr, 1870: 166, 188, 172). 

William Vincent Wells (1826-1876) formed an 

association called the Honduras Mining and Trading 

Company early in 1854 with James Davenport 

Whelpley, and Byron Cole. Wells traveled to Honduras 

through Nicaragua looking for the gold mines of 

Olancho, and he wrote Explorations And Adventures 

In Honduras (Wells, 1857). William V. Wells was one 

of the pioneers during the gold rush in California. One 

of his partners, Byron Cole, was one of the instigators 

of William Walker’s invasion of Nicaragua in 1856. 

In his travel journal, Wells described what where 

undoubtedly orchids, near the Nicaraguan city of 

Chinandega: “…parasitic plants, adorned with showy 

flowers, hung from the branches, which presented 

fantastic forms…”. Wells was not the first to confuse 

epiphytic plants with parasites. Some months later, 

already in Honduras, he writes about the “solemn 

greatness of these forests: the ceibas (Ceiba pentandra), 

of gigantic proportions, with the hanging gardens of 

parasites on their branches ...” (Wells, 1857). 

The Irishman Thomas Francis Meagher (1823- 

1867) came to Costa Rica in 1858 and again in 1860. 

From his travels he wrote his well-known Holidays in 

Costa Rica. During an excursion to the valley of Orosi, 

Meagher writes: “We rode the last part of the journey 

towards the rivers with the eyes fixed on the canopy of 

the trees, full of orchids ...” (Meagher, 1859). 

A narrative of a journey along the Panama Railroad 

by Oran (?-?) in 1859 includes the description of a 

huge ceiba, the famous ‘Stephen’s tree’: “This Titan 

of the tropics measured no less than five yards in 

diameter at its base, including the broad plane-shaped 

LANKESTERIANA 


roots that extended out on every side like buttresses, 

and towering up without a branch for nearly a hundred 

feet, supported a canopy of foliage full fifty yards in 

diameter… A little reconnaissance rewarded us with 

several fine specimens of orchidaceae with which the 

trunks and branches of many of the trees were studded” 

(Vargas, 2008: 159). 

The German Karl Albert Ludwig von Seebach 

(1839-1880) traveled through Central America 

during the years of 1864 and 1865, studying mainly 

the volcanoes of the region. In March of 1865 he 

climbed the Turrialba volcano in Costa Rica. During 

the ascend, he describes the tropical forest: “Vines and 

epiphytic orchids hang from the trees, which, hidden 

from our view, announce their presence through their 

sweet perfume” (Seebach, 1892). 

Frederick Boyle (1841-1883) arrived in Greytown, 

Nicaragua, on November 12, 1865, having traveled 

via Kingston (Jamaica) and Aspinwall (today Colón, 

Panama) in the company of his friend John Gladwyn 

Jebb. Boyle became years later a well-known writer 

on orchid matters. However, as Boyle explains in the 

preface to the book that he wrote about this journey, 

his interests during this trip were different. “The main 

object of the travels [...] was to examine the antiquities 

of Nicaragua”. Boyle sailed on a small steamer on the 

San Juan River to Granada, and from there rode to the 

mining region of Chontales, where he spent some time 

digging out Indian graves in search for antiquities. 

Along the way to Libertad, the main village in this 

region, he writes, “every branch was decked with a 

fringe of orchids”; and, lying under a big tree, he saw 

that “purple dendrobia boldly clung to the lianas, 

parasites of a parasite” (Boyle, 1868). “Who in a volume 

could tell the story of this tree and its inhabitants, could 

describe the variety, the loveliness of its vegetation, 

the millions of its living things...” (Boyle, 1874). In 

January of 1866 Boyle had returned to Granada, from 

where he explored the surroundings until the first days 

of March. In March of 1866, Boyle sailed from the 

port of El Realejo to Puntarenas, in Costa Rica, riding 

from there to San José, the capital of the country. “The 

beautiful purple orchids, for which Costa Rica is famed 

[Guarianthe skinneri], hung trailing down from walls 

and branches...” as Boyle noticed (Boyle, 1868). After a 

few weeks in San José, he returned to Greytown along 

the road of Sarapiquí. In Greytown he embarked for


his return trip to England. His collections of antiquities 

went to the British Museum. 

Thomas Belt (1832-1878), English geologist and 

naturalist, was born at Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1832, and 

educated in that city. As a youth he became actively 

interested in natural history through the Tyneside 

Naturalists Field Club. In 1852 he went to Australia 

and for about eight years worked at the gold-diggings, 

where he acquired a practical knowledge of ore deposits. 

In 1860 he proceeded to Nova Scotia to take charge of 

some gold-mines, and there met with a serious injury, 

which led to his return to England. In 1861 he wrote 

on the origin of mineral veins in Australia. Later on he 

was engaged for about three years at Dolgelly (North 

Wales), another though small gold-mining region, and 

here he carefully investigated the rocks and fossils, 

his observations being published in an important and 

now classic memoir in the Geological Magazine for 

1867. In the following year he was appointed to take 

charge of some mines in Nicaragua, where he passed 

four active and adventurous years (1868-1872) the 

results being given in his The Naturalist in Nicaragua 

(1874), a work of high merit. In this volume the author 

expressed his views on the former presence of glaciers 

in that country. In subsequent papers he dealt boldly and 

suggestively with the phenomena of the Glacial period 

in Britain and in various parts of the world. After many 

further expeditions to Russia, Siberia and Colorado, 

he died at Denver on the 21st of September 1878 and 

was buried there. Belt arrived at Greytown, as did most 

of the Europeans traveling to Nicaragua, and gives an 

interesting description of the route along the San Juan 

River to the Lake of Nicaragua. The mine managed 

by Belt was in the region of Chontales, in the Santo 

Domingo valley, where he made the acquaintance 

of the well-known German botanist Dr. Seemann, 

who was the manager at that time of the neighboring 

Javalí mine. Seemann died at Javalí; and Belt read the 

Burial Service over him, as was his custom upon the 

death of any European. Although Belt’s main interests 

were in geology and entomology, he made interesting 

observations about orchids. “Beyond the brushwood, 

which grows where the original forest has been cut 

down, there are large trees covered with numerous 

epiphytes — Tillandsias, orchids, ferns, and a hundred 

others, that make every big tree an aerial garden”. 

“Excepting near the river, the country was very thinly 

115 

timbered; and it was pleasant, after riding across the 

open plains, exposed to the hot rays of the sun, to reach 

the shady banks of the stream, by which grew many 

high thick-foliaged trees, with lianas hanging from 

them, and bromelias, orchids, ferns, and many other 

epiphytes perched on their branches”. “This rock, on 

the southern and most perpendicular side, weathers to 

a whitish colour, and is called Pena Blanca, meaning 

the white peak. It is visible from some points on the 

savannahs. During the summer months it is, on the 

northern side, covered with the flowers of a caulescent 

orchid (Ornithorhynchos) that has not been found 

anywhere else in the neighbourhood; and the natives, 

who are very fond of flowers, inheriting the taste from 

their Indian ancestors, at this time, often on Sundays 

ascend the peak and bring down large quantities of the 

blossoms. Its colour, when it first opens, is scarlet and 

yellow”. “A ridge on the eastern side runs up to within 

about 200 feet of the summit, and so far it is accessible. 

Up this I climbed to the base of the brown rock, the 

perpendicular cliff towering up above me; here and 

there were patches of grey, where lichens clung to the 

rock, and orchids, ferns, and small shrubs grew in the 

clefts and on ledges. There were two fine orchids in 

flower, which grew not only on the rock, but on some 

stunted trees at its base...”. “Amongst the numerous 

plants that do not provide houses, but attract ants to their 

leaves and flower-buds by means of glands secreting a 

honey-like liquid, are many epiphytal orchids, and I 

think all the species of Passiflora”. “Many epiphytes 

grew on the oaks, amongst which the mottled yellow 

flower of an orchid hung down in spikes six feet long” 

(Belt, 1874: 7, 42, 110, 153, 174, 188). “Mr. Belt is 

a close, an accurate, and an intelligent observer. He 

possesses the valuable faculty of wonder at whatever is 

new, or strange, or beautiful in nature; and the equally 

valuable habit of seeking a reason for all that he sees. 

Having found or imagined one, he goes on to make 

fresh observations and seeks out new facts, to see how 

they accord with his supposed cause of the phenomena. 

He is a man of wide experience; having travelled much 

in North and South America and in Australia, as well 

as in many parts of Europe — and always with his eyes 

open — before visiting Nicaragua. He is a geologist 

and an engineer, and knows how to overcome obstacles 

whether caused by the perversity of man or the forces 

of nature” (Wallace, 1874). 


116 

The era of lIberalIsm 

“Paz, educación y prosperidad material” 

(= ‘Peace, education and material prosperity’) 

Slogan of the liberal reform in Guatemala, 1871 

“The immense ideological power of the Church 

was a notorious characteristic in the formation of 

Central American society… The establishment of 

secular power was slow and difficult; a first attempt 

was made in the second half of the XVIII century, 

under the Bourbons of enlightened Spain. But one has 

to wait until the end of the XIX century to observe a 

moderate laic triumph: this is the liberal era, the era of 

positivism, of education controlled by the State and the 

definitive consecration of freedom of religion (Pérez 

Brignoli, 2000: 27)”. “... the fight between liberals and 

conservatives (clericals) fills the history of Central 

America in the second half of the century...” (Halperin 

Donghi, 2001: 258). 

In Guatemala the liberal revolution triumphed 

in 1871, dominated by the figure of president Justo 

Rufino Barrios, who was responsible for a radical 

agrarian reform and the expropriation of ecclesiastical 

possessions. In 1876 liberal ideas gained strength in 

El Salvador, during the presidency of Rafael Zaldívar 

(1876-1885) and under strong Guatemalan influence. 

Nicaragua and Honduras were an exception, with 

reforms that were frustrated or incomplete. While 

Walker’s defeat in Nicaragua was followed by more 

than thirty years of conservative governments, regional 

fragmentation, difficulties in communications and 

backwardness hindered in Honduras the consolidation 

of the State. In Costa Rica, the liberal reforms initiated 

in the forties by president Braulio Carrillo were 

continued by president José María Castro Madriz, who 

fought for public education and for the freedom of 

the press, and by the ‘progressive authoritarianism’ of 

dictator Tomás Guardia (1870-1882). The first public 

schools and the first universities of Central America 

were founded during those years. 

“After most of Latin America achieved independence 

from Spain in the early nineteenth century, foreign 

naturalists began to visit the new republics, as part 

of a flood of foreign soldiers, miners, engineers, 

adventurers, missionaries and others. The botany 

practiced by these foreign naturalists was essentially 

LANKESTERIANA 


extractive. They extracted botanically significant plants 

in much the same way that foreign corporations such 

as the United Fruit Company extracted bananas from 

Central America… By the late nineteenth century, the 

most important herbaria of Latin American plants were 

to be found in Europe and North America… Beginning 

in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, however, 

many Latin American countries began to produce 

their own botanical inventories and national floras. 

The growing official interest in the natural world 

coincides with the liberal era in Latin America that 

lasted roughly from 1870 to 1930. National botanical 

inventories appealed to Latin America’s liberal elites 

for ideological and practical reasons. During the liberal 

era, national governments pursued the goals of ‘order 

and progress’, enlisting science and technology to 

help rationalize and modernize the state, the economy, 

and society. They pursued economic growth through 

the export of tropical commodities – ranging from 

industrial commodities such as rubber and henequen 

to luxury foods such as coffee, sugar and bananas. 

This meant that during the liberal era many Latin 

American economies -and by extension the states- 

depended heavily upon plants… The leaders in each 

country began to take an interest in botany that offered 

the possibility of increasing the production of existing 

export crops and of discovering new ones. Many Latin 

American governments established or revived national 

botanical gardens, agricultural experiment stations, 

and natural history museums, whose research agendas 

included surveying the nation’s plants, compiling 

national herbaria and, most significantly, producing 

national floras” (McCook, 2002: 514-515). 

Liberal ideas also led to the creation of private 

gardens and collections, combining leisure with 

scientific interests. In the history of the orchids of 

Central America the legendary orchid hunter began to 

be displaced by the scientific collector. Although great 

quantities of plants where still collected and sent to 

Europe and later to the United States, the shipments of 

herbarium specimens began to outnumber those of live 

plants. A further contribution to this development were 

the improvement of methods for the reproduction of 

orchids from seed in England, which began in 1849 and 

the production of the first hybrids by John Dominy in 

1854. “Gradually […] the interest in imported species 

waned as commercial success in orchid hybridization


increased” (Reinikka, 1995: 66). The era of the great 

collectors, of the great adventurers and gatherers of 

living plants, came slowly to an end, and gave way 

to a large group of scientific travelers, whose main 

interest was the collection of herbarium specimens. An 

additional reason for this change were the rising costs 

of the expeditions. 

As Boyle wrote in 1893, “twenty years ago, nearly 

all the great nurserymen in London used to send out 

their travellers; but they have mostly dropped the 

practice. Correspondents forward a shipment from 

time to time. The expenses of the collector are heavy, 

even if he draw no more than his due. [...] Then, grave 

losses are always probable –in the case of South 

American importations, certain. It has happened not 

once but a hundred times that the toil of months, the 

dangers, the sufferings, and the hard money expended 

go to absolute waste. Twenty or thirty thousand plants 

or more an honest man collects, brings down from the 

mountains or the forests, packs carefully and ships. 

[...] The cases arrive in England – and not a living 

thing therein!” (Boyle, 1983: 68). 

German (and other) collectors in the second half of 

the XIX century. Germany played always an important 

role in the history of Botany. When national unity was 

achieved, symbolized by the crowning of Wilhelm I as 

German Emperor in 1871, natural sciences received a 

new impulse. The Royal Herbarium in Berlin, created 

in 1815 under the tutelage of the Royal Prussian 

Academy of Sciences to host the collections of de C. 

L. Willdenow, became in 1879 the Royal Botanical 

Museum of Berlin, to which the Botanical Garden 

was attached in 1910.When the German Empire 

expanded during the 1880s, with the incorporation 

of the colonies of Cameroon, Togo, German South- 

West Africa, Eastern Africa, South Pacific Territories, 

Kiautschou, New Guinea and Samoa, a great wave of 

emigrants began to leave Germany. During the last 30 

years of the XIX century more than 4 million Germans 

left for America, Africa and Asia in search of fortune. 

Great opportunities presented themselves to 

German explorers and scientists to explore little known 

territories. Reichenbach had, until his death in 1889, an 

inexhaustible source of new orchid species that were 

sent to him from all confines of the globe. His place 

would be occupied very soon by a young scientist 

117 

who, at the age of 19, embarked on his first exploratory 

mission to colonial Africa: Rudolf Schlechter. 

The new wave of German collectors in Central 

America began with Gustav Wallis (1830-1878) (Fig. 

40F), who was born with a physical limitation: he was 

deaf and mute until six years of age, when he learned to 

articulate, although a speech defect persisted during his 

entire life (Reinika, 1995: 234). Despite of his problem, 

and of a childhood filled with penuries, he showed 

always an indomitable will and enormous energy. He 

learned gardening and botany in Germany, where he 

made his first collections while studying the flora of the 

Alps. He first traveled to America in 1856, collecting 

in Southern Brazil. In connection with a German house 

he started a horticultural establishment, but owing to 

the failure of the parent firm in 1858 Wallis was left 

practically penniless (Veitch, 1906: 63). He continued 

collecting in Brazil, employed by Linden, and explored 

the Amazonas River from its mouth in the Atlantic 

to its source. “At the end of September 1868, utterly 

exhausted by arduous journeys, he returned to Europe. 

... He received the Great Gold Medal for Botany at the 

International Exhibition in Paris and also a premier 

prize from the Belgian Government” (Yearsley, 2007: 

108). During the years of 1860 to 1864 he collected 

again in Brazil and passed in 1865 to Colombia y 

Ecuador, arriving in 1868 in Panama, from where he 

made an excursion to the border of Costa Rica. He 

returned to Europe and in 1869 came under contract 

with Veitch to explore the Philippines. He went to Japan 

and then to the United States and returned to Europe. 

He was sent in 1872 to Colombia, in what would be 

his last travel to South America. Upon the termination 

of his contract with the Veitches he continued to 

collect plants in South America, among them many 

orchids. Reinikka suggests that he arrived in Panama 

after 1875 (Reinikka, 1995: 235), but he must have 

been earlier in Central America, because Reichenbach 

described Trichocentrum capistratum Rchb. f., based 

on a collection by Wallis in Costa Rica in 1871, and 

Zygopetalum (= Kefersteinia) lacteum Rchb. f. (Wallis 

s.n., Panama) in 1872. The majority of his collections 

(as had the collections of Roezl some years before) 

arrived at the London market by intermediation of 

Eduard Ortgies, an important German orchid merchant 

based in Zurich, Switzerland (Anonymous, 1894: 225- 

229). 


118 

Wallis published a few new species, presumably 

based on material collected while he worked for 

Linden, which resulted in a strong personal attack by 

Linden (1875), who accused Wallis of being a corrupt 

collector with little knowledge of plants. “I found him 

penniless, unknown, abandoned. When he left me he 

had a reputation, a small fortune [...]. I took him from 

the Amazon Delta to the Isthmus of Panama, a journey 

which cost me 125,000 francs: an enormous sum 

compared with the paltry returns resulting from the 

specimens arriving in poor condition...” (Ceulemans et 

al., 2006: 146). Wallis answer was a letter of 18 pages 

and consisted in citing previous letters by Linden, 

in which he was congratulated for his work and 

excellent collections (Jörgensen, 2003). In Panama he 

suffered a bad attack of yellow fever, from which he 

barely recovered. He continued working and arrived 

in Ecuador, but a second attack, combined with 

dysentery, proved fatal. “Letters from the collector 

Edward Klaboch carried the news that Wallis died in 

the hospital at Cuenca, Ecuador, on 20 June 1878” 

(Reinikka, 1995: 235). More than 20 species of 

Orchidaceae carry his name, among them Oerstedella 

wallisii (Rchb. f.) Hágsater, one of the most beautiful 

species of this genus. 

Carl Ernst Otto Kuntze (1843-1907) (Fig. 41A), 

the famous German botanist and naturalist, crossed 

Costa Rica from the Atlantic to the Pacific in 1874, 

and complains in his book (Kuntze, 1881) that he 

saw only six species of orchids. He had previously 

explored the isthmus of Panama, between Colón and 

Panama City. The results of his botanical explorations 

were published by Kuntze in his Revisio Generum 

Plantarum that appeared in several parts between 1891 

and 1898. It contained a large section on Kuntze’s 

nomenclatural system that became the source of a 

great deal of controversy. In the third volume, Kuntze 

replied to many of his critics and introduced much 

new material. It was published in two parts in 1893 

and 1898 and contains a lengthy summary of his 

nonconformist system. For the rest of his life, Kuntze 

was engaged in disputes with the botanical community 

on the basic questions of plant nomenclature. An 

enemy of Linné’s binomial system of nomenclature, he 

spoke of the date of 1753 (when Linné promulgated his 

system) as ‘a horrible fiction and mistake that I cannot 

accept as a scientific and honest man’ ”(Anonymous, 

LANKESTERIANA 


1907: 67). In his Revisio Generum Plantarum, Kuntze 

describes over 1,000 new species of Orchidaceae. One 

of his collections was dedicated to him by Cogniaux: 

Campylocentrum kuntzei Cogn. ex Kuntze (= 

Campylocentrum micranthum (Lindl) Rolfe - Bolivia). 

According to some sources, Kuntze was in Mexico at 

the beginning of the XX century, where he collected in 

the states of Veracruz, Puebla and Oaxaca (Anonymous, 

1906: 167). However, no records of collections of 

Orchidaceae have been found from these travels. 

As one of many German emigrants who traveled 

to the tropics searching for fortune, Baron Hans 

von Tuerckheim (1853-1920) (Fig. 41B) arrived in 

Guatemala in 1877. He settled in the region of Alta 

Verapaz, near Cobán, where he acquired the farm 

‘Chicoyogüito’, thanks to a letter of recommendation 

from the German Charge of Affairs Werner von Bergen 

(Wagner, 2007: 178). There he lived, producing coffee 

and studying the flora and fauna of the region. It is 

said that he was disinherited by his German family, 

because he married a Guatemalan dancer. From 1883 

to 1895, von Tuerckheim substituted for the Charge of 

Affairs at the German vice-consulate in Cobán, until 

he decided to sell his farm and return to Germany. In 

1906 he returned to Guatemala for a short period and 

left finally Central America in 1914. The collections 

by von Tuerckheim whose numbers start with “II” are 

all from this last journey. In 1910 he made a short trip 

to the Dominican Republic (March-June, 1910), as 

German consul in that country. From this trip we know 

of several collections (Pleurothallis appendiculata 

Cogn., Tuerckheim 3233). When he started to have 

financial problems due to the fall of the international 

coffee prices, he began collecting plants and seeds at 

a larger scale, which he exported to laboratories and 

botanical gardens. At a certain point of his research 

in Guatemala he received financial support from John 

Donnell-Smith, the great North American botanist, 

who distributed von Tuerckheim’s specimens to the 

most important herbaria of the world (Maldonado 

Polo, 1996: 135). Donnell-Smith published also his 

Enumeratio Plantarum Guatemalensium, describing 

von Tuerckheim’s collections in Guatemala, including 

40 species of orchids (Donnell-Smith, 1889: 41.45). 

His collections form the base for a more exact 

knowledge of the orchid flora of Guatemala, mainly 

that of Alta Verapaz, especially because he occupied


A B 

C 

D 

Figure 40. A — San Jose in Endrés’ time. 19th century postcard, courtesy of Alvaro Castro. B — Epidendrum endresii Rchb.f. 

Illustration by A. Goosens, in Cougniaux and Goosens, 1896-1907. C — Endrés’ obituary in the Gardeners’ Chronicle, May 

8, 1875. D —Ephraim G. Squier (1821-1888). In Squier, 1972: 28. E — Gustav Wallis (1830-1878). Courtesy of the Oakes 

Ames Herbarium, Harvard University.. 

E 

119 


120 

C 

A B 


LANKESTERIANA 119 

Figure 41. A — Carl Ernst Otto Kuntze (1843-1907). Courtesy of the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. B — Hans 

von Tuerckheim (1853-1920). Courtesy of Freddy Archila. C — The city of Cobán, 19th century. In Wagner, 2001: 121. 

D — Frederick Sander (1847-1920). In Swinson, 1970, after p. 190. 

D


himself also with the less showy species. “The study 

of the collections prepared by Baron von Tuerckheim 

in the area of Cobán has made us discover a surprising 

number of new species” (Schlechter, 1918: 343). 

Among the many types of new species that he 

discovered, are the following, described mainly 

by Ames and Schlechter: Aspidogyne stictophylla 

(Schltr.) Garay (Tuerckheim II 1994), Dichaea 

intermedia Ames & Correll (Tuerckheim II 1798), 

Dichaea muricatoides Hamer & Garay (Tuerckheim 

s.n.), Dichaea tuerckheimii Schltr. (Tuerckheim s.n.), 

Dryadella guatemalensis (Schltr.) Luer (Tuerckheim II 

490), Dryadella linearifolia (Ames) Luer (Tuerckheim 

7784), Encyclia tuerckheimii Schltr. (Tuerckheim 2456 

), Epidendrum cerinum Schltr. (Tuerckheim 4179 ), 

Epidendrum isomerum Schltr. (Tuerckheim II 167), 

Epidendrum mixtum Schltr. (Tuerckheim II 1868), 

Epidendrum pseudoramosum Schltr. (Tuerckheim 

II 1951), Erythrodes tuerckheimii (Schltr.) Ames 

(Tuerckheim 733), Microstylis tuerckheimii Schltr. 

(Tuerckheim 1017), Platystele jungermannioides 

(Schltr.) Garay (Tuerckheim 698), Scaphyglottis 

cuneata Schltr. (Tuerckheim s.n.), Scelochilus 

tuerckheimii Schltr. (Tuerckheim II-1919), Stelis 

fulva Schltr. (Tuerckheim 4064), Stelis gracilis 

Ames (Tuerckheim 7681), and Stelis rubens, Schltr. 

(Tuerckheim II 1061). Platystele jungermannioides 

is one of his most interesting collections, being 

reputedly the smallest orchid in the world. He is also 

mentioned in relation to the discovery of Catlleya 

bowringiana Veitch: “A planter named Turkheim 

[sic] sent it from British Honduras to Mr. Bowring 

of Forest Farm, Windsor, in 1884” (Boyle, 1901: 

37). Von Tuerckheim was also interested in many 

other plants families, and many new species were 

described and dedicated to him, such as: Coccobola 

tuerckheimii Donn. Sm. (Polygonaceae), Panicum 

tuerckheimii Hackel (Poaceae), Lyonia tuerckheimii 

Urb. (Ericaceae), Phyllanthus tuerckheimii G.L. 

Webster (Euphorbiaceae), Phaseolus tuerckheimii 

Donn. Sm. (Fabaceae), and Columnea tuerckheimii 

Sprague (Gesneriaceae). Von Tuerckheim met briefly 

Bernoulli, before the Swiss went on his last expedition 

to the region of Petén in 1877. 

The city of Cobán (Fig. 41C) and the department 

of Alta Verapaz occupy a special place in the history 

of Guatemalan orchidology, similar to that of San 

121 

Ramón in Costa Rica. With its very humid climate 

(Cobán in the language of the Q´eqchi’ means 

“between rainfalls”) the region offers an enormous 

diversity of orchids and has traditionally been the 

birthplace of the best nurseries in the country. Cobán 

was founded on August 14, 1543 by Dominican friars 

and Emperor Charles V named her ‘Imperial City’. 

The following species of orchids were dedicated to 

the city: Jacquiniella cobanensis (Ames & Schltr.) 

Dressler, Maxillaria cobanensis Schltr., Pleurothallis 

cobanensis Schltr., and Spiranthes cobanensis Schltr. 

The types of the first three were collected by von 

Tuerckheim. The fourth was collected by Friedrich 

Carl Lehmann, of whom we will talk shortly. 

The demand for orchids during the last quarter of the 

century escalated and the collection of plants from the 

wild and their shipment back to Britain (and subsequently 

to the rest of Europe) became a major industry. The time 

was right for Henry Frederick Conrad Sander (1847- 

1920) to set up business as an importer and commercial 

grower of orchids. Sander faced stiff opposition from 

already well-established firms, such as James Veitch, 

Hugh Low, William Bull and others, and he teetered 

on the brink of bankruptcy on several occasions. But 

eventually Sander (later Sander and Sons) became the 

largest orchid establishment in Europe. 

Frederick Sander (Fig. 41D) was born in Bremen 

(Germany) but moved to England at age 16. Marriage 

in 1870 to Elizabeth Fearnley, daughter of a rich printer 

was the catalyst for Sander’s rise to fame, as she provided 

him with the funds to enter business by purchasing a 

seed business at Saint Albans, a short distance northwest 

of London. He soon entered into a profitable 

arrangement with the Czech orchid collector Benedict 

Roezl and they prospered together until Roezl died in 

1884. More and more collectors were employed until 

at one point he had 23 ‘travelers’ collecting orchids for 

him throughout the world. Several of them (Oversluys, 

Falkenberg, Forget, etc.) collected for Sanders in our 

region. The supply of plants of all kinds grew to such an 

extent that Sander found it necessary to set up a second 

nursery in Bruges (Belgium), where 250 glass-houses 

were eventually constructed, of which 50 were used 

to house orchids. Some idea of the scale of Sander’s 

operations can be gained from his claim that he imported 

more than one million plants of just one orchid species, 

Dendrobium phalaenopsis var. schroederiana, from 


122 

New Guinea. Between 1888 and 1894 Sander devoted a 

great amount of work and money on the publication of 

Reichenbachia, a series of beautiful orchid illustrations, 

in Boyle’s worlds “that great monument to orchidology, 

printed in four languages. [...] Sander employed the most 

skilful craftsmen to be found, the finest paper, the most 

deliberate and costly processes, to rival great works of 

the past ...” (in Swinson, 1970: 17). Volume I of the first 

series came out in 1888, containing forty-eight plates. 

Volume two, with the same number of plates, came 

out in 1890. In 1892 and 1894 the two volumes of the 

second series appeared, again with a total of ninety-six 

plates. “It is no wonder that Sander often remarked that 

the project almost ruined him” (Swinson, 1970: 100). 

In 1902 Sander’s three sons (Louis, Fearnley and Fred) 

were taken into partnership but the orchid boom was 

nearing its end. New species were becoming harder 

to find and they did not command such high prices 

as they had in the past. Most other nurserymen no 

longer employed plant collectors, but bought orchids 

on commission, so that any losses incurred during 

shipment (a frequent occurrence) were borne by the 

collector, not by the nurseryman. But Sander remained 

loyal to his long-time collectors Forget and Micholitz, 

who remained in his employment until they retired in 

1914. 

World War I and the German occupation of Belgium 

forced the Sander family to leave Bruges but thanks 

to the services of a Swedish manager the nursery 

survived the war, although many orchids died during 

winter because of fuel restrictions. Frederick Sander 

also survived the war, but in declining health and he 

died in 1920, aged 72 years. He had become a legend 

in Europe. Most royal families grew orchids and they 

all knew him personally and respected his advice. He 

received honors from many of them. Sander exhibited 

orchids throughout Europe during his long career and 

won innumerable trophies for his displays, and awards 

and gold medals for his orchids. Such was his fame 

that he was known as ‘The Orchid King’. Sander was 

Royal Orchid Grower to Queen Victoria from 1886 

and a foundation member of the Orchid Committee of 

the Royal Horticultural Society. A great number of new 

species were dedicated to him. From the American 

Tropics we find among them: Calanthe sanderiana 

B.S. Williams, Epidendrum sanderi A.D.Hawkes, 

Gongora sanderiana Kraenzl., Houlletia sanderi 

LANKESTERIANA 


Rolfe, Laelia sanderiana Crawshay, Lueddemannia 

sanderiana Kraenzl., Maxillaria sanderiana Rchb.f. 

ex Sander, Odontoglossum sanderianum Rchb.f., 

Oncidium sanderae Rolfe, Oncidium sanderianum 

Rolfe, Schomburgkia sanderiana Rolfe, Sobralia 

sanderae Rolfe, and Zygopetalum sanderianum Regel. 

“Though the precise date that Sander sent out his first 

travellers cannot be stated with certainty, it must have 

been very soon after he opened up his shop in 1876...” 

(Swinson, 1970: 44). One of these travelers was Martien 

Oversluys, a (Dutch?) collector with long experience 

in South America, who came to Costa Rica in 1878 

in search of Oncidium splendidum A. Rich. ex Duch. 

Boyle gives us an account of his travels from one part 

of the country to the other, during five years in which 

Oversluys went from North to South and East to West, 

but “not a peon could be found in the woods to recognize 

the sketch which Mr. Sander had given him” (Boyle, 

1901: 243). “It may grow in heaven or in other places, 

but it is not to be found in Costa Rica” (Oversluys in a 

letter to Sander, in Swinson, 1970: 101. “Irritated and 

despairing as time went by, but not permitted to abandon 

the search, the collector found diversion now and again 

in a gallop through the neighboring States. And once he 

pushed as far as Guatemala” (Boyle, 1901: 37). Here 

Boyle relates the story of how Oversluys attempted, in 

vain, to collect a large number of Cattleya bowringiana 

from the roof of a church in a small Indian village, 

having to flee for his life after being discovered. Some 

years later, he returned to Guatemala. “[In March 1889] 

Oversluys was writing from Guatemala that he was 

sending off sixty-nine cases of orchids, including 2,000 

plants of Oncidium splendidum (Fig. 42A). This must 

have delighted Sander’s heart, for this was the plant 

he had dispatched him to find several years earlier” 

(Swinson, 1970: 101). Oversluys was an interesting 

character, and a confirmed pessimist, and like Micholitz 

he was never afraid to tell Sander what he thought of 

him. So he writes: “I duly received your letter of the 

6th May and am very astonished at the order you give 

me to collect in this month Lycaste skinneri. You know 

as well as I do that it is in full growth from April till 

the end of October and cannot be collected in these 

months.’ In his quaint English, he also gave some vivid 

pictures of the problems besetting the orchid hunter: ‘3 rd 

September, 1890, Cobán. I got the plants, many in fine 

pieces, but now have the painful trouble of how I can


get them away from Cobán. At the moment I do not 

know, as the season of heavy rainfall has settled in. I sit 

here before the question. How can I begin to pack and 

get them all away? I had the plants cleaned, arranged 

under the trees in the shade, I will see they are given 

much care and try to keep them in good condition... and 

when carts go down I will see they are packed and sent 

away by and by. Mules are not to be had in Cobán and 

from Guatemala drivers will not come up. All transport 

here is done on men’s backs” (in a letter to Sander, in 

Swinson, A., 1970, op. cit., p. 102). 

At the end of 1894, only three travelers remained 

with Sander: L. Forget, the German William Micholitz, 

and Oversluys, who was almost at the end of his career. 

In April 1895 he was again in Cobán, where he had 

been sent to collect once more Lycaste skinneri: “I have 

already 5,000 plants and think within ten days more 

I’ll have at least 8,000. There is one thing that troubles 

me about your letter of the 25 th February, which I got 

yesterday. That is you hope I will not take up too much 

money. [...] Will you please explain to me how I should 

collect up to 10,000 Lycaste in one month, before 

the season is finished, with seventy-five to hundred 

pounds? [...]” A few days later: “Oncidium splendidum 

is getting scarce. I told my men to look out for further 

spots” (letter to Sander, in Swinson, 1970: 127). After 

this no further news appear from Oversluys, and what 

happened to him is unknown. “Probably though, as 

there is no record of his being killed or dying on the 

job, he merely left Sander’s services or gave up orchid 

hunting and returned home. His final letters indicate 

a trend [...]: increasing expenses and the drying up of 

orchid grounds” (Swinson, 1970: 127). 

“Falkenberg perished at Panama...” This statement 

has been repeated over and over in many orchid 

histories. However, according to Frederick Sander, 

who was his employer and should know better, Carl 

Falkenberg (1850-1880) (Fig. 42B) died at Saint 

Thomas, one of the Virgin Islands (Sander, 1880). 

Born in eastern Germany, Falkenberg came in 1878 to 

Sander’s nursery, asking to be sent as a plant collector 

to South America. Both Sander and Roezl, who was 

present, advised the young man to stay in Europe, 

pointing at the extreme difficulties he would have to 

encounter. But nothing changed his mind and a few 

weeks later he was on his way. He was immediately 

successful (Reichenbach, 1880: 232) and became soon 

123 

famous for his eye for rare plants and for his skill in 

packing them, most of which arrived in Europe in 

perfect condition. His main collecting ground was 

Colombia and he was probably on his way home when 

he passed through Panama, in the first months of 1880. 

If he died in Panama, delirious with yellow fever 

(Munera, 2005), or went already ill onboard his ship, 

dying shortly afterwards in Saint Thomas, is a mystery 

which will probably remain unsolved. Reichenbach 

named in his honor Restrepia falkenbergii, which 

Falkenberg had collected in Colombia, but perhaps his 

most important discovery was Vriesea falkenbergii W. 

Bull, a bromeliad which grows in Panama and won a 

First Class Medal at an exhibit in Kensington, a few 

months before Falkenberg’s death. 

We know little about another of Sander’s collectors, 

Friedrich Christian Bartholomaeus (1854-1904), who 

apparently collected in South America between 1882 

and 1892, but also in Panama and in Mexico. From this 

last country we know of his collection of Laelia anceps 

var. schroederiana (Bock, 2008). 

Friedrich Carl Lehmann (1850-1903) went to South 

America as a collector for the firm of Hugh Low & 

Co. of London. Around 1878 he settled in Popayán, 

Colombia, where he held the position of consul of 

Germany until his death. He made very important 

discoveries of new Colombian species, especially 

in the genus Masdevallia, which was his favorite. In 

1883 he was described as “the most important traveler 

and collector in the United States of Colombia and 

neighboring territories of our time” (Anonymous, 

1883: 287). Reichenbach published his Orchidaceae 

F. C. Lehmannianae ecuadorenses (Reichenbach, 

1878) where he described Lehmann’s collections 

in Ecuador from the year 1876. At the beginning of 

the 1880s he traveled to Costa Rica, Panama and 

Guatemala. Although the exact dates of his journey 

are not known, the first clearly dated collection from 

our area is Physurus lehmannii Schltr. (Lehmann 1757, 

Costa Rica), in 1882. In a short time he discovered 

numerous new Central American species, described 

later by Schlechter and Kränzlin: Dichaea suaveolens 

Kraenzl. (Lehmann 1642, Guatemala), Maxillaria 

stenostele Schltr. (Lehmann 1236, Costa Rica), 

Maxillaria turialbae Schltr. (Lehmann 1098, Costa 

Rica), Physurus lehmannii Schltr. (Lehmann 1757, 

Costa Rica), Physurus nigrescens Schltr. (Lehmann 


124 

s.n., Costa Rica), Pleurothallis jalapensis (Kraenzl.) 

Luer (Lehmann 1296, Guatemala), Stenorrhynchus 

guatemalensis Schltr. (Lehmann s.n., Guatemala), 

Spiranthes cobanensis Schltr. (Lehmann s.n., 

Guatemala), Stelis crescentiicola Schltr. (Lehmann 

4540, Panama). 

An important number of the orchids collected by 

Lehmann were described by F. Kränzlin under the 

title of Orchidaceae Lehmannianae in Guatemala, 

Costarica, Columbia et Ecuador collectae, quas 

determinavit et descripsit (Kraenzlin, 1899). Lehmann 

liked to say: “I attribute my good health, and even my 

life mainly to two things: First, when in danger either 

from natives or, worse still, from lawless white men, I 

never produce a revolver or other weapon… Secondly, 

I never drink water without first boiling it” (Taylor, 

1975: 177). His precautions did not help him. He 

shared the fate of many other explorers of these regions 

and died by drowning in 1903, while trying to cross 

the Timbiquí River with the intention of visiting a gold 

mine in which he had interests. His herbarium and his 

drawings were sold by his widow to the herbarium at 

Kew. Lehmann was also an excellent illustrator. Many 

of the pencil drawings with which he accompanied his 

herbarium specimens are preserved at the herbarium 

at Kew. He also wrote the notes for the geographical 

description in the monograph of Masdevallia edited 

by the Marquis de Lothian and illustrated by Miss 

Woolward (Woolward, 1896), where his extensive 

knowledge about the plants in their native habitats can 

be appreciated (Fig. 42D). A new genus was dedicated 

to him by Kraenzlin: Neolehmannia. 

The botanist Gustav Niederlein (1858-1924) was 

the last German collector to visit Central America 

in the XIX century. Niederlein came very young to 

Argentina, where since 1878 he explored the flora 

of the province of Córdoba. He settled in Argentina 

and in 1893 was appointed as commissioner of that 

country to the Universal Exposition of Chicago. He 

stayed for several years in the United States and in 

1896 acquired, for several museums of Philadelphia, 

the collection of objects of natural history that 

Costa Rica had sent to the Exhibition of Chicago. 

For this reason he was named consul of Costa Rica 

in Philadelphia (González 1921: 223-224). In 1897 

he traveled through Central America and visited 

the Central American Exposition in Guatemala. In 

LANKESTERIANA 


Honduras he collected Pleurothallis niederleinii 

Schltr. (Niederlein s.n.) and Spiranthes hondurensis 

Schltr. (Niederlein s.n.). While in Philadelphia he 

published several works about Central America: The 

State of Nicaragua, The Republic of Guatemala and 

The Republic of Costa Rica (1898). 

“[...] the world — the whole way of life of which 

orchids had been such a typical expression — came to 

an abrupt end on the outbreak of the First World War in 

1914 and even prior to this there were signs of change. 

The despoiling of the world’s tropical wild places could 

not continue unchecked and the trade in the export of 

tropical species never recovered” (Black, 1973: 56). 

Hemsley and the ‘Biologia Centrali-Americana’. 

Godman y Salvin were mentioned in the last chapter. 

They made the decision to “produce a work which 

should review every form of life in a definite part of the 

world”. This work, the Biologia Centrali-Americana, 

resulted from the contributions of the best specialists 

in its time in all fields of natural history, and is perhaps 

the most monumental biological publication of all 

times. It contains 1677 illustrations, of which more 

than 900 are in color. It was published at irregular 

intervals during 36 years (1879 a 1915). The preface is 

by Sir J. D. Hooker. This work, written over a century 

ago, is an obligatory reference for anybody wishing to 

study Central America’s biodiversity. 

William Botting Hemsley (1843–1924) (Fig. 

42D), in charge of the Botany for this work, published 

the first list of the orchids of Central America and 

Mexico (Hemsley, 1879), a condensed version of 

the one that would later appear in volume III (1883) 

of the botany of the Biologia Centrali-Americana. 

During the same period he published the description 

of an important number of botanical species in his 

Diagnoses plantarum novarum vel minus cognitarum 

Mexicanarum et Centrali-Americanarum (Hemsley, 

1878-1880). Hemsley became in 1899 Keeper 

of the Herbarium and Librarian of Kew, in which 

positions he served until his retirement in 1908 

(Jackson, 1924: 77). The final version of Hemsley’s 

Orchideae can be found in volume III of the Botany 

and is dated November 1883. It lists 927 different 

species distributed in 100 genera, indicating their 

localities of collection in Mexico and Central 

America. 109 plants are illustrated, but no orchids.


Thus, despite all efforts by collectors and botanists, 

at the end of the XIX century less then one third 

of all presently known Central American orchid 

species had been identified. In volume IV of 

March 1887, Hemsley wrote a historical sketch of 

the botanical exploration of the region. Restrepia 

hemsleyana (today a synonym of R. antennifera 

Kunth) was dedicated to him by Rudolf Schlechter. 

In recognition of his services Hemsley was elected 

an Honorary Member of the Natural History Society 

of Mexico (Anonymous, 1925: 22). He passed away 

in Broadstairs, on October 7, 1924. 

The Botanical Station in Belize (1892-1921). 

Originally the nation’s capital, popular lore has Belize 

City built on a landfill of mahogany chips and rum 

bottles, both ingredients generated by the British pirates 

of the XVIII century (Miller & Miller, 2002: 70). At 

the beginning of the XIX century, all Guatemalan trade 

passed through this port. The common route left the 

Central American capital and had to cross the fearful 

‘Montaña del Mico’ (=‘Mountain of the Monkey’) to 

arrive finally at the port of Izabal. Here the merchandise 

was embarked on small vessels that sailed along the 

coastline to Belize, from where British ships would 

carry it, via Jamaica, on to England. During the 1840s 

trade with the United States began to flourish, again 

through Belize (Fig. 43A). 

Skinner used this route for many years to ship his 

orchids to England and it was not until 1855, when the 

Panama railroad was inaugurated, that Belize lost its 

importance for Central American trade to Europe and 

the United States. 

An Account of the British Settlement of Honduras, 

written by Captain George Henderson of the 44 th 

Regiment of the British Army, contains the earliest 

detailed description of the natural history of Belize 

(Henderson, 1811). Interspersed with descriptions 

of the economic activity of the colony (mostly 

based on timber) are numerous references to the 

conspicuous or useful plants, often referred to by 

scientific and common name” (Balick et al., 2000: 

5). But Henderson did not mention any orchids. 

In fact, few orchids from Belize were known 

during the XIX century. Leaving aside the types of 

Polystachya clavata Lindl. (1842) and Brassavola 

digbyana Lindl., already mentioned, there is 

125 

only the publication by Reichenbach, in 1876, of 

Epidendrum (= Encyclia) belizense. 

Stephens, the great North American traveler, wrote 

that in 1841 the territory of Belize counted no more 

than 6,000 inhabitants, of which 4,000 were Negroes 

employed by the wood cutters (slavery had been 

abolished in 1839). “Government House is built on a 

beautiful site at the end of the city, with a park that 

extends to the water and is adorned with coconut 

palms” (Stephens, 1841: 15). It was on the site of 

the Governor’s kitchen garden where years later the 

Botanic Station of Belize (also known as Botanic 

Center) was built, the first botanical garden to be 

established in Central America. 

A botanical research facility was formally proposed by 

J. D. Hooker, Director of Kew from 1865 to 1885, and 

adopted by the Secretary of State for Colonies in 1884 

(Balick et al., 2000: 6). It was given a one-acre terrain 

behind Government House and began functioning in 

1892. A postcard dated 1904 depicts an orderly garden 

with well-maintained paths. George Samuel Jenman 

(1845-1902) assisted in the establishment of the Botanical 

Station. Jenman, who had arrived in Guyana in 1879 as 

Government botanist and Superintendent of Gardens to 

work on the enhancement project of the Georgetown 

area, came to Belize in October of 1890. During that 

time he made a collection of Arpophyllum giganteum 

Lindl. (Jenman s.n., Belize). George S. Jenman was an 

important figure in the botanical exploration of Guyana, 

and collected the types of two new orchid species for 

that region: Cattleya jenmanii Rolfe (Jenman s.n.), and 

Sievekingia jenmanii Rchb.f. (Jenman s.n.). Robert A. 

Rolfe named in his honor a new genus of Orchidaceae: 

Jenmania, with a single species, Jenmania elata (J. 

Zahlbr.) Rolfe. The Jenman Herbarium of the University 

of Guyana was named in his honor. 

James McNair was the first superintendent (1892 to 

1896), followed by Eugene Campbell (1896 to 1920), 

who presided over the station for most of its brief 

existence. On several occasions Campbell wrote of his 

dissatisfaction with the size and location of the station 

at Belize City and proposed creating a permanent 

station in the Stann Creek District, probably where the 

Forestry Department now has a field station. Charles 

Hummel assumed control over the station in 1821, 

after which the project was abandoned (Balick et al., 

2000: 6). 


126 

LANKESTERIANA 

Table 7. Species of Orchidaceae that grew in the Botanical Station of Belize in 1899 (Balick et al., 2000: 14) . 

Botanical name as it appears in the original list Botanical name today 

Brassavola nodosa Brassavola nodosa (L.) Lindl. 

Brassavola grandiflora Brassavola grandiflora Lindl. 

Brassavola cuspidata Brassavola cuspidata Hook. 

Brassia maculata Brassia maculata R. Br. 

Epidendrum cochleatum Prosthechea cochleata (L.) W.E. Higgins 

Epidendrum radicans Epidendrum radicans Pavón ex Lindl. 

Epidendrum acicularis Encyclia bractescens (Lindl.) Hoehne 

Epidendrum bootheri Prosthechea boothiana (Lindl.) W. E. Higgins 

Epidendrum stamfordianum Epidendrum stamfordianum Batem. 

Epidendrum atropurpureum Encyclia cordigera (Kunth) Dressler 

Epidendrum alatum Encyclia alata (Batem.) Schltr. 

Epidendrum alatum majus Encyclia alata (Batem.) Schltr. var. majus 

Galeandra Batemanii Galeandra batemanii Rolfe 

Catasetum tridentatum Catasetum tridentatum Hook. 

Cattleya skinneri Guarianthe skinneri (Batem.) Dressler & N. H. Williams 

Cattleya Gaskelliana Cattleya gaskelliana B. S. Wms. 

Oncidium luridum Trichocentrum luridum (Lindl.) M.W. Chase & N. H. Williams 

Oncidium papilio Psychopsis papilio (Lindl.) H. G. Jones 

Dendrobium moschatum Dendrobium moschatum Sw. 

Dendrobium fimbriatum Dendrobium fimbriatum Hook. 

Stanhopea grandiflora Stanhopea grandiflora (Lodd.) Lindl. 

Schomburgkia undulata Schomburgkia undulata Lindl. 

Vanilla planifolia Vanilla planifolia Andr. 

Eugene Campbell made several collections of 

Orchidaceae during his time as superintendent of the 

Botanical Station: Brassavola cucullata (L.) R. Br. 

(Campbell s.n.), Cycnoches ventricosum Bateman 

(Campbell s.n.), Encyclia alata (Batem.) Schltr. 

(Campbell s.n.), Epidendrum ciliare L. (Campbell 

s.n.), and Rhyncholaelia dygbiana (Benth.) Schltr. 

(Campbell 104). 

A list of the plants in cultivation at the Botanic 

Station in 1899 can be found in the archives of Kew, 

sent by C. A. Moloney, Governor and Commander-in- 

Chief. This list is apparently the earliest list of plants 

collected or introduced into the colony, and it shows 

23 species of orchids. [Table 7] Among the species 

mentioned in this list is Prosthechea cochleata, the 

“Black Orchid”, Belize’s National Flower. There 

is another list in the archives of Kew, indicating 

that there was an herbarium at the Botanic Centre. 

The whereabouts of these collections are however 

unknown” (Balick et al., 2000: 15). 

32 This chapter follows mostly Gómez, 2007. 


Central American orchids in England at the end of 

the XIX century 32 . Among the most important English 

establishments dedicated to the import and growing of 

orchids were the house of B.S. & H. Williams (Victoria 

and Paradise Nurseries) and that of James Veitch in 

Chelsea, of which we talked in the previous chapter. 

The first one produced the famous The Orchid- 

Grower’s Manual, (first edition 1852), and the second 

a catalogue, the Hortus Veitchii, published in 1906. 

The Williams were great promoters of British 

orchidomania, particularly Benjamin who began, 

in 1851 and at the suggestion of John Lindley, a 

divulgative series entitled Orchids for the Millions, 

published in The Gardeners’ Chronicle. From this 

series the famous Orchid Album was derived, a 

monthly publication with illustrations by John Fitch. 

The Orchid-Grower’s Manual contains 796 pages, 

with 310 line illustrations. We are following here the 

7 th (last) edition, published in 1894, which lists a total 

of 3,359 taxa of which the authors consider that 2,650


A B 

C D 

Figure 42. A — Oncidium splendidum A. Rich ex Duchartre. Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, plate 5878. B — Carl Falkenberg 

(1850-1880). In Sander, 1880: 173. C — Illustration of a species of Rodriguezia by F.C. Lehmann. Courtesy of Rudolf 

Jenny. D — William Botting Hemsley (1843–1924) Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny and the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. 

127 


128 

LANKESTERIANA 

A B 

C 

E 

Figure 43. A — Old Belize City. Front cover of Thomson, 2004. B — Henri Francois Pittier (1857-1950). Portrait by Sava 

Botzaris (Caracas, 1942) in the frontispiece of Häsler & Baumann, 2000. C — Meteorological Institute, San José. Courtesy 

of L.D. Gómez. D — Anastasio Alfaro (1865-1951). Courtesy of his grandson, Rodrigo van der Laat Alfaro. E — Map of 

Panama by Pittier. In Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 113. 


D


are valid names. From the valid names, 163 correspond 

to Central American species. 

The Hortus was a limited edition for private 

distribution, beautifully bound and that used a 

watercolor paper of heavy weight. The edition was 

obviously prepared for a select and wealthy list of 

clients, and was divided into five sections or chapters. 

Part one is a history of the Veitch family and of the 

creation of the company and its evolution. Part two is 

dedicated to short biographies, with interesting notes, 

of the travelers and collectors sponsored by Veitch 

& Son, which amount to a total of 22, between 1840 

and 1905. Section three is destined to biographical 

data about the main horticulturists, most of them 

dedicated to the hybridization of orchids. Section four 

is the one that is of interest to us. It bears the title of 

Orchid Species. A list of the principal orchid species 

introduced by Messrs. Veitch. The list mentions 219 

species with its author, origin, often curious notes and 

a very brief description. Of these species 23 are Central 

American. 

Because of the different selection criteria, in 

Veitch for a wealthy clientele and in Williams based 

on a populist attitude of orchids for the millions, any 

analysis or numerical comparison would be useless. 

It is clear, however, that Central American orchids 

played a very important role in the early development 

of professional and amateur orchidology. 

Costa Rica: the National Museum and the ‘Instituto 

Físico-Geográfico’ 

“The interest for natural sciences is proportional 

to the spiritual development of the nations” 

Karl Wercklé 

(In a letter to Dr. N. L. Britton,1901) 

Botanical exploration of Central America was 

in the hand of foreigners during the entire century. 

“Costa Rica attracted more botanists and plant hunters 

than the neighboring countries. Although the list by 

Lanjouw (1945) is not complete, it shows that in the 

XIX century Costa Rica was visited by 10 scientists 

or collectors, Nicaragua by 5, Panama by 6 and 

Guatemala by 7. This preference can be explained 

because the publications by the foreigners who visited 

129 

the country after Independence were very favorable to 

Costa Rica” (León, 2002: 154). However, the last two 

decades of the century showed for the first time the 

development of a ‘national science’ in Central America. 

In Costa Rica, “as part of an educational reform aimed 

at secularizing public education, the government of 

president Bernardo Soto (1885-1889) hired a group of 

European academics to staff the two new public high 

schools in the capital, San José (The ‘Liceo de Costa 

Rica’ for boys and the ‘Colegio Superior de Señoritas’ 

for girls, both founded under Soto’s administration). 

The arrival of these academics marks the beginning 

of a small scientific renaissance in Costa Rica. Two 

institutions symbolize this renaissance: the Instituto 

Físico-Geográfico (IFG) (=‘Physical-Geographical 

Institute’) and the National Museum, founded in 1887 

and 1889, respectively.” 

Among the hired teachers were Pablo Biolley 

(1861-1908) and Henri Francois Pittier (1857-1950) 

(Fig. 43B), who arrived in 1886 and 1887. Pittier 

lived in Costa Rica until 1905 and during these years 

conducted a systematic exploration of the Costa Rican 

flora that had no equal in his time in any country of 

tropical America. From these efforts resulted the 

publication of the Primitiae Florae Costaricensis, 

the first flora of Costa Rica, a work that unfortunately 

was not concluded 33 . The Primitiae was published 

in conjunction with a Belgian colleague, Téophile 

Alexis Durand (1855-1912) and appeared in three 

volumes and 12 fascicles, published from 1891 to 

1905 (Grayum et al., 2004: 12). According to Paul C. 

Standley, in his introduction to the Flora of Costa Rica: 

“Henri Pittier has undoubtedly gained a more intimate 

knowledge of the natural history and especially the 

botany of Central America and northwestern South 

America than has ever been possessed by any single 

person” (Standley, 1937:49). 

The combined labors of Pittier, Alfaro, Tonduz, 

Biolley, Wercklé, Brenes and the Brade brothers 

resulted in the formation of the National Herbarium that 

counted initially with more than 5,000 species. Citing 

Standley again, in 1903 the National Herbarium “was 

unequaled below the Río Grande del Norte” (Standley, 

1937:50). Pittier’s other goal was the creation of a map 

of Costa Rica. Cartographic work began in 1891 and 

33 Only the first two volumes of the Primitiae Flora Costaricensis were published. Pittier expected Schlechter to write the fascicle 

on the orchids, which never happened. 


130 

went on until the publication of the map in 1904. A 

great part of the botanical exploration of the country 

followed the routes of the mapping expeditions. 

“Perhaps the most important result of these efforts 

were his travels to the southern region of the country, 

almost unexplored at that time” (Castro Castro & 

Colombo Víquez, 1989: 114). Although hired to teach 

at secondary schools, Pittier had more ambitious 

ideas and immediately after his arrival in Costa Rica 

started to fight for the formation of a meteorological 

observatory and an institute. The Meteorological 

Institute (Fig. 43C) was founded in April 1888, under 

the direction of Pittier. 

“Shortly before Pittier arrived, a young Costa Rican 

named Anastasio Alfaro (1865-1951) (Fig. 43D) had 

persuaded the government to organize a national 

museum. Alfaro had overcome the obstacles facing any 

student of the sciences in Costa Rica (such as the lack 

of mentors and facilities) to become an essentially selftaught 

naturalist and archaeologist and a collaborator 

with several important U.S. scientists. Minister of 

Development Cleto González Víquez... had dispatched 

Alfaro on a mission to the United States to learn about 

the latest techniques in museum organization. On 

Alfaro’s return in May 1887, the government funded 

the creation of the Museo Nacional and named Alfaro 

its first director” (Eakin, 1999: 127). Pittier, who had 

been in Costa Rica for only two months, was named on 

the Board of Directors of the Museum, together with 

Pablo Biolley and José Cástulo Zeledón. 

With the publication of a list with the known plants 

of Costa Rica, an interest awoke in professor Alfaro 

for the study of botany which lasted to his last days 

(Alfaro, 1888). Alfaro wrote, a few months after the 

inauguration of the Museo Nacional: “And in no 

way can this void [the absence of studies about the 

vegetation of the country] be filled if not with the 

formation of collections in which day by day the 

material accumulates that is indispensable to achieve 

a correct scientific knowledge” (cited in Viales & 

Clare, 2006: 12). He paid great attention to orchids, 

ferns, mosses and cacti, making important discoveries 

in each of these groups. The list published by Alfaro 

was an extract of the botanical part of the Biologia 

Centrali-Americana of W. B. Hemsley (from the 

Botanic Gardens at Kew), edited by the British 

naturalists Godman and Salvin some years earlier. 

LANKESTERIANA 


Unfortunately, Alfaro and Pittier, the two major 

scientific entrepreneurs in the small country, never 

could agree on how to organize their operations. In 

1889 the government consolidated the Museum and the 

Meteorological Institute into one center, the ‘Instituto 

Físico-Geográfico Nacional de Costa Rica’. This was a 

temporary triumph for Pittier, who was named director. 

However, integration only lasted a few months and 

the Museum was again separated from the rest of the 

Institute. In 1890, Pittier became part of the staff of the 

recently founded School of Agriculture, where he as 

in charge of the practical instruction. In 1898, a severe 

economic crisis led the government to cut expenses 

and to eliminate entire agencies and departments. 

One of them was the Instituto Físico-Geográfico. 

“The small staff of the Museum took custodial care 

of the collections that Pittier and Alfaro had amassed 

over the previous decade (especially the Herbario 

Nacional)” (Eakin, 1999: 133). But Pittier continued 

fighting. In 1901 he apparently persuaded politicians 

of the practical benefits that his research in economic 

botany could bring. The government, at a time when 

the nation was feeling the worst consequences of 

coffee monoculture, revived the IFG, which absorbed 

the Museo Nacional as one of its divisions. However, 

constant intrigues and lack of funds led to Pittier’s final 

falling out with the government. In 1905 he left the 

country to work in the United States and on to a long 

and distinguished career in Venezuela until his death in 

1950. With his departure, the Instituto lost its creator 

and engine, and Costa Rica a dynamic and prolific 

scientist. 

“Within a month, Anastasio Alfaro became the new 

director of the Instituto. The government assigned 

an assistant to care for the collections in each of the 

three sections: the Museo, the observatory, and the 

herbarium. In effect, the Instituto was reduced to a 

collection of plants and an assistant who made daily 

meteorological observations. In 1910 the observatory 

became an official division of the Museo Nacional, and 

the Instituto essentially ceased to exist in name as well 

as fact” (Eakin, 1999: 135-136). Alfaro was not really 

a botanist and even less an orchidologist. In Pittier’s 

opinion, “Alfaro is hardly a collector, botanically 

speaking… He is before everything a native lawyer 

and his work in natural history is of the amateur kind” 

(Häsler & Baumann, 2000: 145). Notwithstanding,


he collected many specimens that were described 

as new species of Orchidaceae, and many others 

were dedicated to him: Epidendrum alfaroi Ames & 

Schweinf. (A. Alfaro, 174), Epidendrum anastasioi 

E. Hágsater, Maxillaria alfaroi Ames & Schweinf. 

(A. Alfaro, 284), Stelis alfaroi Ames & Schweinf. (A. 

Alfaro, s.n.). Lankester and Ames had great respect of 

him: “Some interesting, and baffling specimens have 

just arrived from your hacienda. Also a few good 

things from Alfaro…” (Letter from Ames to Lankester, 

Jan. 23rd, 1926). 

From the beginning, Pittier had considered the 

botanical exploration of Costa Rica as one of the 

main activities of the Instituto Físico-Geográfico. 

“Pittier began sampling plants for the herbarium in 

the vicinity of San José and eighteen months later 

had collected 2,500 specimens” (León, 2002: 147). 

Pittier collected in Costa Rica until his departure in 

1905. During the same year he visited and collected 

in Guatemala. Between 1906 and 1907 he was again 

briefly in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and 

Costa Rica. Finally, he traveled to Panama employed 

by the United States Department and collected there 

intensively between 1910 and 1917. In 1908, with the 

support of the United States government, he published 

his important work Plantas Usuales de Costa Rica 

(Pittier, 1908). 

In Costa Rica, Pittier had researched in geology, 

meteorology, ethnology, botany, cartography and 

archeology. In Panama, without forgetting his other 

interests, he dedicated himself almost exclusively 

to the botany. From 1910 to 1912 he took part in the 

‘Biological Exploration of Panama’ of the Smithsonian 

Institution, collecting over 4.000 specimens (Fig. 43E). 

“With these words he described his first encounter 

with the astounding biodiversity of the isthmus: ‘I set 

everything up Friday night and yesterday, December 

31, 1910, I began collecting. From the beginning I 

convinced myself of the impossibility of finishing 

the task alone, confronted with a profusion of plants 

flowering in these first months of the summer or dry 

season.’[...] He asked to be assisted by William R. 

Maxon, from the New York Botanical Garden, to study 

the mosses, cacti, orchids and bromeliads. [...] He had 

tried to get Adolphe Tonduz as his assistant, but his 

countryman had already departed from Costa Rica 

to Guatemala (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 81).” Upon 

131 

returning to Washington, he set himself to analyze and 

publish the scientific information of his vast collection 

of plants from Panama, many of them new to science. 

In this research he was assisted by a young botanist 

who would later become famous in the history of 

the botanical exploration of Central America: Paul 

C. Standley. “Pittier was the driving force behind 

the decision of [Panamanian] president Porras to 

establish within the Ministry for Development… the 

Agricultural Service [...] The ‘Estación Experimental 

de Matías Hernández’, the first agricultural research 

center in Panama, was established in 1916. Pittier was 

its first director” (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 87). 

He was always interested in orchids. While working 

on his Primitiae Flora Costaricensis he sent a great 

number of specimens to his friend Théophile Durand in 

Brussels, who passed them on to Schlechter in Berlin 

for identification. The orchids collected in Panama 

during his work for the United States government went 

the same way. “In Panama he had obtained specimens 

from the collections of David D. Gaillard and Mrs. 

Harry Harwood Rousseau and had formed, during the 

botanical exploration of the Smithsonian (together 

with Maxon) a large collection of orchids in the Canal 

Zone and Chiriquí” (Standley, 1925: 357-358). Among 

the latter 18 new species were found. After initial 

differences (Schlechter during some time refused 

to return the material sent by Pittier), Pittier worked 

together with Schlechter until the death of the German 

scientist in 1925. In 1906, Schlechter dedicated a new 

genus of Orchidaceae to Pittier: Pittierella (today a 

synonym of Cryptocentrum). 

Among the types of new species discovered by 

Pittier are: Cranichis pittieri Schltr., Epidendrum 

cardiophorum Schltr. (Pittier 9519, Costa Rica), 

Epidendrum henrici Schltr. (Pittier 2176, Costa Rica), 

Epidendrum insulanum Schltr. (Pittier 16350 Herb. 

Nac., Costa Rica), Kefersteinia costaricensis Schltr. 

(Pittier 16058, Costa Rica), Lockhartia pittieri Schltr. 

(Pittier 3401, Panama), Microstylis (= Malaxis) 

carpinterae Schltr. (Pittier & Tonduz 4394 Herb. 

Nac., Costa Rica), Notylia pittieri Schltr. (Pittier 

6850, Costa Rica), Oncidium pittieri Schltr. (Pittier 

10310, Costa Rica), Oncidium salvadorense Schltr. 

(Pittier 5753, El Salvador)., Prosthechea abbreviata 

(Schltr.) W. E. Higgins (Pittier & Tonduz s.n., Costa 

Rica), Sauroglossum nigricans Schltr. (Pittier s.n., 


132 

Costa Rica), Scaphosepalum elasmatopus Schltr. 

(Pittier 3229, Panama), Scaphosepalum pittieri Schltr. 

(Pittier 11143, Costa Rica), Stelis chiriquensis Schltr. 

(Pittier 3228, Panama), Stelis panamensis Schltr. 

(Pittier 4490, Panama), Stelis perplexa Ames (Pittier 

308, Guatemala), and Vanilla pittieri Schltr. (Pittier 

6600, Costa Rica). Pittier’s orchids are probably 

in the National Herbarium in Washington” (Häsler 

& Baumann, 2000: 206). Pittier moved in 1922 to 

Venezuela and spent the rest of his life in this country, 

where he founded the National Park System and died 

in 1950. The Henri Pittier National Park, located 

along the Coastal Range in northern Venezuela, was 

created in 1937 and named in his honor. He returned to 

Costa Rica for a brief visit in 1938, for the celebration 

of the 50 th anniversary of the ‘Colegio Superior de 

Señoritas’. 

Pablo Biolley (1861-1908) formed part of the first 

group of Swiss teachers hired by the government 

of Bernardo Soto. Biolley established himself 

permanently in Costa Rica, obtaining the Costa Rican 

nationality and marrying a Costa Rican. He died in 

1908 at the very young age of forty six. His sister 

Estela arrived in 1889 and was for many years a 

teacher at the ‘Colegio Superior de Señoritas’. Biolley 

accompanied Pittier during many of his explorations 

and was, for a short period (1904) director of the 

Instituto Físico-Geográfico. Although his main interest 

was in entomology, he made important contributions 

to the knowledge of the Costa Rican flora. To him 

we owe, among others, the discovery of the types of 

Masdevallia ecaudata Schltr. (Biolley 3127, Costa 

Rica), Maxillaria biolleyi (Schltr.) L. O. Williams 

(Biolley 1052, Costa Rica) and Telipogon biolleyi 

Schltr. (Biolley 1340, Costa Rica). 

Shortly after his arrival in Costa Rica in 1887, 

Pittier ...“obtained from the government the necessary 

funding for the assignment of a person in charge of 

the botanical service, for which he chose Adolphe 

Tonduz (1862-1921) (Fig. 44A), who was assistant at 

the botanical garden of Lausanne, Switzerland, and 

arrived in Costa Rica in June of 1889” (León, 2002: 

147). “Botanical exploration of Costa Rica was not 

only closely related with [Tonduz], but depended 

heavily on him” (Häsler & Baumann, 2000: 151). 

However, Pittier was not easily satisfied. In a letter to 

John H. Barnhart (1915) he wrote: “Adolphe Tonduz 

LANKESTERIANA 


has been and is still, a laborious and painstaking 

collector, responsible for almost 60% of the 20,000 

specimens of the Instituto Físico-Geográfico, ... but 

his collections contain again and again the same 

species and comparatively few new things.” Tonduz’ 

collecting excursions were best described by himself 

in his Herborisations au Costa Rica (1895). Pittier and 

Tonduz collected at times together, discovering several 

new species, among them Epidendrum abbreviatum 

Schltr. (Pittier & Tonduz s.n. – Costa Rica). After Pittier 

left Costa Rica, Tonduz went to work for the United 

Fruit Company. In 1908 he held again the position of 

curator of the National Herbarium and in 1911 he went 

to Guatemala, where during a short period he occupied 

a position in the department of phytopathology of the 

Direction of Agriculture. He died in Guatemala, a 

victim of alcoholism, in December 1921. With sadness 

we read Lankester’s words to Ames: “Poor Tonduz 

was also hopeless in this regard [alcoholism] and the 

possession of a small sum of money was immediately 

fatal. I kept him here 10 months during our previous 

stay in Cóncavas (Lankester’s farm near Cartago) and 

had him ‘dry’ the whole time, clothed [and] fed… 

he became a new man, but a salaried position in 

Guatemala broke him completely (in a letter to Ames, 

1922).” 

Costa Rica owes to Tonduz the discovery of 

many new orchid species, most of them described 

by Schlechter (1923). Worthy of mention, among 

others, are the following: Bulbophyllum vinosum 

Schltr. (Tonduz 13734, Costa Rica), Camaridium 

dendrobioides Schltr. (Tonduz 17620 Herb. Nac., Costa 

Rica), Epidendrum acrochordonium Schltr. (Tonduz 

s.n., Costa Rica), Epidendrum majale Schltr. (Tonduz 

17620 Herb. Nac., Costa Rica), Masdevallia tonduzii 

Woolward (Tonduz s.n., Costa Rica), Microstylis 

microtoides Schltr. (Tonduz s.n., Costa Rica), 

Ornithocephalus tonduzii Schltr., (Tonduz s.n., Costa 

Rica), Pleurothallis tonduzii Schltr. (Tonduz 17646 

Herb. Nac., Costa Rica), Stelis aemula Schltr. (Tonduz 

17632b Herb. Nac., Costa Rica), Stelis conmixta Schltr. 

(Tonduz 17632a Herb. Nac., Costa Rica), and Stelis 

sarcodantha Schltr. (Tonduz 17632 Herb. Nac., Costa 

Rica). From his time in Guatemala we know several 

collections of Orchidaceae: Scaphyglottis crurigera 

(Bateman ex Lindl.) Ames & Correll (Tonduz 409, 

Guatemala), and Osmoglossum convallarioides


Schltr. (Tonduz 523, Guatemala) and at least one new 

type: Pleurothallis pacayana Schltr. (Tonduz 413 - 

Guatemala). The illustrious trio of Swiss naturalists is 

remembered in Costa Rica’s geography: the district of 

Biolley and the village of Santa María de Pittier, in the 

province of Puntarenas, and the peaks of Tonduz and 

Pittier, in the mountain range of Talamanca, remind us 

of those initial glorious years when the first national 

scientific institutions were born. 

Other collectors at the end of the XIX century 

“Normal people do not collect plants” 

Franco Pupulin, 2004 (pers. comm.) 

Ludwig Kienast-Zölly grew orchids in his native 

Hirslanden (Zurich), Switzerland, and occasionally 

sent plants to Reichenbach or to Kew for identification, 

among them Epidendrum kienastii Rchb. f., which 

was named in his honor. The archives of the Swiss 

Confederation indicate that Kienast-Zölly was “Consul 

général honoraire” in Mexico, in the period between 

1870 and 1875. He lived, according to Boyle, for 

many years at Orizaba (Veracruz), “where he collected 

orchids with enthusiasm for his own delight.” Boyle 

goes on: “an Indian servant gave zealous help, partly, 

doubtless, for love for the flowers, but partly also for 

love of the master whose ‘bread he had eaten’ from 

childhood [...].”Boyle continues telling us the story of 

Sobralia kienastiana (which was the pride of Kienast- 

Zölly’s collection for many years), a crazy account of 

Indian chiefs, Catholic priests, human sacrifice and an 

orchid laid before the ‘Blessed Mother’, called ‘the 

Devil’s Flower’ (Boyle, 1901: 163-169). Other orchid 

species dedicated to Kienast-Zölly were Oncidium 

kienastianum Rchb. f., Ponera kienastii Rchb. f. and 

Trichopilia kienastiana Rchb. f. Kienast-Zölly was 

a contributor to the Gardeners’ Chronicle, where he 

wrote on Mexican orchids. 

Another Swiss, Rudolf Richard Pfau ( —1897), 

founded in San José, Costa Rica, in the final years of 

the XIX century, a nursery that sold a great variety of 

ornamental plants. He also collected native plants for 

exportation. Through his collections we know that he 

was also in Panama and Colombia, and at least one of 

the new species described from plants sent to Europe 

by Pfau came from Mexico: Vanilla pfaviana Rchb. f. 

Other species discovered by Pfau were: Epidendrum 

133 

pfavii Rolfe (Pfau s.n., Costa Rica), Pleurothallis pfavii 

Rchb.f. (Pfau s.n., Panamá), Sobralia pfavii Schltr. 

(Pfau s.n., Costa Rica), Telipogon pfavii Schltr. (Pfau 

930, Costa Rica), and Trichocentrum pfavii Rchb.f. 

(Pfau 60, Panamá). Pfau wrote the first work published 

in Costa Rica about the orchids of this country: New, 

Rare and Beautiful Orchids of Costa Rica (ca. 1895), of 

greater interest for horticulture than for botany. In this 

work, Pfau gives advice as to how to grow and pack 

orchids for exportation, and includes a list of the species 

he had for sale in his nursery (Fig. 44B). But Pfau’s 

voice is also one of the first to address the rising concern 

about the destruction of our nature, when he describes 

one of our most beautiful orchids: “Cattleya skinneri, 

some ten years ago, was a common Orchid all over 

Central America; but in the last few years it has been 

exported by shiploads; and to-day – at least in Costa 

Rica – it has almost become rare” (Pfau, 1895: 6). Pfau 

also wrote several articles about Central America and its 

orchids, such as The climate of Central America, Orchid 

culture (1883), Notes on the fertilization of Orchids 

in the Tropics (1894) and Costa Rica and its Orchids 

(1896). As did Roezl and Wallis, Pfau sold his plants in 

Europe through the agency of Eduard Ortgies in Zurich. 

Many of his specimens are part of the Reichenbach 

herbarium in Vienna, often accompanied with beautiful 

illustrations by Pfau (Fig. 44C). 

“By the turn of the century, U.S. scientists had 

replaced Europeans as the Instituto’s principal 

collaborators. The first was apparently Sereno Watson 

(1826-1892), who had made important botanical 

explorations in California and went for a short 

period of time to Guatemala (1885), but had to stop 

due to illness. There he made several collections of 

Orchidaceae, among them the type of Pleurothallis 

(=Trichosalpinx) blaisdelli S. Watson (Watson, s.n., 

Guatemala), named in honor of his travel companion, 

F. E. Blaisdell and Notylia guatemalensis Schltr. 

(Watson, s.n., Guatemala). Watson, curator of the Gray 

Herbarium at Harvard until his death, was possibly 

who interested Donnell Smith in the flora of Central 

America” (Williams, 1972: 203). 

George Franklin Gaumer (1850-1929), president 

of the Natural History Society of Kansas University, 

established himself in 1884 in Yucatán, where he 

resided until his death. He was also briefly in Honduras 

and Guatemala (1885). Gaumer stands out for having 


134 

been the first to collect in the island of Cozumel (1885- 

1886), collections that were described by Hemsley 

(Hemsley, 1887b). Besides the types of Triphora 

yucatanensis Ames (Gaumer 1008, Yucatán) and 

Epidendrum yucatanense Schltr. (Gaumer 588), we 

find numerous other orchids among the specimens 

collected by Gaumer, such as: Ionopsis utricularioides 

(Sw.) Lindl. (Gaumer 23305), Rhyncholaelia digbyana 

(Lindl.) Schltr. (Gaumer 23357), Leochilus scriptus 

(Scheidw.) Rchb. f. (Gaumer 23358), Harrisella 

porrecta (Rchb. f.) Fawc. & Rendle (Gaumer 23359), 

Oncidium sphacelatum Lindl. (Gaumer 23664), 

Lophiaris oerstedii (Rchb. f.) R. Jiménez & Carnevali 

(Gaumer 23813), Encyclia belizensis (Rchb. f.) Schltr. 

(Gaumer 23916), and Psygmorchis pusilla (L.) Dodson 

& Dressler (Gaumer s.n.). 

The Czech Eduard Klaboch (1852-1915), a nephew 

of Benedikt Roezl, collected mostly in Ecuador but 

was in Guatemala in 1885, from where we know of 

his collections of Epidendrum elegans (Knowles & 

Westc.) Rchb. f. and Spiranthes acaulis (J. E. Sm.) 

Cogn. He was killed in Mexico. 

John Hinckley Hart (1847-1911), an Englishman 

who worked for the Department of Botany in Jamaica, 

visited Bocas del Toro (Panama) between November 

and December of 1885, where he collected extensively 

in a region that had been scarcely explored. We know 

of only one specimen of Orchidaceae among his 

collections: Brassavola nodosa (L.) Lindl. (Hart 111). 

Edward Shuttleworth (1829-1909) (Fig. 44D) 

collected in 1873 for William Bull in Colombia. He 

collected several new species of Masdevallia and was 

successful to bring them back to England alive. After 

his return from South America he founded, together 

with John Carder (-1908), another of Bull’s collectors, 

his own company under the name of Shuttleworth 

and Carder. Like Shuttleworth, Carder was a gardener 

by training and like him, worked for William Bull’s 

nursery in Clapton, England, and collected plants in 

South America. There are no accounts of Shuttleworth 

or Carder traveling to Costa Rica, but the database of 

the Missouri Botanical Garden lists two species as 

collected by them in this country: Masdevallia astuta 

Rchb. f. (Costa Rica, Shuttleworth & Carder, s.n.) and 

Masdevallia demissa Rchb. f. (Costa Rica: collected 

by Mr. Carder, and grown by Messrs. Shuttleworth 

& Carder). Several orchid species were dedicated 

LANKESTERIANA 


to the two partners: Stanhopea shuttleworthii Rchb. 

f., Restrepia shuttleworthi Rolfe, Masdevallia 

shuttleworthi Rchb. f., Masdevallia carderi Rchb. f. 

and Oncidium carderi Rchb. f. (Jenny, 2003: 36-37). 

In the meantime, Carl Thieme collected in Honduras 

between 1887 and 1890 (Fig. 45A). He sent his 

specimens to Donnell Smith for identification. “The 

collections of Dr. Thieme, now in the U. S. National 

Herbarium, are the only important ones I know of from 

Honduras before 1900. No Honduran, as far as I know, 

became interested in the native flora until the 1940’s.” 

(Williams, L.O., 1972). To him we owe Pelexia 

hondurensis Ames (C. Thieme 785) and Physurus 

vaginatus Hook. (C. Thieme 681). 

“Shortly after his death, his collections of insects and 

his manuscripts, which must be very important..., were 

sent to Germany... (Pérez Estrada, 1952: 153).” A 

man with a strange character, Thieme never admitted 

women in his house. “Although a real man of science, 

the rarities of his social life were not those of a scientist 

but those of a human being who carries in his soul an 

emotional disturbance and a grief that only death can 

bring to an end. Through vague accounts of his fellow 

countrymen it was known that he had been married and 

that his wife, in whom he had set all of his confidence, 

failed her duties in such a manner that the affronted 

husband was brought to the brink of madness” (Pérez 

Estrada, 1952: 152). 

Reverend Heinrich Theophile Heyde and his nephew 

Ernesto Lux collected extensively in Guatemala 

between 1889 and 1894. Amongst their over 6,000 

collections there are hundreds of orchids, mentioned in 

Orchids of Guatemala and Belize by Ames & Correll 

(1985). Oakes Ames described several new species 

among their specimens: Habenaria macroceratitis 

Willdenow var. brevicalcarata Ames (Heyde & Lux 

6383, 1894), Odontoglossum majale (Heyde & Lux 

3502, 1892), Sarcoglottis zamororae Ames (Heyde & 

Lux 4625, 1893), and Sarcoglottis orbiculata Ames 

(Heyde & Lux 3504, 1892). 

John Donnell Smith (1829-1928) (Fig. 45B), a 

retired captain of the Confederate Army and botanist at 

the Johns Hopkins University worked with Anastasio 

Alfaro and Pittier and made two trips to Costa Rica 

in the 1890s” (Eakin, 1999: 141). Although he had 

no special interest in orchids, his work as a botanist 

was important and he collaborated with Pittier in his


Primitiae Flora Costaricensis, for which he wrote the 

fascicles on the orders of Polypetalae and Gamopetalae 

of the second volume. In Costa Rica he collected 

Oncidium ascendens Lindl. in 1894 (J.D. Smith 4592). 

He also worked in Guatemala, where he made 

important contributions, “not only through his own 

work, but because he financed other scientists such 

as Tuerckheim, Father E. T. Heyde and his nephew 

Ernesto Lux, W. C. Shannon, Juan J. Cooper [in 

Costa Rica], Carl Thieme [in Honduras] and others 

(Maldonado Polo, 1996: 135).” He distributed many 

specimens of the Central American flora among the 

main herbariums of the United States and it may have 

been through him that Ames made his first contacts 

with the orchids of the region (Williams, 1972: 201). 

Among the collections of Donnell-Smith in Guatemala 

we find the following orchids: Epidendrum arbuscula 

Lindl. (J. D. Smith 2635), Epidendrum atropurpureum 

Willd. (J. D. Smith 2225), Epidendrum imatophyllum 

Lindl. (J. D. Smith 1584), and Nageliella purpurea 

(Lindl.) L. O. Wms. (J. D. Smith 2643). Donnell Smith 

was appointed an Honorary Associate of the U.S. 

National Herbarium in 1905, a position that he retained 

until his death in 1928. “Captain Smith published no 

fewer than 39 contributions to the Central American 

flora, all in the Botanical Gazette…” (Williams, 1972: 

201). Of great importance for the knowledge of the 

flora of Guatemala where his Enumeratio Plantarum 

Guatemalensium (Donnell-Smith, 1889-1907). His 

herbarium of Central American material, with over 

100,000 specimens, is preserved at the Smithsonian 

Institution. Louis O. Williams called him ‘the Father 

of Botany in Central America.’ He is commemorated, 

among others, with the moss genus Donnellia and 

Donnelsmithia (Apiaceae). 

William Cummings Shannon (1851-1905), an 

American surgeon, collected specimens of Orchidaceae 

in Guatemala during 1891 and 1892 (Barkeria skinneri, 

Govenia bella, Osmoglossum pulchellum) and went later 

on to Honduras and El Salvador (1893). He botanized 

sparingly in the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica during 

the same year (Grayum et al., 2004: 17). 

Under contract with Anastasio Alfaro, Juan J. Cooper 

(1843-1911) collected plants and birds in Costa Rica 

for local and foreign institutions. He was employed by 

the National Museum and appointed interim director in 

1896. For several years he send herbarium specimens of 

135 

dicotiledons and monocotiledons to John Donell Smith 

from the neighborhood of Cartago and the Atlantic 

region. Several new species of orchids were described 

from specimens collected by Cooper: Epidendrum 

selaginella Schltr. (Cooper 523), Physosiphon cooperi 

Ames (Cooper 481), Pleurothallis cooperi Schltr. 

(Cooper s.n.), and Stelis cooperi Schltr. (Cooper 562). 

Charles Leonard Smith (1866-1923) and Bohumil 

Shimek (1861-1937), American botanists specialized 

in ferns, collected several species of Orchidaceae 

in Nicaragua in 1893 (Leochilus labiatus and 

Psygmorchis pusilla). 

Another American, Charles Fuller Baker (1872- 

1927) brought together a large collection of more 

than 2,500 samples in the Nicaraguan Pacific region 

beginning in 1895. A few orchids, collected in León and 

Granada in 1903, can be found among his specimens 

(Encyclia gravida and Laelia rubescens). 

Before turning the century, special mention must be 

made of U. S. biologist Edward William Nelson (1855- 

1934), who made extensive botanical explorations 

throughout Mexico together with Edward A. 

Goldman from 1892-1896. An autodidact, Nelson had 

participated in the famous Death Valley Expedition 

from 1890-91, in the newly created Division of 

Ornithology and Mammalogy of the Bureau of 

Biological Survey. He worked in every state in Mexico 

and on all coastal islands, as well as in northern 

Guatemala. In Chiapas, well within our area of study, 

he discovered an important number of new orchid 

species, most of which were later described by Ames. 

Worthy to mention are the following: Bletia nelsonii 

Ames (Nelson 913), Erythrodes chicharrasensis Ames 

(Nelson 3808), Erythrodes mexicana (= vesicifera) 

Ames (Nelson 3777), Malaxis macrantha Ames 

(Nelson 3124), Microstylis (= Malaxis) nelsonii 

Ames (Nelson 4782), and Pleurothallis nelsonii Ames 

(Nelson 3763). 

Charles Frederick Millspaugh (1854-1923), the first 

Curator of Botany of the Field Museum in Chicago, 

selected Peru as the Museum’s center of floristic 

research. He looked however also to Central America. 

On board of the famous yacht ‘Utowana’ he traveled 

through the Caribbean in 1898-99, touching land in 

Cozumel Island and Yucatan, where he collected, 

among others, Spiranthes orchioides (Sw.) Rchb. 

f. (Millspaugh 1616, Yucatan), Brassavola cordata 


136 

Lindl. (Millspaugh 1797, Island of Cozumel) and 

Oncidium cebolleta (Jacq.) Sw. (Millspaugh 1617, 

Pisté, Yucatan). He described his collections in 1900. 

Millspaugh was at that time already famous for his 

work American Medicinal Plants (1887). 

Other travelers in Central America (II): 1870-1900. 

We continue with accounts of travels through Central 

America, written by persons who came for various 

motives (never primarily as botanists). 

In 1874, the German Helmuth Polakowsky (1847- 

1917) came to Costa Rica, hired to teach lessons of 

Chemistry, Physics, Botany, Mineralogy and Zoology 

at the National Institute of San José. Polakowsky 

traveled throughout the country and left various 

detailed accounts, among which “La República de 

Costa Rica” stands out (Polakowsky, 1940). In addition 

to his comments about the Vanilla that Carmiol had in 

his house, he writes in his books about the common 

plants of Costa Rica: “The largest number of parasites 

belong to the family of the orchids and Bromeliads. 

Among the first I mention the genus Epidendrum (there 

are many species), Lelia [sic], Oncidium, Trichopilae 

[sic], Odontoglossum and the rarest Catleyas [sic] 

(such as Dowiana and Stanhopea [sic]). In no private 

garden have I seen these plants growing in large 

numbers; at the most one or two hang in the corridors 

of the ‘haciendas’ growing on a piece of wood, and 

nobody knows or chooses the species with particularly 

beautiful flowers” (Polakowsky, 1940). Specimens of 

Epidendrum ciliare L., Epidendrum paniculatum Ruiz 

& Pav. and Stelis sp. were collected by Polakowsky 

in 1875 (Polakowsky 382) and are today in the orchid 

collection of the Natural History Museum in London. 

The British traveler John W. Boddam-Whetham 

(1843-?) arrived at the Guatemalan port of San José 

in October of 1875. From the capital he made ‘some 

interesting trips, east and west’, and continued then to 

Cobán in Alta Verapaz. He went on over the mountains 

to the region of Petén and finally by canoe on the 

Usumacinta River to the island of Carmen in the Gulf 

of Mexico. 

Two years later Boddam-Whetham published an 

account of his travels with the title of Across Central 

America (Boddam-Whetham, 1877). In his narrative, 

orchids are frequently mentioned. Between Guatemala 

and Esquipulas, he finds “many of the large trees [...] 

LANKESTERIANA 


adorned with a most beautiful rose-coloured orchid 

-I think a Lycaste Skinneri- whose large flowers 

gave a wonderful glow to the grey trunk and green 

leaves among which they were perched. It appeared 

to me that they had been transplanted, as they were 

seldom far from the ground, and generally on trees 

overhanging a native hut; to an Indian an orchid is a 

sacred flower, and as none of the trees in that locality, 

except those near houses, were similarly decorated, it 

is not improbable that superstition rather than a love 

of gardening accounted for their appearance.” And he 

complains: “Guatemala is rich in these lovely plants 

-the élite of the floral kingdom- and every day I had 

cause to regret my limited knowledge of botany; and 

after I had left the country, when showing what I 

had collected and describing what I had not, I often 

found I had taken the chaff and left the grain”. Once in 

Esquipulas, he describes the procession of the pilgrims 

who came to the village to worship the Holy Christ: 

“They were all decked with garlands of the tillandsia, 

and in their hands they carried brilliant orchids. Some of 

the different companies carried spikes of the beautiful 

rose-coloured orchid I have before mentioned; others 

carried a species of Epidendrum whose rich orange 

flowers contrasted with the creamy blossoms of an 

Odontoglot which seemed a great favourite. Panicles 

of one of the commonest orchids in Guatemala -an 

Oncidium- were used in great profusion, and their long 

drooping stalks covered with small yellow flowers 

looked very graceful”. Riding back to Guatemala he 

“entered a beautiful country [which] was a region of 

orchids, and each species seemed to have its favourite 

locality. In one spot a Stanhopea flourished, the 

flowers of this kind being a bright yellow, barred with 

chocolate. In another, the trees bore no other species, 

except one whose flowers were shaped like a China 

rose and of a delicate pink hue. I gathered twenty of 

these blossoms off one tree, and I recalled to mind that 

once or twice in London I had paid five shillings for a 

single specimen”. He continued and crossed the border 

to Honduras, wanting to inspect the ruins of Copán. 

“The forest was damp and hot, and for that reason a 

wild garden of ferns, orchids, and creepers...” 

Some weeks later, in the first days of 1876, he rides 

from Guatemala to Cobán. Close to this city, amidst 

a terrible down-pour, he crosses a river and finds a 

place that “in fine weather must be a perfect Paradise


A B 

C D 

D 

Figure 44. A — Adolphe Tonduz (1862-1921). Courtesy of L.D. Gómez. B — Front cover of Pfau’s book and advertisement 

of his nurseries. C — Chondroscaphe bicolor (Rolfe) Dressler. Illustration by R. Pfau. Courtesy of F. Pupulin. D — Edward 

Shuttleworth (1829-1909). Anonymous, 1889b: 1. 

137 


138 

A 

C 

D 

F 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 45. A — San Pedro Sula at the time of Thieme’s collections. In Escoto, 2002: 28. B — John Donnell Smith (1829-1928). 

Courtesy of Jaime García. C — The city of Guatemala. In Boddam-Whetham, 1877, frontispiece. D — United Fruit Co. Lodge 

and Station in Port Limón, ca. 1915. Photograph by Manuel Gómez Miralles in Leiva Coto, 2004: 83. E — Rudolf Schlechter 

(1872-1925), in the Herbarium of the Botanical Museum inBerlin, 1909. F — The Herbarium in Berlin, after its destruction in 

March, 1943. (E—F, Courtesy of Dr. N. Kilian, Archives BGBM Berlin-Dahlem). 


B 

E


[...] The branches which arched the deep stream on 

our right were loaded with orchids and parasites, over 

whose blossoms a few humming birds hovered as if 

in defiance of the rain...” (Fig. 45C). After Cobán, he 

crosses the mountains and begins the descend to the 

Atlantic regions. “The scenery is splendidly tropical; 

vines and orchids festoon the trees, from which you 

are saluted by the merry chatter of the parrots...” And 

two leagues later he arrives at a shrine dedicated to Our 

Lady of Candelaria, where the offerings, among them 

orchids, were very numerous (Boddam-Whetham, 

1877: 150, 151, 167, 172, 186, 261-262). Already on 

his way home, in Petén, near the village of Tenosique, 

he found Peristeria elata Hook. “Here for the first time 

I saw the curious Holy Ghost orchid -Espíritu Santo- 

so called on account of the yellow dove-like form that 

stands in the centre of the white globular flower”. And 

in the same area: “One portion of the wood glowed so 

brilliantly with a crimson flush that I went to see the 

cause. It proved to be a number of splendid orchids 

whose flowers graduated in colour from a pale pink 

to a bright spotted crimson, the inner cup being pink 

and white. The blossoms grew on a long spike, one 

of which I measured, being over five feet in length, 

and having on it more than one hundred flowers. 

Afterwards I saw many trees laden with them, but all 

near Tenosique and none on the other side of the river” 

(Boddam-Whetham, 1877: 311). 

Armando Reclus (1843-1927), an officer in the 

French Navy, traveled to Panama on two occasions, 

during the years of 1876 to 1878, recognizing and 

surveying possible routes for a future interoceanic 

canal. In 1878 the Colombian government finally 

granted a French company the right to build a canal 

across the isthmus. Napoleon Bonaparte Wyse, 

Armando Reclus and Pedro J. Sosssa presented the 

plans for the famous project and founded the Universal 

Company of the Interoceanic Canal. A description of 

the travels by Reclus was published in Madrid (Reclus, 

1972). We find in it some interesting references. 

Describing the merchandises that were offered to 

the travelers in the railroad station of Gatún, Reclus 

writes: “They also offer a plant from the Orchid family 

(Peristeria elata), the Holy Ghost flower, which grows 

in great numbers in the neighborhood, and is very rare 

further away, as it seems; on the corolla of this flower, 

deliciously scented and of a color white as wax, the 

139 

stamen and pistils form a small group that resembles 

a tiny dove variegated with red”. Months later, already 

in the region of Darién, he describes ‘espavé’ trees 

(Anacardium excelsum): “Their short, wide and curved 

trunk, […] can almost be described as disappearing 

under the stems of thousands of orchids…” (Reclus, 

1972: 50, 182). 

The British Mary Lester traveled in 1881 through 

Honduras, riding from Amapala, on the Pacific Coast, 

all the way to San Pedro Sula, where she expected to 

find employ as a teacher. She marveled about the forest: 

“… we went into a labyrinth, going in and out, where 

the soil was firmer, free from the extended, uncovered 

roots of the trees, and from the garlands of parasite 

plants that fell from above…” (Lester, 1971: 196). 

Carl Bovallius (1847-1917) descended from a 

family from Northern Sweden. His father, Robert 

Bovallius, was the Royal Librarian in Stockholm. Carl 

studied at the University of Upsala, where he became 

a professor in Biology. In 1881 he asked for a leave of 

absence and traveled to Central America. He visited 

Panama (February to July, 1882), Costa Rica (July to 

October, 1882) and Nicaragua (October, 1882 to April, 

1883), returning to Europe in 1883. The observations 

made during his journey were the base for Viaje por 

Centroamérica (1881-1883), published in 1887 in 

Upsala and translated later into Spanish in 1977. In 

his work he writes about a trip to the Atlantic region 

of Costa Rica, in the company of Julian Carmiol and 

Anton Huebsch, a botanist from Bohemia who had 

made the trip mainly “to collect and study orchids”. 

From the Hacienda Caño Seco, near Siquirres, where 

they stayed for several weeks, Bovallius and Huebsch 

continued to the region of Talamanca, in the company 

of Costa Rican Bishop Bernard August Thiel. Jerónimo 

Fernández, the priest who acted as the chronicler of 

the expedition, tells us about the indian village of 

San José Cabécar, where Huebsch found “an orchid 

unknown to science” (Bovallius, 1977: 125). Huebsch, 

a collector for Sander in St. Albans, traveled also in 

Ecuador and Colombia, where he discovered three 

new species: Maxillaria huebschii Rchb. f., Oncidium 

huebschii Rchb. f. and Masdevallia huebschiana 

Kraenzl. In Costa Rica he collected the type specimen 

of Masdevallia flaveola Rchb. f. In the type protologue 

we read: “discovered by Hübsch for Mr. F. Sander, 

who has just imported a stock of it”. From the same 


140 

year (1884) is his collection of another new species, 

Masdevallia anchorifera Rchb. f. (Hübsch s.n.; Costa 

Rica, without locality). Bovallius tells us about his 

experiences in the Costa Rican rainforest, and about his 

encounter with “the almost soporific aroma of Vanilla 

… so strong that it almost produced indisposition”. 

Sometime later, he traveled from San Juan del Norte 

to the Lake of Nicaragua on the San Juan River, and 

described in his journal the beauty that he encountered: 

“As the sun rose we climbed again on the steamer and 

never tired to admire the majestic landscape around 

us. Heliconias with white stems could be seen in great 

numbers, which made a showy contrast to the dark 

green, luxuriant vegetation in the background. Species 

of ficus with thick, brilliant leaves, passion flowers 

with large white and red flowers, […] leafy bromeliads, 

and orchids with colors from purple velvet to the most 

delicate waxy yellow, made up a decoration to the 

green walls so brilliant and strong that any description 

will seem pale against it” (Bovallius, 1977: 171, 207). 

The new empIre 

“Company no heart” 

Popular saying in the Costa Rican 

Atlantic regions 

The introduction of bananas in Central America 

led to the colonization of the Atlantic region and 

to the consolidation of the influence of the United 

States on the political and economical life of the 

young republics. “Banana plantations began during 

the decade of 1870, with shipments from the coast of 

Honduras that were sold in New Orleans.... The United 

Fruit Company was founded in 1899. Together with 

the Cuyamel Fruit Company (with which it merged in 

1929) and the Standard Fruit and Steamship Company, 

it monopolized the banana activities in the whole 

Central American area and the Caribbean” (Pérez 

Brignoli, 2000: 126-127) (Fig. 45D). The dominance 

of the United States increased after the Spanish- 

American War (1898), during which Spain lost, besides 

the Philippine Islands, Cuba and Puerto Rico, her last 

possessions in America. Cuba became a protectorate 

and Puerto Rico is presently an “Associated State” of 

the United States. 

LANKESTERIANA 


The ‘Big Stick’ policy 

“Speak softly and carry a big stick, and 

you will go far.” 

African proverb 

In 1901 Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), who had 

become a hero during the war against Spain, was elected 

President of the United States. In 1904 the “Roosevelt 

Corollary” was added to the Monroe Doctrine, 

declaring that the United States would exercise force 

to maintain the stability in the Western Hemisphere. 

Directed at Europe, the Roosevelt Corollary stated 

that the United States would consider any interference 

in the affairs of small, poor Latin American nations a 

violation of the Monroe Doctrine. The first application 

of the Corollary occurred in 1905, when Roosevelt 

sent Marines to the Dominican Republic to manage 

the country’s European debts. This was the beginning 

of the “Big Stick Policy”. A controversial figure, 

Roosevelt was a great conservationist and naturalist, 

considered in his time one of the greatest U. S. experts 

in large American mammals. During his tenure in the 

White House from 1901 to 1909, he designated 150 

National Forests, the first 51 Federal Bird Reservations, 

5 National Parks, the first 18 National Monuments and 

the first 4 National Game Preserves. Altogether, in the 

seven-and-one-half years he was in office, he provided 

federal protection for almost 230 million acres, a 

land area equivalent to that of all the East coast states 

from Maine to Florida. In 1916, Roosevelt took part 

in an expedition to Brazil, exploring the course of the 

Juruena River. The great orchidologist F. C. Hoehne, 

who was part of the expeditionary group, found a new 

species of Catasetum, that was dedicated to Roosevelt: 

Catasetum rooseveltianum Hoehne.The United States 

intervened in 1903 in favor of the independence of 

Panama, obtaining a contract that would allow them 

to begin, one year later, the construction of the canal, 

which was inaugurated in 1914. The Canal Zone was 

ceded in perpetuity to the United States. Liberal revolts 

against the conservative regime of Adolfo Díaz were 

on the point of victory when U.S. troops were sent to 

Nicaragua to help put them down. After the entry of 

American Marines, the U.S. would essentially rule the 

country until 1925 through a series of puppet dictators. 

In 1926, when a Liberal insurrection was started 

by Augusto César Sandino (1895–1934), the U.S.


government hastily landed forces. Dedicated to freeing 

the country of foreign domination and improving 

the lot of Nicaraguan peasants, Sandino would fight 

a war against U.S. Marines and the National Guard 

for the next eight years. The Marines withdrew in 

1933, leaving Anastasio Somoza as commander of 

the National Guard. In 1937 Somoza, who had been 

responsible for the murder of Sandino in 1934, was 

elected president, initiating a dynasty of dictators that 

would rule the country for the next forty years. The 

antagonism between the dictatorship and the ideals of 

Sandino would mark the history of Nicaragua during 

the rest of the XX Century. “The penetration of foreign 

capital – especially North American after World War 

I – complements the already close relations of Central 

America to international trade... The powerful banana 

companies, with extensive interests in a vast scope 

of activities (plantations, railways, shipping lines, 

communications, etc.) played an increasingly relevant 

role” (Pérez Brignoli, 2000: 127). 

While Europe struggled with the problems and 

the misery of the postwar years, the establishment of 

communism and the rapid rise of fascism, the United 

States consolidated, during the first three decades of 

the XX century, their new American empire. In the 

same manner, European explorers and scientists, 

who had dominated the history of orchids in Central 

America during the past four centuries, yielded the 

field to a new generation of U. S. botanists, especially 

after the deaths of Rolfe in 1921 and of Schlechter in 

1925, giving way to what Robert Dressler would coin, 

years later, “botanical imperialism” (in a letter to E. 

Greenwood, January 5, 1981). 

In Costa Rica, the strong impulse given to the 

botanical exploration of the country by the ‘Instituto 

Físico Geográfico’ and the National Museum in the last 

years of the XIX century continued until after World 

War I. It was the only Central American country where 

a strong group of national scientists and naturalists was 

formed, working together with foreign residents. In 

Panama, the impulse came from the construction of the 

canal, which attracted the interest of institutions such as 

the Smithsonian and the Missouri Botanical Garden. In 

northern Mesoamerica, Guatemala, Yucatan, Belize, and 

to a lesser degree Honduras, were explored in the first 

years of the XX century by naturalists who followed the 

archeological exploration of the ancient Mayan cities. 

Rudolf Schlechter 

141 

“Without a good memory it is of no use trying to 

be a botanist; one had better give it up and be a 

merchant” 

Rudolf Schlechter (Reinikka, 1995: 293) 

The previous quote is characteristic of the egotistic 

self-confidence of the great German orchidologist 

Friedrich Richard Rudolf Schlechter (1872-1925) (Fig. 

45E), a man of driving ambition, a great capacity for 

work and a remarkable memory, of whom it is said 

that at an early age had set for himself the goal of 

describing at least one new orchid every day (Reinikka, 

1995: 293-294). Schlechter was born in Berlin where 

he served an apprenticeship as a horticulturist, first 

in the well-known commercial nursery of F. Bluth, 

and later in the gardens of the University of Berlin 

(Loesener, 1926: 912). At nineteen years of age he 

left Europe on botanical explorations that carried 

him to Africa, Sumatra, Java, Celebes, Borneo, New 

Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago and Australia. 

Of utmost importance were his explorations of New 

Guinea (1901-1902 y 1906-1909) where he discovered 

over 1,100 new species of Orchidaceae, described 

in his work Die Orchidaceen von Deutsch-Neu- 

Guinea, published in 1914. “Between collecting trips 

Schlechter continued his visits to London, always 

stopping in at the herbarium at Kew and the British 

Museum. He was considered an interesting figure, but 

being not respectful of persons or things, he was apt to 

tread on other people’s feelings and sensibilities. He 

was dogmatic in his convictions, a characteristic which 

did not assist in making him popular; but on the basis 

of his achievements and experience, he was accorded 

great respect” (Reinikka, 1925: 294). 

Schlechter’s work had been preceded, after the death 

of Reichenbach, by Ernst Hugo Heinrich Pfitzer (1846- 

1906). Pfitzer, since 1872 professor and director of the 

Botanical Garden of Königsberg (Prussia), dedicated 

himself to the classification of the Orchidaceae and 

published in 1895 his Beiträge zur Systematik der 

Orchideen (= ‘Contributions to the Systematics of 

Orchids ’ ). Of jovial character, Pfitzer was respected all 

over Europe. It was his untimely death, at only 60 years 

of age, which really opened the way for Schlechter. 

Schlechter described, in his Orchidaceae novae 

et criticae (1906-1907), for the first time new orchid 


142 

species from Central America, which were specimens 

collected by von Tuerckheim in Guatemala (which 

he received from Donnell-Smith) and in Costa Rica 

by Pittier and others, which were sent to Schlechter 

by Durand: Cranichis guatemalensis Schltr. (von 

Tuerckheim 1379), Epidendrum isomerum Schltr. (von 

Tuerckheim II 167), Physurus tuerckheimii Schltr. 

(von Tuerckheim 733), Camaridium costaricense 

Schltr. (Tonduz 12429), Epidendrum selaginella 

Schltr. (J. Cooper 523), Epidendrum wercklei Schltr. 

(Wercklé 16419), Lockhartia pittieri Schltr. (Pittier 

10592), Pittierella calcarata Schltr. (Tonduz 9682), 

and Vanilla pittieri Schltr. (Pittier 6600). 

Shortly after first describing new Central American 

orchids comes Schlechter’s first contact with Ames. In 

a letter written from German New Guinea, Schlechter 

congratulates Ames on his paper on the Orchids 

of Mount Halcon in the Philippines. After having 

published in 1914 his studies of the orchids of the 

Andean countries in South America, Schlechter wrote 

in 1918 a general recapitulation of the orchids of 

Central America in his work: Kritische Aufzählung 

der bisher aus Zentral-Amerika bekanntgewordenen 

Orchidaceen (= ‘Critical enumeration of the orchids 

that so far are known from Central America’) where he 

enumerates 132 genera of orchids with 1,325 species 

for Central America and Mexico (about 400 more than 

those mentioned by Hemsley a quarter of a century 

earlier). The lack of knowledge about the orchid flora 

of certain countries is notorious. Schlechter mentions 

only eight species for Belize, 13 for El Salvador and 

18 for Honduras, while he counts 396 and 366 for 

Costa Rica and Guatemala, 57 for Nicaragua, 117 for 

Panama and 688 for México. In this work, Schlechter 

describes also in detail the geography and climate of 

the Central American regions, analyzing for the first 

time the phytogeographical distribution of orchids 

in Central America. In his correspondence with 

Lankester, Ames wrote sharply about Schlechter’s 

work: “Schlechter’s list of Central American orchids is 

an undigested compilation which bristles with errors” 

(Letter to Lankester, December 30, 1922). 

From 1921 onward Schlechter held the position 

of curator of the herbarium of the Berlin Botanical 

Garden, amassing an enormous collection of 

Orchidaceae. His interest in the orchids of Central 

America was maintained until his death. In 1919 

LANKESTERIANA 


Schlechter wrote to Alberto M. Brenes and Amparo 

de Zeledón in Costa Rica, asking them to prepare new 

collections in the country. Shortly after Rolfe’s death in 

1921, Charles C. Powell sent him numerous herbarium 

specimens from Panama, which often proved to be 

new species. With the material received from Costa 

Rica and Panama, Schlechter published in 1922 his 

Orchidaceae Powellianae Panamenses (collections 

by C. Powell), followed one year later by Additamenta 

ad Orchideologiam Costaricensem (collections by 

Brenes, Brade, Tonduz, Wercklé and Acosta). 

In 1926, one year after his death, his system for 

the classification of the Orchidaceae saw the light of 

day: Das System der Orchidaceen. This system was 

widely accepted for the next three decades. If we study 

Schlechter’s catalogue of publications, we find that he 

wrote 233 works about orchids in which he described 

177 new genera and 5,592 new species, approx. 14% 

of all valid species known today (Senghas, 2002: 4). 

Hoehne dedicated to him the genera Schlechterella and 

Rudolfiella and many other orchidologists honored his 

name in a great number of species, among which the 

following can be named: Bifrenaria rudolfii (Hoehne) 

Carnevali & G. A. Romero, Dichaea schlechteri J. P. 

Folsom, Eltroplectris schlechteriana (Porto & Brade) 

Pabst, Epidendrum rudolfianum Hoehne, Epidendrum 

schlechterianum Ames, Erythrodes schlechteriana 

(Hoehne) Pabst, Habenaria rudolfi-schlechteri 

Hoehne, Maxillaria rudolfii Hoehne, Maxillaria 

schlechteri Foldats, Maxillaria schlechteriana J. 

T. Atwood, Platythelys schlechterana (Hoehne) 

Garay, Pleurothallis schlechteriana Ames, Prescottia 

schlechterii Hoehne, Schiedeella schlechteriana 

Szlach. & Sheviak, Schomburgkia schlechterana H. G. 

Jones, and Stelis schlechterana Garay. 

Rudolf Schlechter died on November 15, 1925, 

from a tropical disease that had troubled him since the 

travels of his youth. His large herbarium, to which the 

collections of Kraenzlin and Mansfeld (who took his 

position after his death) were later incorporated, was 

completely destroyed during an Allied bombardment 

in March of 1943 (Fig. 45E). Only those specimens 

that were on loan to other institutions escaped the fire, 

plus a series of copies that Schlechter had prepared 

on behalf of Oakes Ames, at that time director of the 

Botanical Institute of the University of Harvard, in 

Massachusetts.


After Schlechter’s death, his wife Alexandra continued 

with this work. Schlechter dedicated to her, a short 

time before his death, the genus Sobennikkoffia Schltr., 

from Madagascar (1925) 34 . 

Hans Sydow (1879-1946) was a bank employee and 

amateur botanist, who collected in Africa for the Berlin 

Museum (ca. 1912). Ames mentioned that he had 

been sent by Schlechter to Costa Rica in his letters to 

Charles H. Lankester, but there is no evidence that he 

ever collected orchids. We know however that Sydow 

visited Costa Rica through several publications, in 

which he describes his collections of fungi (which 

where his specialty), based greatly on collections 

prepared by Alberto Ml. Brenes, of whom we will talk 

later. 

Oakes Ames 

“I am afraid that my boyish enthusiasm 

must seem to you inordinately intense, but I 

take courage in the thought that you have 

experienced similar enthusiasm among those 

fluttering things that seem to rival the orchids 

in beauty or color-patterns. The collector’s 

spirit, whether the hobby centers in plants 

or animals is specifically the same and the 

victims of it understand each other.” 

(Letter from Oakes Ames to 

Charles H. Lankester, August 24,1923) 

Oakes Ames (1874-1950) (Fig. 46A), son of a 

cultivated and wealthy family in New England, 

graduated from Harvard University in 1899 and was 

named shortly afterwards director of its Botanical 

Museum. He was Schlechter’s main competitor during 

the last two decades of the life of the great German 

scientist and at the same time his friend and admirer. 

During his whole career, Ames maintained a great 

interest in the Orchidaceae, dedicating his free time 

completely to the taxonomic study of this family. After 

Schlechter’s death he became the world’s foremost 

authority in orchidology. Married to Blanche Ames, he 

had in his wife an excellent illustrator whose drawings 

enriched many of Ames’ publications. “Seldom in 

botanical history have science and art been so happily 

and fruitfully joined” (Mangelsdorf, 1948: xv). 

143 

Although he dedicated himself initially to the orchids 

of Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines, he soon 

became interested in the species of the American tropics. 

In 1905 Ames began the publication of Orchidaceae: 

Illustrations and Studies of the Family Orchidaceae, 

in seven volumes. It is in volume II (1908) where he 

described the first species of Central America, all based 

on specimens distributed by J. Donnell-Smith, collected 

by William Nelson and Hans von Tuerckheim in 

Chiapas and Guatemala, or by R. S. Williams in Panama: 

Epipactis dolabripetala Ames (Nelson 3211 – Chiapas), 

Malaxis macrantha Ames (Nelson 3124 – Chiapas), 

Masdevallia tubuliflora Ames (von Tuerckheim 512 

– Guatemala). Masdevallia tuerckheimii Ames (von 

Tuerckheim 464 – Guatemala), Physurus polygonatus 

Ames (von Tuerckheim 7678 – Guatemala), Physurus 

purpureus Ames (von Tuerckheim 8000 – Guatemala), 

Physurus venustulus Ames (von Tuerckheim 8591 

– Guatemala), Pleurothallis hastata Ames (von 

Tuerckheim 501– Guatemala), Pleurothallis repens 

Ames (von Tuerckheim s.n.– Guatemala), and Stelis 

williamsii Ames (Williams 970 - Panama). Thus Ames 

entered into the world the orchids in Central America, 

only two years after Schlechter described the first 

orchids from this region. 

In one of his fundamental works, Schedulae 

Orchidianae, published in ten fascicles between 

1922 and 1930 with the collaboration of Charles 

Schweinfurth (who was his disciple and friend for over 

35 years), Ames described numerous new species for 

Central America. Years later, in 1936, Ames published 

(again with the collaboration of Schweinfurth) The 

genus Epidendrum in the United States and Middle 

America, a work in which we find again many new 

species of our region. Together with Donovan S. 

Correll he prepared an extensive work on the orchids of 

Guatemala, that was published in three parts between 

1952 and 1956. Finally, in the numerous publications 

of Paul C. Standley related to the flora of Central 

America, Ames authored, without exception, the list of 

orchids for each country. 

In 1922 he began his relationship with Charles H. 

Lankester, an English naturalist who lived in Costa 

Rica, which bore many fruits and lasted until Ames’ 

death. The first contact with Lankester became a 

34 Alexandra Vasilevna Sobennikoff, the daughter of a Russian tea Merchant, had married Schlechter in 1910. They had two 

daughters, Alexandra and Julia. 


144 

reality thanks to Powell, who had met don Carlos 

some years earlier (Fig. 46B). In his answer to the letter 

from Powell that is shown above, Ames is delighted 

to learn that he can count on Lankester’s help: “Now 

that I know from your letter that he has contemplated 

sending his things to me, this day begins with plenty of 

sunshine even though heavy clouds obscure the sky” 

(Letter from Ames to Powell, 6.10.1922). Ames was 

undoubtedly playing a double game: while he could not 

severe his relations with Schlechter (the German had 

too much information that Ames needed desperately), 

he tried to block Schlechter’s access to Powell’s and 

Lankester’s materials. 

In 1923, Ames paid a brief visit to Central America. 

He visited Panama, where he met Powell and also 

Costa Rica, where he made contact with Amparo de 

Zeledón. Lankester (who could not meet with Ames 

during his brief stay in the country) wrote to him: “The 

Zeledóns are old friends of mine; don José has been for 

nearly 60 years a keen ornithologist. I was delighted 

to find that you had called on her [doña Amparo] and 

if she leaves the Schlechter camp may get you a lot of 

material, tho’ it is rather late in the day” (Letter from 

Lankester to Ames, April 30, 1923). He finally went on 

to Honduras, where he collected in the neighborhood 

of Tela and found several new species, among them: 

Campylocentrum hondurense Ames (Ames II 210), 

Pelexia callosa Ames (Ames II 259), and Pleurothallis 

hondurensis Ames (Ames II 201). He passed briefly 

through Puerto Limón in 1928 and was a last time 

in Costa Rica in 1932 (Ames-Plimpton, 1979: 353). 

Curiously, during his various visits, he never could 

meet Lankester, his life-long friend. 

His studies of the orchids of Central America 

were always overshadowed by his competition 

with Schlechter and the urgent need to receive 

new collections, in a tireless effort to surpass the 

great German in the description of new species. 

We find numerous expressions of this rivalry in the 

correspondence of Ames with Lankester, from which 

we have extracted the following examples: “We must 

work fast if we hope to keep abreast of the Germans. 

I was surprised to see how far reaching their efforts 

have been to secure a monopoly of tropical American 

species” (Sept. 17, 1922). “If you decide to make 

specimens for me, please begin as soon as possible. 

Time is very precious” (October 10, 1922). “I wish we 

LANKESTERIANA 


could get out another number of Sched. Orch. based 

on your work. We might beat Schlechter and give him 

food for thought” (May 28, 1923). “Standley is in New 

York to-day. When he arrives in Costa Rica, shower 

orchids on him. Make it a rule that no orchid goes 

unpressed” (November 13, 1923). “At this stage of the 

undertaking, quantity rather than quality is important” 

(December 3, 1923). He also mocked the German 

mania of splitting the family of Orchidaceae in more 

and more genera and species: “As my old teacher, Dr. 

Farlow, used to tell us, when referring to the modern 

systematists: ‘if they can see a difference, then a new 

genus is made; if they can imagine a difference, then 

a new species is described’ ” (Letter from Ames to 

Lankester, February 6, 1924). But these phrases can 

give us a wrong picture. In spite of the passionate 

rivalry, Ames respected and admired Schlechter 

throughout his life. Let us see other expressions, again 

in Ames’ correspondence with Lankester: “From the 

South of France, Col. Godfery writes that Schlechter 

is seriously ill... I have not heard from Schlechter for 

over four months, and I had begun to fear that he was 

angry or in some way provoked by some act of mine” 

(March 23, 1924). “I should not have begun this letter 

with a reference to myself. I should have expressed 

to you my deep sorrow at the news that came in this 

noon from Alexandra Schlechter. Schlechter died early 

in November. I had known of his illness and on the 

ninth of December I sent aid to Mrs. Schlechter to meet 

the heavy burden of a hospital bill. But I had been led 

to believe that there were hopes for recovery. What a 

place the old world is. There comes a time when death 

plays round us like heat lightning. And then it begins to 

thin the ranks of those we called friends. It is a wonder 

we are able to carry on” (December 3, 1925). 

Another little known aspect of the relationship 

between both orchidologists is that Ames contributed 

financially to the publication of part of Schlechter’s 

work on the orchidaceous flora of theAndean countries. 

After finishing volume II (Colombia), Schlechter ran 

out of funds for the remaining three volumes. “I was 

fortunate that Prof. Oakes Ames, in Boston, put at my 

disposal the means which guaranteed the completion 

of the printing of this work” (Schlechter, 1922b: v). 

In the summer of 1924, Ames agreed to pay some 

400 German gold marks as a subsidy to publish 

Kraenzlin’s Monograph of Masdevallia. In return for


this favor, the Ames Orchid Herbarium now possesses 

a rather large part of the Kraenzlin Herbarium, 

especially of the species described by him. Of great 

importance is Ames’ herbarium. “The Ames Orchid 

Herbarium, which now comprises 65,000 critically 

determined specimens as well as large numbers of 

line drawings, tracings, and photographs of type 

material from the large orchid herbaria of Europe, 

has become the largest single orchid herbarium in the 

world [...] Only the Lindley Herbarium at Kew and 

the Reichenbach Herbarium in Vienna are comparable 

in scope [...] the Ames Orchid Herbarium has become 

the centre for most of the taxonomic studies on the 

orchid flora of the Philippines and of the New World” 

(Schultes, 1951: 224-225). 

Several new genera of Orchidaceae were dedicated 

to Ames: Amesia A. Nelson & J. F. Macbr., Amesiella 

Schlechter ex Garay, Oakes-amesia C. Schweinf. 

& P. H. Allen; and many species, among them: 

Bulbophyllum amesianum J. J. Smith, Dendrobium 

amesianum Schltr., Epidendrum amesianum Correll, 

Habenaria amesiana Schltr., Notylia amesii L. B. Sm. 

& S. K. Harris, Schiedeella amesiana L. A. Garay, 

Spiranthes amesiana Schltr., and Vanda amesiana 

Rchb. f. Loefgrenianthus blanche-amesiae (Lófgren) 

Hoehne was dedicated to his wife. 

Ames’ wife Blanche passed away in 1969, at the 

age of ninety-one. She had gained world recognition 

as the outstanding botanical illustrator of her time 

(Anonymous, 1969: 313). 

Charles C. Schweinfurth (1890-1970) (Fig. 46C) 

was Ames’ most important assistant and also his great 

friend during thirty five years. He was hired in 1915 to 

work in the herbarium to look after the living orchids in 

Ames’s greenhouses. “This new appointment turned out 

to be one of the rare concurrences of fate when the right 

man was given the right job at the right time (Botanical 

Museum Harvard University, 1983: 29).” Although his 

main interest were the orchids of Peru, about which 

he published an important work, his contributions to 

the identification of many Central American species 

were fundamental. Thus, if in most of the descriptions 

of new species of the XIX century we read the famous 

abbreviations of “Lindl.”, “Batem.”, “La Llave & 

Lex.”, “A. Rich. & Gal.” and “Rchb. f.”, the first 

decades of the XX century are clearly dominated by 

145 

“Schltr.”, “Ames” and “Ames & C. Schweinf.” A 

new genus, Cischweinfia (he signed “C. Schweinf.”), 

was dedicated to Schweinfurth (Fig. 46D), as well as 

many species: Acoridium schweinfurthianum Ames, 

Catasetum schweinfurthii D. E. Benn. & Christenson, 

Dendrobium schweinfurthianum A. D. Hawkes & A. 

H. Heller, Epidendrum schweinfurthianum Correll, 

Grastidium schweinfurthianum (Hawkes & Heller) 

S. Rauschert, Mormolyca schweinfurthiana Garay 

& Wirth, Oerstedella schweinfurthiana (Correll) 

F. Hamer & Garay, Pleurothallis schweinfurthiana 

L. O. Williams, Pleurothallis schweinfurthii Garay, 

Rhynchopera schweinfurthii (Garay) Szlach. & 

Margonska, and Sauroglossum schweinfurthianum 

Garay. As Garay wrote in his friend’s obituary: “The 

world of orchids is today immensely richer because 

there was a Charles Schweinfurth intimately associated 

to it…” (Garay, 1971: 12). 

Costa Rica: the years of ‘doña’ Amparo 35 

“[Doña Amparo] has secured for herself a 

permanent place of honor in the history of the 

botanical exploration Costa Rica.” 

Rudolf Schlechter (1923: 4) 

José Cástulo Zeledón, disciple of Alexander von 

Frantzius, continued managing his establishment (the 

famous ‘Botica Francesa’) after Frantzius’ returned to 

Germany in 1869. Inspired by von Frantzius, José C. 

Zeledón went to work at the Smithsonian Institution 

in Washington. He returned to his country in the late 

1870s as the first formally trained Costa Rican scientist. 

Bovallius wrote in 1881: “I used the days which I spent 

in the central plateau in excursions … among them 

some in the company of Dr. José Zeledón, a physician 

and certainly the most prominent ornithologist of Costa 

Rica” (Bovallius, 1974). Some years later he married 

Amparo López-Calleja (1870-1951) (Fig. 47A), who 

had been born in 1870 in Camagüey, Cuba. Her father, 

a wealthy landowner of Spanish origin, had fled from 

Cuba to Costa Rica after the independentist uprisings 

against Spain, which had increased after 1860. Doña 

Amparo de Zeledón, as she was respectfully called, 

supported her husband’s scientific activities (Zeledón 

had become Costa Rica’s leading ornithologist) and 

became herself involved in collecting native plants, 

35 ‘Doña’: title given to a lady, equivalent to the English Mrs. but used only before Christian names. 


146 

especially orchids, which she grew in her large garden 

in San José. 

Costa Rica’s agricultural economy began to 

stagnate at the turn of the century, diminishing the 

government’s ability and willingness to support 

expensive institutions and research projects (McCook, 

1999: 119). Contributions of private sponsors were of 

fundamental importance during this period. Amparo de 

Zeledón sponsored many of the collecting excursions 

throughout Costa Rica of the Swiss Adolphe Tonduz 

(of whom we talked in the last chapter) and the Alsatian 

Karl Wercklé (1860-1924). During the first two 

decades of the 20 th century, Tonduz and Wercklé were 

responsible for the collection of over two thirds of the 

20,000 specimens in Costa Rica’s National Herbarium. 

In 1919, after receiving a letter from Rudolf Schlechter 

asking for Costa Rican orchid material, doña Amparo 

reacted with enthusiasm, arranging for Tonduz to press 

plants from her orchid garden and sending Wercklé 

out on new collecting excursions. The results were 

three shipments of herbarium specimens that were 

received by Schlechter between 1921 and 1923, and 

that were described as Orchidaceae Amparoanae in 

his Additamenta ad Orchideologiam Costaricensem 

(Schlechter, 1923). Among the specimens received 

from Amparo de Zeledón, Schlechter found three 

new genera and 62 new species. Lankester wrote with 

envy: “No wonder Schlechter had a rich CR collection, 

he had the whole of the orchids from the National 

Herbarium!” (In a letter to Ames, November 30, 1923). 

Schlechter honored doña Amparo with the dedication 

of a new genus: Amparoa (Fig. 47B) and numerous 

new species, among them: Cycnoches amparoanum 

Schltr., Dichaea amparoana Schltr., Epidendrum 

amparoanum Schltr., Gongora amparoana Schltr., 

Habenaria amparoana Schltr., Isochilus amparoanus 

Schltr., Maxillaria amparoana Schltr., Scaphyglottis 

amparoana (Schltr.) Dressler, Sobralia amparoae 

Schltr., Stelis amparoana Schltr., and Trigonidium 

amparoanum Schltr. After her husband’s death in 

1924, Amparo de Zeledón continued with her scientific 

interests and formed part, from 1929 to 1932 (together 

with O. Jiménez, C. Lankester and A. Alfaro) of the 

Board of Directors of the National Museum. However, 

she began dedicating her efforts and wealth more and 

more to religious works, which she continued later in 

Honduras. She died in Tegucigalpa , the 20 th of April 

LANKESTERIANA 


of 1951 (Standley, 1952: 68-69). Her importance 

in the history of Central American orchidology is 

fundamental, not only because of the new species that 

were discovered through her efforts, but because she 

became the center of the Costa Rican scientific world 

during the first decades of the XX century. Her love 

for plants was inherited by her niece Herminia López- 

Calleja (Fig. 47C). 

Karl Wercklé (Fig. 47D) came to Costa Rica for 

the first time in 1897, the year in which his first orchid 

collections are dated. He did not come directly from 

Europe, but emigrated to the United States, where he 

worked as a horticulturist in the nurseries of John Lewis 

Childs, in New York. Childs sponsored Wercklé’s first 

journey to Costa Rica, in search of plants and seeds of 

ornamental value, for acclimatization in the American 

gardens. As early as 1899, Childs’ commercial catalogue 

described a plant “collected in the mountains of Costa 

Rica by Mr. Carlos Wercklé” (Childsia wercklei) 

(Gómez, 1978: 373. He returned to the United States 

in 1898 and in 1902 came back to Costa Rica, where 

he stayed until his death. In an article of 1909 with the 

title La subregión fitogeográfica costarricense (= ‘The 

Costa Rican phytogeographical subregion’), Wercklé 

described Costa Rica as “the privileged region of 

Tropical America”, adding that “in truth, it is unlikely 

that any other country contains a flora containing the 

same number of species in a territory of the same size.” 

“The cause of this ‘great exuberance’, argued Wercklé, 

was Costa Rica’s irregular, mountainous geography, 

that created a great range of atmospheric and climatic 

conditions in a small area. These diverse climatic 

conditions, in turn, produced a wide variety of species. 

The diversity of Costa Rica’s plant species was even 

more than that found in Nicaragua and Panama, Costa 

Rica’s comparatively flat and botanically homogeneous 

neighbours” (McCook, 1999: 119). Shortly thereafter 

Wercklé published the first scientific article ever written 

in Costa Rica about the orchids of this country: Las 

Orquídeas de Costa Rica (Wercklé, 1913). Wercklé 

died in 1924 (the same year of the death of José Cástulo 

Zeledón), a victim of alcoholism. “Doña Amparo de 

Zeledón... attended to his funeral, burying the friend 

in the family mausoleum, where he still rests next 

to ‘don’ José Cástulo...” (Gómez, 1978: 366). We 

remember him in Standley’s words: “There is no doubt 

that Wercklé received a good education, and he was

A 

C 


Figure 46. A — Oakes Ames (1874-1950). Courtesy of the Oakes Ames Herbarium, Harvard University. B — Letter from 

Powell to Ames (Sept. 25, 1922) introducing Charles H. Lankester. C — Charles C. Schweinfurth (1890-1970). Courtesy 

of the Oakes Ames Herbarium, Harvard University. D — Cischweinfia pusilla (C. Schweinf.) Dressler & N. Williams. 

Watercolor by Rafael L. Rodríguez. Courtesy of the University of Costa Rica. 

B 

D 

147 


148 

A 

C 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 47. A — Amparo López-Calleja (1870-1951). Courtesy of Conchita Guzmán. B — Amparoa costaricensis Schltr. 

Watercolor by Rafael L. Rodríguez. Courtesy of the University of Costa Rica. C — Residence of Amparo de Zeledón in San 

José. Courtesy of Jaime García. D — Karl Wercklé. Courtesy of Luis Diego Gómez. 


D 

B


a man of exceptional native talent [... ] Wercklé did 

not distinguish himself for his herbarium specimens, 

although it is true that a good many specimens of his 

collecting are found in herbaria. His favorite way 

of preserving an interesting plant was to roll it into 

a bundle and stuff it in a pocket, where it remained 

indefinitely. It is thus only too easy sometimes to 

recognize in the herbarium his specimens, without 

even looking at the label” (Standley, 1926: 221). 

Among the new species discovered by Wercklé 

we find: Epidendrum carolii Schltr. (Wercklé 101), 

Epidendrum flexicaule Schltr. (C. Wercklé s.n.), 

Epidendrum prostratum Schltr. (Wercklé - 683 in Herb. 

O. Jiménez), Epilyna jimenezii Schltr. (Wercklé – 670 in 

Herb. O. Jiménez), Habenaria plantantheroides Schltr. 

(C. Wercklé s.n.), Masdevallia cyathogastra Schltr. 

(Wercklé - 842 in Herb. O. Jiménez), Masdevallia 

diantha Schltr. (Wercklé- 673 & 843 in Herb. O. 

Jiménez), Pleurothallis bifalcis Schltr. (C. Wercklé 

s.n.), Scaphyglottis jimenezii Schltr. (Wercklé - 682 in 

Herb. O. Jiménez), Sigmatostalix hymenantha Schltr. 

(C. Wercklé s.n.), Stelis nutantiflora Schltr. (Wercklé - 

840 in Herb. O. Jiménez), and Stelis rhodochila Schltr. 

(Wercklé - 839, 845 & 857 in Herb. O. Jiménez). 

Many others were dedicated to him by Schlechter 

and other authors: Chondrorhyncha wercklei (Schltr.) 

C. Schweinf., Dichaea wercklei Schltr., Elleanthus 

wercklei Schltr., Epidendrum wercklei Schltr., 

Eriopsis wercklei Schltr., Habenaria wercklei Schltr., 

Kefersteinia wercklei Schltr., Lepanthes wercklei 

Schltr., Malaxis wercklei Ames, Maxillaria wercklei 

(Schltr.) L. O. Williams, Oncidium wercklei Schltr., 

Pleurothallis wercklei Schltr., Scaphyglottis wercklei 

Schltr., Schiedeella wercklei (Schltr.) Garay, and 

Sobralia wercklei (Schltr.) L. O. Williams . 

At some point Ames wanted to hire Wercklé as a 

collector and sought information from Lankester, who 

answered: “Wercklé is a dipsomaniac, an appalling 

wreck of a fine intelligence, but has still a good 

local knowledge and might be of use yet” (Letter to 

Ames, October 11, 1922). “Towards the end of his 

life, Wercklé forgot all moderation and like any other 

alcoholic, roamed through the city, in rags and without 

a place to live... Some tell that he spend the nights in an 

unoccupied niche of the General Cemetery, to which 

he gained access at nightfall, others that he passed 

his deliriums in a shed in the property of the Zeledón 

149 

family, or now and then in the always open house 

of Alfredo Brade, a German gardener who always 

showed towards him hospitality and warmth” (Gómez, 

1978: 364). 

Alberto Manuel Brenes (1870-1948) (Fig. 48A) was 

born in San Ramón, Alajuela, and studied in Costa Rica 

until 1890, when he left Central America for Europe on 

a government grant. He spent a short time in Paris and 

from there went on to Lausanne, Switzerland, where he 

studied during one year at the university followed by 

a time in Geneva, where he stayed until 1898, taking 

courses in Botany and Natural History (Jenny, 2000: 

20). Botanist of the National Museum for many years, 

he continued botanical explorations after Pittier left 

the country in 1903. When Standley wrote his Flora 

of Costa Rica in 1937, Brenes had accumulated an 

herbarium of over 20,000 specimens which, for the 

quantity and quality of its materials, did not find its equal 

in Central America. His collections came primarily from 

the region of San Ramón de Alajuela. From there he sent 

Schlechter a large collection of orchids in 1922. In 1919 

Schlechter made contact with Brenes after receiving 

a letter from Tonduz, suggesting that orchids should 

be collected for a Costa Rican orchid flora (Jenny, 

2000: 20). Schlechter described this collection in his 

Additamenta ad Orchideologiam Costaricensem under 

the title of Orchidaceae Brenesianae and highlighted 

the good quality of the included specimens. Only the 

collections organized by doña Amparo de Zeledón could 

stand up to those of Brenes, among which Schlechter 

identified some 90 new species”. In 1920 Brenes 

became the head of the section of botany at the Museo 

Nacional, a position he held until 1935. 

Schlechter named a new genus after him: Brenesia 

(Fig. 48B) and a great number of species, among which 

the following are worthy to be mentioned: Barbosella 

brenesii Schltr., Brachystele brenesii (Schltr.) Schltr., 

Campylocentrum brenesii Schltr., Catasetum brenesii 

Schltr., Dichaea brenesii Schltr., Elleanthus albertii 

Schltr., Encyclia brenesii Schltr., Epidendrum brenesii 

Schltr., Habenaria brenesii Schltr., Lepanthes brenesii 

Schltr., Maxillaria brenesii Schltr., Notylia brenesii 

Schltr., Oncidium brenesii Schltr., Pleurothallis brenesii 

Schltr., Ponthieva brenesii Schltr., Stelis brenesii Schltr., 

and Trichocentrum brenesii Schltr. 

Of difficult character, Brenes often avoided contact 

with his botanist colleagues, and rejected several times 


150 

Ames’ approaches. Ames always wanted Brenes to 

collect for him but complained to Lankester: “Brenes is 

as dumb as a turtle and behaves like one. He belongs, 

I imagine, to that human group that is characterized 

by an unlimited capacity to take offense at well meant 

attentions...” (Letter to Lankester, May 2, 1925). Pittier 

complained also: “I must state that when I departed from 

Costa Rica in 1900, I left a herbarium of several thousands 

of plants [...] In 1939, [...] this collection still existed in 

perfect conditions. Therefore, I cannot understand the 

title of ‘founder of the Costa Rican Herbarium’, which 

Mr. Brenes attributes to himself in several publications. 

I say this without diminishing his merits as an active 

collector, but making clear that this does not constitute 

a botanist...” (Letter to Mariano Montealegre, October 

13, 1943). Brenes taught at the best schools of Costa 

Rica and wanted to retire to Switzerland, where he 

planned to write a great flora of Costa Rica. According to 

Echavarría Campos, he had a girlfriend in Switzerland, 

Edda by name, and he had promised to marry her and 

bring her to Costa Rica once he had made enough 

money. However, he lost everything in the earthquake 

of Cartago (1910) and told his friend afterwards that 

“he wanted Edda to believe him dead, because he had 

nothing more to offer…” (Echavarría Campos, 1966: 21, 

61). His name is still respected in the country. Brenesia, 

the scientific journal of the Department of Natural 

History of the National Museum, was named after him. 

Schlechter praised Brenes’ collections, because they 

contained not only precise references as to the localities 

of collection, but also indications of the color of the 

flowers, an information of great value for the scientist. 

According to Schlechter, this data gives us “for the first 

time a more precise image of the plants in question, 

since previous collectors considered this indications to 

be superfluous” (Schlechter, 12923: 159). We conclude 

with Standley: “How fortunate botanical science would 

be if only there were more collectors of equal industry 

and discrimination!” (Standley, 1937: 53). 

Costa Rican fine arts during the first decades of the 

century were equally attracted by the magic of orchids. 

The famous poet Lisímaco Chavarría (1878-1913) 

wrote in 1913 his romantic poem Manojo de Guarias 36 

(= ‘A handful of Guarias’): “To you I offer the delicate 

bouquet of fresh native parasites…” Chavarría incurs 

LANKESTERIANA 


in the popular error of confusing epiphytes with 

parasites. The German painter Emilio Span (1869- 

1944) came to Costa Rica in 1906, after having spent 

several years in Guatemala. A teacher at the Faculty 

of Fine Arts, Span traveled through Costa Rica’s 

countryside, portraying the beauties of nature, among 

them many orchids (Loaiza, 1973: 41) (Fig. 48C). As 

Lankester wrote to Ames in 1927: “…Emilio Span, 

an elderly artist who has recently made with Brade’s 

help a really fine collection of ‘botanical’ orchids…” 

Together with Enrique Echandi and Tomás Povedano, 

Span was chosen, in 1925, to represent Costa Rica at 

the Panamerican Art Exposition, sponsored by the Los 

Angeles Museum. 

We know very little about Guillermo Acosta 

Piepper (1878-1955) (Fig. 48D). He was a farmer, 

merchant, miner and Political Chief of San Ramón. 

His grandfather, August Piepper, had arrived in Costa 

Rica in 1854 on board of the Antoinette, together with 

Hoffmann, von Frantzius, and Carmiol, to form part 

of the German colony which Baron von Bülow had 

founded in La Angostura. He had been sent by his family 

to London, where he studied business administration, 

returning to San Ramón to manage the family’s fortune, 

which was considerable. Acosta sporadically collected 

orchids and sent a small collection to Schlechter, who 

described it in his Additamenta ad Orchideologiam 

Costaricensem (1923) under the title of Orchidaceae 

novae et rariores collectorum variorum in Costa Rica 

collectae. In this collection, Schlechter found a new 

genus, that he dedicated to don Guillermo: Acostaea. 

It is surprising that Reichenbach made no reference 

whatsoever to this species, having seen the magnificent 

illustration and detailed description that had been sent 

to him by Endrés (Fig. 49A). Other species were also 

dedicated to Acosta by Schlechter: Dichaea acostaei 

Schltr., Lepanthes acostaei Schltr., Maxillaria acostaei 

Schltr., Pleurothallis acostaei Schltr., Scaphyglottis 

acostaei (Schltr.) C. Schweinf., and Stelis acostaei 

Schltr. We don’t know how Acosta made contact with 

Schlechter. It might have been through Alberto M. Brenes 

(who was also a native of San Ramón), or through his 

family’s contacts in Germany (Acosta’s mother, Adelina 

Piepper, was a German citizen, and don Guilermo 

married another German, Herminia Beer). Acosta was 

36 ‘Guaria is in Costa Rica the vernacular name for orchids, especially Cattleyas. Guarianthe skinneri Dressler & W. E. Higgins, 

Costa Rica’s National flower, is commonly known as ‘Guaria Morada’, the ‘Purple Guaria’.


also a friend of Otón Jiménez, who remembers how don 

Guillermo helped him during one of Adolphe Tonduz’ 

‘alcoholic journeys’: “Don Anastasio Alfaro, director of 

the National Museum, asked me to bring back Tonduz 

[who was in San Ramón], to avoid sanctioning him for 

abandoning his duties. A Roman enterprise! I had to ask 

the Political Chief of San Ramón, Guillermo Acosta 

Piepper, for help, and through his paternal intervention 

I managed to put him on a horse and in a ten-hour 

journey, step by step, we reached Grecia and from there, 

in another similar journey, Alajuela. It was then easy for 

me to bring him to the house of my neighbor, David 

Mora” (Jiménez, 1971: 63). 

It is sad that the three emblematic species which 

Schlechter dedicated to the Costa Rican collectors of 

the first years of the XX century: Amparoa, Brenesia 

y Acostaea costaricensis have disappeared, by the 

inexorable rules of botanical nomenclature, having been 

converted in synonyms of Rhynchostele beloglossa, 

Pleurothallis johnsonii and Specklinia mirifica. To the 

town of San Ramón de Alajuela, from where he obtained 

so much material during many years, Schlechter 

dedicated the genus Ramonia, with one single species: 

Ramonia pulchella (“the beautiful”), that was later 

transferred to Scaphyglottis. From the region around 

San Ramón Schlechter said that it was an “Eldorado for 

the orchid collectors” (Schlechter, 1923). 

Tonduz was the great intermediary between 

Schlechter and those who collected in Costa Rica 

during the first years of the last century. This seems to 

have been the case of the relation between Schlechter 

and the exceptional orchid collections made between 

the years of 1908 and 1910 by the brothers Alexander 

C. and Alfred Brade, German nationals who had 

established themselves in Costa Rica. 

Alexander Curt Brade (1881-1971) (Fig. 49B), by 

profession an architect, was the driving force behind 

those collections. Alexander Curt came to Costa 

Rica in 1908 invited by his brother but stayed only 

for a short time, traveling in August of 1910 Brazil, 

where he reached glory as one of South America’s 

greatest orchidologists. His collection of the type 

of Epidendrum pinniferum C. Schweinfurth (A. C. 

Brade 335, may 1936) is however evidence that Brade 

returned at some point to Costa Rica, probably to visit 

his brother. During his stay in Costa Rica, the brothers 

explored the surroundings of San José, the mountains 

151 

of Tablazo, Candelaria, Carpintera and the natural 

paradise of La Palma. Longer trips followed to the 

Miravalles volcano, the Barva and to the Atlantic Coast. 

The great variety of ferns drew Alexander’s interest, 

and influenced by the writings of several European 

specialists he started to study them, discovering 

over 60 species new to science, described by Christ, 

Rosenstock and Hieronymus (Pabst, 1967: 161). In the 

meantime, his brother Alfred dedicated himself almost 

exclusively to orchids. Guido Pabst (1914-1980), the 

great Brazilian orchidologist, founded in 1958 the 

‘Herbario Bradeanum’ in Rio de Janeiro and began 

in 1969 the publication of the journal Bradea, thus 

honoring the name of who had been his teacher for 

more than thirty years. 

Alfred Brade (1867-1955) had arrived at Puerto 

Limón in 1893 and after two years of work in the 

banana plantations of the Atlantic region found a 

position in the nurseries of Julian Carmiol in San José. 

With Carmiol he shared his enthusiasm for Botany and 

he dedicated himself for years to explore all accessible 

regions in the country. After several years he made 

himself independent from Carmiol and founded the 

Brade Nurseries (Jiménes, 1957: 2). With the years he 

dedicated himself more and more to horticulture and 

finally abandoned botanical exploration completely. 

He was however “famously generous, and his personal 

garden was in many ways more of a botanical garden 

than a commercial enterprise” (Grayum et al., 

2004: 14). Rudolf Schlechter, in his Additamenta 

ad Orchideologiam Costaricensem dedicated an 

entire chapter to the collections that he had received 

from the Brade brothers: Orchidaceae Bradeanae 

Costaricenses (Schlechter, 1923). Schlechter 

described there over 50 new species for Costa Rica, 

a number that gives us an idea of the importance of 

those collections. Schlechter praised the great quality 

and excellent preparation of the Brade’s herbarium 

specimens and called the collection “a milestone in 

the botanical exploration of the country ”(Markgraf, 

1973: 4). Among the many new species discovered by 

the Brades we find: Habenaria irazuensis Schltr. (A. u. 

C. Brade 1069), Lepanthes blephariglossa Schltr. (C. 

Brade s.n.), Lepanthes bradei Schltr. (C. Brade s.n.), 

Osmoglossum convallarioides Schltr. (A. & C. Brade 

1292), Pleurothallis schulzeana Schltr. (C. Brade s.n.), 

Pogonia nitida Schltr. (C. Brade s.n.), Sarcoglottis 


152 

bradei Schltr. (C. Brade s.n.), Stelis bradei Schltr. (C. 

Brade s.n.), Sarcoglottis costaricensis Schltr. (C. Brade 

s.n.), and Warrea costaricensis Schltr. (A. Brade 16327). 

As could be expected, numerous species where named 

in honor of the Brades: Barbosella bradeorum Schltr., 

Cranichis bradei Schltr., Cyclopogon bradei Schltr., 

Dichaea bradeorum Schltr., Dipteranthus bradei 

Schltr., Elleanthus bradeorum Schltr., Epidendrum 

bradeanum Kraenzl., Goodyera bradeorum Schltr., 

Habenaria bradei Schltr., Laelia bradei Pabst, 

Lepanthes bradei Schltr., Lycaste bradeorum Schltr., 

Masdevallia bradei Schltr. ex Hoehne, Maxillaria 

bradeorum (Schltr.) L. O. Williams, Octomeria bradei 

Schltr., Pleurothallis bradeorum (Schltr.) Ames, Hubb. 

& Schweinf., Pogonia bradeana Kraenzl., Polystachya 

bradei Schltr. ex Mansf., Sarcoglottis bradei Schltr., 

Sobralia bradeorum Schltr., Sophronitis bradei (Pabst) 

Van den Berg & M. W. Chase, Stelis bradei Schltr., 

Stenorrhynchos bradei Schltr., Trichosalpinx bradei 

(Schltr.) Luer, and Zygostates bradei (Schltr.) Garay. 

‘Bradei’, ‘Bradeorum’, ‘Bradeanum’... are all normal 

epithets that remember and honor the Brade brothers. 

But only a few know that Liparis fratrum Schltr. was 

also dedicated to them (from the Latin fratrum = 

‘belonging to the brothers’). 

Otón Jiménez 

One of the most vivacious and enjoyable 

gentlemen (and botanists) to be met anywhere 

Louis O. Williams (1972: 206) 

Schlechter wrote: “a young collector stands out 

lately in Costa Rica, O. Jiménez, who in a short period 

of activity has already found a series of new species 

and, through his efforts, promises to enrich in an 

important way our knowledge about the flora of that 

country, especially of the Orchidaceae” (Schlechter, 

1918: 325). Otón Jiménez (1895-1988) (Fig. 49C) had 

the good fortune to study at the Liceo de Costa Rica 

in its golden age, with teachers like Emel Jiménez, Dr. 

Michaud and Biolley. Of a precocious intelligence, he 

was only 17 years of age when he was appointed as 

director of the Herbarium of the National Museum, 

a position he held until 1914. He remembers his first 

encounter with Charles H. Lankester in 1911: “I still 

remember his smile while shaking hands with me, 

observing my youngster-look due to the short trousers, 

LANKESTERIANA 


long socks and occasionally a sailor-type blouse, 

the usual attire of the students of those years ...” 

(Jiménez, 1967: 248). His friendship with Lankester, 

that lasted throughout their lives, converted him into a 

lover of orchids, accompanying the great Englishman 

on many of his collecting trips, during which he 

found several new species: Epidendrum obliquifolium 

Ames, Hubb. & Schweinf. (Jiménez 972), Habenaria 

jimenezii Schltr. (Jiménez 631), Stelis jimenezii Schltr. 

(Jiménez 621), and Stelis tonduziana Schltr. (Jiménez 

618). He had the privilege to grow up during a period 

when the botanical exploration of Costa Rica was in 

full effervescence. “By 1914 Costa Rica had become 

the center of scientific research in tropical America” 

(Evans, 1999: 20). Jiménez knew personally the great 

botanists of his time: Wercklé, Pittier, Tonduz, the 

Brade brothers, Donnell Smith, Britton, Dr. Patiño 

(Colombia), Wilson Popenoe, Maxon (with whom 

he collected orchids in the region of Varablanca), 

Standley, Williams and Allen, and furthermore 

married a daughter of Anastasio Alfaro. In 1915, Pittier 

described him as follows: “... a disciple of Tonduz 

and a student of pharmacy, who has already done a 

large amount of collecting and may yet surpass” his 

master (Letter from Pittier to J. H. Barnhart, 1915). 

Because of the ups and downs of the Museum after 

the departure of Pittier, and because of his studies in 

Pharmacy, ‘Oto’ could not continue with the Botany, 

as he wished. However, during the remaining years 

of his life, he dedicated to Botany as much time as he 

could (which unfortunately was not much). After this 

period, since the collections at the Museum were not 

well organized and sometimes were lost, he started 

to send his collections abroad, I believe for the rest 

of his lifetime. I know that in the process many got 

lost, especially those destined to Europe.his later 

work, besides collecting and taxonomy, was oriented 

to the investigation of the nourishing properties of 

certain plants, or to the study of certain drugs (Silvia 

Troyo, pers. comm.). Together with Lankester, he had 

to suffer Ames’ impatience: “When may I expect the 

specimens that Jimenez has in hand? Now is the time 

to get this material under the lens” “‘Otón’ has not 

sent me a scrap. I think it will be wise if you remind 

him of my needs and accompany him to the post office 

with the package” (Ames to Lankester, in letters from 

August and December, 1923). But it was not Ames


but Schlechter and several other scientists who really 

valued Jiménez’ work, naming in his honor a series 

of new species: Epidendrum jimenezii E. Hágsater, 

Epilyna jimenezii Schltr., Habenaria jimenezii Schltr., 

Lepanthes jimenezii Schltr., Masdevallia jimenezii 

Königer, Pachystele jimenezii Schltr., Scaphyglottis 

jimenezii Schltr., and Stelis jimenezii Schltr. In 

addition to being an excellent botanist, Jiménez was a 

prolific writer, who left interesting articles about Von 

Frantzius, Humboldt, Wercklé, Tonduz, Brade, and 

Lankester; an important bibliographical source for the 

study of scientific life in Costa Rica during the XIX 

and the first half of the XX century. “It is much to 

be regretted that the demands of business affairs have 

precluded a greater amount of personal field work 

on the part of one who has such a keen perception 

of facts and the ability to discover them in strange 

places” (Standley, 1937: 53). 

Amelia Smith Calvert (1876-1966) and Philip Powell 

Calvert (1871-1961) came to Costa Rica in 1909 and 

stayed one year in the country. As entomologists, 

the main purpose of their visit was the study of the 

seasonal distribution of dragonflies. However, they 

were interested in all fields of natural history and 

published an account of their travels throughout the 

country, under the title of A Year of Costa Rican Natural 

History (Calvert & Calvert, 1917). Although orchids are 

frequently mentioned in their work, the book is of some 

interest because the Calverts met and became friends 

of several of the characters that are now part of our 

orchid history. One of the Calvert’s first acquaintances 

was Alfred Brade, whom they visited at his home 

where he had a “flower garden, with a few animals in 

captivity, which formed one of the sights of San José 

at this time” (Calvert & Calvert, 1917: 30). They set up 

their headquarters in Cartago, from where they made 

excursions in all directions, starting to explore the flanks 

of the Irazú volcano and continuing than to the south, to 

the foothills of the Cordillera of Talamanca, where they 

often found great numbers of Epidendrum radicans. 

Finally, in March of 1910, they met the Lankesters, who 

invited them to their house in Cachí. The invitation was 

accepted and the Calverts went by train to Paraíso and 

then rode to Lankester’s farm. “Mr. Lankester’s house 

was beautifully situated half a mile from the Reventazón 

153 

River and about a hundred and fifty feet above it. It 

was not a typical Costa Rica residence, for although 

built of adobe it was two-storied and had no patio. A 

wide veranda or “corridor” ran across the entire front 

on the first and second floors, charming places, for they 

were set with plants and hung with baskets of orchids, 

some of which were in full flower when we were there” 

(Calvert & Calvert, 1917: 160) (Fig. 49D). In many of 

their excursions the Calverts traveled in the company 

of Costa Rican naturalist José Fidel Tristán (1874- 

1932), who was a magnificent guide and became their 

best friend in the country. The also received help from 

naturalist Anastasio Alfaro and well know ornithologist 

José Cástulo Zeledón. Near Guápiles, on the Atlantic 

side of the mountains, they were the guests of Mr. R. 

E. Woodbrigde, manager of the United Fruit Company, 

who was extremely fond of flowers. “All around the 

balconies were numerous potted plants and hanging 

baskets of orchids, ferns, caladiums and begonias” 

(Calvert & Calvert, 1917: 284). And while climbing the 

Poás volcano, they found that “all trunks and branches, 

even the stems of small bushes, were thickly covered 

with soft bright green moss, and the epiphytes were 

mostly green bromeliads and orchids.” Finally, near the 

Tempisque River, in Guanacaste, they passed “a number 

of trees bearing orchids with medium-sized pinkish 

flowers, which were called ‘guarias’; the same name 

is applied to Cattleya in the interior of the country, but 

these orchids were not Cattleya” (Calvert & Calvert, 

1917: 354, 418). On May 4, 1910, while preparing to 

return to Limón and to their ship to the United States, 

the Calverts were caught by the terrible earthquake that 

destroyed Cartago, and barely saved their lives and their 

collections. 

Harvey Elmer Stork (1890-1959) was a U. S. 

botanist who made important collections of orchids in 

Costa Rica. He collected in the country from 1920 to 

1932, and was also in Peru, Nicaragua and Guatemala 

(1938-1939) where he collected with Oliver Butler 

Horton (Habenaria bractescens Lindl. –Stork & 

Horton 8832 – Guatemala). Many years later, in 1956, 

he returned to Costa Rica. He had met Lankester in 

1923: “On Friday past I had the pleasure to take two 

botanists for a short woodland ramble (Dr. Stevens 

37 ... and Mr. Stork..) (Letter to Ames, June 25, 1923).” 

37 Frank Lincoln Stevens (1871-1934), was professor of Biology at the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic and a 

botanical collector who did NOT collect orchids. 


154 

Professor of Botany at Carleton College (Minnesota), 

Stork collected in Costa Rica over 1,200 specimens of 

plants. “The material gathered by Prof. H. E. Stork is 

just about finished. Two new Epidendrums and what I 

take to be a new Stelis” (Letter from Ames to Lankester, 

November 8, 1923). Some of the new species of 

Orchidaceae collected by Stork were: Epidendrum 

linifolium Ames (Stork 417), Epidendrum storkii Ames 

(Stork 460), Oncidium storkii Ames & Schw. (Stork 

s.n.), Stelis storkii Ames (Stork 2103), and Telipogon 

storkii Ames & Schw. (Stork 2101). Rafael Lucas 

Rodríguez described him as follows: “Harvey Stork 

was a North American of gigantic stature who, when he 

first visited the isthmus, walked all the way from David 

to Bocas del Toro, in Panama, to gain knowledge of 

the country. I went everywhere with him the last time 

he visited Costa Rica, and although he was already 

very old, I had problems trying to walk as he did” 

(Rodríguez, 1972: 14). The list of localities reveals 

that Stork collected primarily in the Central Valley, 

near Cartago and Orosi, making some excursions into 

Guanacaste, Pérez Zeledón and Puerto Limón. At 

some point he collected together with Willard Winfield 

Rowlee (1861-1923) to whom we owe Pleurothallis 

rowleei Ames (W. W. & H. E. Rowlee 236). Rowlee 

made important investigations on balsa wood in the 

Canal Zone, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras and 

Nicaragua. 

Carroll William Dodge (1895-1988) came to 

Harvard University as Instructor in Botany and was 

made Assistant Professor and Curator of the Farlow 

Library and Herbarium in 1924. While at Farlow 

from 1924 to 1931, Dodge doubled the herbarium 

collections by purchase and collection. Some of 

his collections came from expeditions to the Gaspe 

Peninsula, Canada (1923) and parts of Latin America. 

In 1925 he was briefly in Panamá and Costa Rica, a 

country where he returned in 1929, to study tropical 

mycoses on a Guggenheim Fellowship. Dodge 

received a second Guggenheim Fellowship for studies 

in Europe, and after his return in 1931, he became 

Professor of Botany at Washington University and 

Mycologist at the Missouri Botanical Garden. It was 

during his years in St. Louis that medical mycology 

and lichenology became his major research interests. 

He taught and visited in Latin America in Panama 

(1934-1935); Costa Rica (1936); Guatemala (1940- 

LANKESTERIANA 


1942); Chile (1950, 1960); and Brazil (1959). In 

Costa Rica he collected throughout the country on 

two occasions (November 1929 - May 1930 and 

July 1936 - May 1937), often in the company of 

the brothers Juvenal and Remo Valerio. Among his 

specimens we find a good number of Orchidaceae, 

among others Oncidium bryolophotum Rchb. f. 

(Dodge 4781), Masdevallia striatella Rchb. f. (Dodge 

4786), Masdevallia reichenbachiana Endres ex 

Rchb. f. (Dodge 6145), Oncidium ascendens Lindl. 

(Dodge 6388), Hexisea bidentata Lindl. (Dodge 

6389), Psygmorchis pusilla (L.) Dodson & Dressler 

(Dodge 16510) and Malaxis soulei L.O. Williams 

(Dodge 9080). While in Panama, he led a botanical 

expedition with Julian Steyermark in 1934-35, and 

collected in the company of Paul H. Allen and Abel 

A. Hunter. Brassavola nodosa (L.) Lindl. (Dodge 

16903) and Sobralia decora Batem. (Dodge 106a) are 

among his Panamanian specimens. 

Charles Herbert Lankester 

“Twenty three years ago today, the good ship 

‘Atrato’ (now alas asleep in the depths off the 

N. Irish coast) left Southampton with myself on 

board en route for C.R., and here I am still ...” 

Charles H. Lankester 

(letter to Ames, December 12, 1923) 

Of only 21 years of age, Charles Herbert Lankester 

(1879-1969) (Fig. 50A), arrived at Puerto Limón in 

December, 1900 and went on by train to the capital 

of Costa Rica, arriving just in time to take part in the 

“Ball of the New Century” offered by Costa Rica’s 

President Rafael Yglesias in the National Theater of 

San José. Better known as ‘don Carlos’, Lankester had 

been born in Southampton, England, and came to Costa 

Rica to occupy a position as assistant in the “Sarapiquí 

Coffee Estates Company”. His contract was for three 

years, with free travel from and to London, and with 

a salary of one hundred and fifty ‘colones’ (a stately 

sum at that time) (Urbina Vargas, 2005: 9). Sarapiquí 

proved too humid for the commercial production of 

coffee and the plantations had to be abandoned three 

years after the arrival of don Carlos in Costa Rica. It 

was here, however, surrounded by the most exuberant 

tropical vegetation, that his interest arose for plants, 

insects and birds. “Don Carlos Lankester arrived at


the right place at the right time to join into the active 

biological exploration of Costa Rica, perhaps the most 

exciting place biologically on our continent (Williams, 

1969: 860).” “He had the opportunity to meet 

professor Pittier when he visited this interesting region, 

beginning a friendship which lasted during all of his 

life” (Jiménez, 1967: 252). When his contract expired, 

Lankester returned to England, but came back to 

Costa Rica a few months later, called by Pittier to take 

over the experimental station which the United Fruit 

Company planned to establish in Zent, a project that 

never became reality. In the following years he worked 

in several farms, collected insects for doctor Schaus 

and birds for the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh. In 

1908 he accepted the administration of a coffee farm 

in Cachí, owned by Cecil V. Lindo, where he lived for 

nine years with his wife Dorothea Hawker (Fig. 50B) 

and his young family. It was during those years that 

don Carlos began his collections in the nearby woods, 

which in many cases proved to be new species. He sent 

his first specimens for identification to Rolfe, at Kew. 

One of them (Lankester 021, 1915, neighborhood of 

Cachí) is probably the first new species of Orchidaceae 

discovered by Lankester: Pleurothallis costaricensis 

Rolfe. 

Robert Allen Rolfe (1855-1921) (Fig. 50C), who 

had stepped into the position of world master of 

orchidology after the death of Reichenbach, was 

Lankester’s logical contact, who in a journey to 

England in 1920 brought an important collection 

of orchids to Kew. Rolfe’s sudden death left this 

collection unstudied, as happened to another 

collection of Panamanian orchids, prepared by C. W. 

Powell. Rolfe died at the age of 65, just when he was 

about to set out on his first trip to Tropical America 

(Panama and Costa Rica) (Reinikka, 1995: 278). “Kew 

had promised financial help and extended his term of 

service to include this field work, and the untimely 

end of a cherished wish was a great disappointment 

to Powell and the writer, both of whom had derived 

much encouragement and help from his kindly cooperation 

and guidance” (Lankester, 1944: 10-11). 

One of Rolfe’s fundamental achievements was the 

foundation of the Orchid Review in 1893, of which he 

was the editor until his death in 1921. Shortly before 

his death he was awarded the Victoria Medal of the 

Royal Horticultural Society (Stapf, 1921: 8). 

155 

After a brief interlude in England and Africa 

(1920–1922), Lankester returned to Costa Rica 

and moved later (1924) to live at “Las Cóncavas”, 

a coffee farm that he had acquired in the vicinity 

of Cartago. The year 1922 was an turning point in 

Lankester’s career as an orchidologist: it brought the 

first contact with Oakes Ames, that would develop 

into a deep friendship. Ames, after returning from a 

trip to Europe, wrote to Lankester: “At Kew I saw 

many specimens collected by you in Costa Rica, 

the greater part unnamed. As it will take some time 

for Kew to recover from the loss of Rolfe and as 

the Germans are making great efforts to assemble 

Costa Rican material through Wercklé, Jimenez and 

Tonduz, it seemed to me that you might be willing 

to co-operate with me by stimulating orchidological 

interest among your neighbors” (Letter from Ames to 

Lankester, September 17, 1922). Lankester answered 

immediately and became so, for the next 25 years, 

the favorite collector of Ames, who discovered 

among the specimens received from Las Cóncavas 

more than 100 new species. Many were dedicated 

to Lankester, such as: Campylocentrum lankesteri 

Ames, Cranichis lankesteri Ames, Dichaea 

lankesteri Ames, Dipterostele lankesteri (Ames) 

Garay & G. A. Romero-González, Epidendrum 

lankesteri Ames, Habenaria lankesteri Ames, 

Hexisea lankesteri Ames, Lockhartia lankesteri 

Ames, Malaxis lankesteri Ames, Maxillaria 

lankesteri Ames, Notylia lankesteri Ames, Oncidium 

lankesteri Ames, Ornithocephalus lankesteri Ames, 

Stelis lankesteri Ames, Stellilabium lankesteri 

(Ames) Dressler, Telipogon lankesteri Ames, and 

Trigonidium lankesteri Ames. He also found a new 

genus amongst Lankester’s collections: “There 

seems to be a new genus among your specimens. 

Lankesterella would be a good name (Letter from 

Ames to Lankester, April 18, 1923). The new genus 

was published in May, 1923. Ames never stopped 

expressing his admiration and gratitude: “... for what 

you have done my gratitude is immeasurable. I am 

mindful of the great service you have done in my 

behalf and I realize that there was no need for you 

to regard me as anything more than a pestiferous 

nuisance; a botanical mendicant reaching out toward 

you, a greedy hand” (Letter to Lankester, December 

16, 1923). 


156 

In Las Cóncavas, during the next 33 years and 

while he continued sending plants to Ames, Lankester 

created the orchid garden that would become the 

Mecca of all botanists who passed through Costa 

Rica, not only because of the plants, but also for 

don Carlos’ vast knowledge of the country and its 

nature (Fig. 50D). “Generous to a fault, hospitable to 

all, he was counselor to all scientists who came to 

Costa Rica. His interests were catholic - butterflies, 

birds, but most especially epiphytic plants, orchids, 

bromeliads and aroids” (Williams, 1972: 207). “A 

naturalist in the best and widest sense of that word” 

(Standley, 1925: 274). His business affairs suffered 

many ups and downs, and he often thought about 

returning to England. “It is just possible I may 

complete sale of this place during the coming week; 

if so Costa Rica will soon see me no more” (Letter 

to Ames, December 17, 1925). But he continued 

and never abandoned the country. In July of 1925, 

Lankester was elected as an honorary member of the 

American Orchid Society. 

After 1932, the correspondence between Ames 

and Lankester became less frequent. Ames was 

approaching 60 years of age and Lankester already 

passed 50. The initial passion gives way to a more 

serene and calm relationship. But their friendship 

continued until the death of the great American 

orchidologist in 1950.In 1956, when Lankester 

could not manage his farm because of his age, he 

sold “Las Cóncavas”. His wife had died, his children 

were far away, and don Carlos had no success in 

finding someone to care for his garden. He then 

moved his garden to a nearby property known as 

“Silvestre”. It was on this property where, years later, 

the Lankester Botanical Garden of the University 

of Costa Rica was established. However, despite 

of his age, he continued collecting. One of his last 

specimens has the number 1761, a plant of Warrea 

costaricensis Schltr., collected in February of 1960, 

when Lankester was already 81 years old. In the last 

years of his life Lankester lived in Moravia, where 

he continued cultivating orchids to the last day. It is 

said that shortly before passing away he confessed to 

his daughter Dorothy: “I am only sorry that, with all 

the opportunities I had, I never made enough money” 

(R. Lankester, pers. comm., 2004). In the words of 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez, one of his close friends, “... 

LANKESTERIANA 


his friends have at least the consolation that he had no 

long agony, and that his last days were rather happy, 

with a celebration of his 90 th birthday in June and 

the Garden Club awarding him a gold medal only last 

week” (In a letter to Robert Dressler, July 10, 1969. 

Except for a few articles, Lankester left a very 

limited amount of publications. He prepared a 

manual about the orchids of Costa Rica, that was 

approved for publication by the American Orchid 

Society in 1968, a year before his death, but the 

project was never completed (Lankester, 1944). The 

manuscript, with the title Costa Rican Orchids, is 

now part of the library of the Lankester Botanical 

Garden, awaiting to be published together with a 

biography of the great naturalist. Lankester’s only 

son, John Maurice Hawker Lankester (1913—), 

became also interested in orchids and in 1952 

collected a new species, Epidendrum puteum Standl. 

& L.O. Williams, that flowered at Las Cóncavas 

(John M.H. Lankester, 1606). 

Alfredo Sancho (1876-1929) was Lankester’s 

good friend and companion on many collecting trips. 

Brother of the writer Mario Sancho and of Francisco 

and Carlos Sancho, who owned farms in Peralta and 

La Estrella (to the East and South of Cartago), he 

introduced Lankester to the orchidaceous flora of the 

regions where his brothers worked. Lankester himself 

owned for a short period of time a farm in Peralta, a 

project he abandoned for economic reasons. During 

their collecting trips, Lankester and Sancho collected 

a great number of new species, that were named in 

honor of Sancho and his favorite collecting sites: 

Epidendrum sanchoi Ames, Lepanthes sanchoi Ames, 

Pleurothallis sanchoi Ames, Stelis sanchoi Ames, 

Encyclia peraltensis (Ames) Dressler, Pleurothallis 

peraltensis Ames, Chondrorhyncha estrellensis 

Ames, Epidendrum estrellense Ames, and Lepanthes 

estrellensis Ames. In a letter to Ames, Lankester 

shows the great affection he felt for the Sanchos: 

“I hope you may have time to meet Mario Sancho 

[at that time Consul of Costa Rica in Chicago]. His 

brother Alfredo, to whom you dedicated a Lepanthes 

and a Pleurothallis, has at various times helped on the 

good cause, and we had the pleasure of seeing them 

both here last night... they are worthy representatives 

of the best of the old Cartago gente” (Letter to Ames, 

July 30, 1924).

A 

C 


Figure 48. A — Alberto Manuel Brenes (1870-1948). Courtesy of Jorge Gómez Laurito. B — Brenesia costaricensis 

Schltr. Illustration by Fritz Hamer in Jenny, 2000: 21. C — Trichopilia galeottiana A. Rich. & Galeotti. Oil on canvas 

by Emilo Span. In Loaiza, 1973. D — Guillermo Acosta Piepper (1878-1955) and his wife Herminia Beer. Courtesy of 

Albán Cambronero Acosta. 

B 

D 

157 


158 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 49. A — Acostaea costaricensis Schltr. Illustration by A.R. Endrés. Courtesy of the Natural History Museum in 

Vienna. B — Alexander Curt Brade (1881-1971). In Pabst, 1967: 61. C — Otón Jiménez (1895-1988) in 1919. Courtesy 

of Silvia Troyo. D — Orchids in Lankester’s house in Cachí. Courtesy of Ricardo Lankester. 


B

A 

C 


Figure 50. A — Charles Herbert Lankester (1879-1969). Courtesy of Ricardo Lankester. B — Dorothea Hawker, Lankester’s 

wife. Courtesy of Ricardo Lankester. C — Robert Allen Rolfe (1855-1921). Courtesy of the Oakes Ames Herbarium, 

Harvard University. D — Lankester in ‘Las Cóncavas’, 1936. Courtesy of Ricardo Lankester. 

B 

D 

159 


160 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 51. A — Panama Canal under construction (1907). B — Barro Colorado Island as seen from Gatún Lake. Courtesy 

of the Missouri Botanical Garden. C — William Ralph Maxon (1877-1948). In the frontispiece of Fern Bulletin, 1903, 

vol. 11. Courtesy of Dr. Gustavo Romero. D — Charles Wesley Powell (1854-1927). Courtesy of the Hunt Institute for 

Botanical Documentation. 


B


The orchIds of The panama canal 

“Since its completion in 1914, the Panama 

Canal has been Panama’s economic base, 

and the United States presence has been the 

republic’s major source of frustration” 

(http://www.canalmuseum.com/ 

stories/history_of_panama_001.htm) 

“Completely different from Suez, where the desert 

hardly provoked any naturalistic concerns, the tropical 

nature of Panama was a complex challenge to Science.... 

At the center of these concerns about the impact of the 

canal on the surrounding environment was the formation 

of Lake Gatún. Its waters, while flooding the lower 

course of the Chagres River, would drown or drive 

away the majority of the plants and animals and would 

extinguish many unknown species.... Other unknowns 

were the changes that could take place once the waters 

and organisms of both watersheds came together...” 

(Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 74) (Fig. 51, A—B). There 

was also a practical interest in undertaking a biological 

survey of such importance: to enrich the collections of 

Panamanian flora and fauna in the museums of natural 

science in the United States. Leaders among those 

who undertook the biological exploration not only of 

Panama, but of the whole American continent, where 

two institutions which had been founded fifty years 

earlier: the Smithsonian Institution and the Missouri 

Botanical Garden. 

The biological exploration of the Smithsonian 

Institution. “... When the floodgates of the great earth 

dam which impounded the Chagres River started to 

close in April of 1910... the world’s largest artificial lake 

started to form: Lake Gatún. Suddenly, with the imminent 

flooding of over 60 villages and hundreds of square miles 

of jungle, the biological study of the region affected by 

the canal works became a scientific priority. Never before 

had the biologists had the unexpected possibility of 

exploring the highest tree tops by simply rowing a boat 

[...] In this odyssey of knowledge that took place on the 

isthmus, the Smithsonian Institution of Washington D. 

C., which undertook the first great biological survey of 

Panama between 1910 and 1912, played a principal role” 

(Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 73-74). 

The first group of a great number of specialists in 

different branches of biological sciences which would 

161 

visit the canal during the following years, gathering 

information and extensive collections, disembarked in 

Colón on December 28, 1910. In charge of the Botany was 

Henri Pittier, from the U. S. Department of Agriculture, 

who resided in Panama from 1910 to1912. According to 

the original plan, the study would require one year and 

would be limited to the immediate neighborhood of the 

canal excavations. However, the need to extend the area 

of study became clear very soon, and the explorations 

were extended to the whole territory of Panama. Field 

work, which lasted until March of 1912, began after 

Pittier’s request was granted and he could count on the 

help of William R. Maxon, who arrived in Panama in 

February, 1911. Pittier collected and classified 1,750 

species of plants in 154 different localities, among 

them many orchids. “After he returned to Washington 

[1912], Henri and his young assistant Paul C. Standley 

attacked the gigantic task of analyzing and publishing 

the scientific data of the vast collection of Panamanian 

plants [with the help of European specialists], many of 

them new to science. The publications were to appear 

under the joint seal of the U. S. National Herbarium and 

the Smithsonian Institution” (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 

84). Pittier wanted to write his final report in Latin, the 

classical language of Botany, employed by nine tenths of 

the systematic botanists, but he encountered resistance 

among the members of the Editorial Committee, who 

wanted everything to be written in English. Finally, the 

Secretary of the Smithsonian decided salomonically to 

publish the manuscripts part in Latin and part in English. 

The quarrel with the languages delayed the publications 

and upset the relations between the American and 

European naturalists. These difficulties paled however at 

the outbreak of World War I, when the relations among 

the international scientific community were finally and 

completely disrupted (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 85). 

William Ralph Maxon (1877-1948) (Fig. 51C) 

worked during his whole life for the New York 

Botanical Garden and the U. S. National herbarium. He 

had collected plants with Pittier in Chiriquí as early as 

1900. In 1905 he visited Guatemala and in 1906 Costa 

Rica (Maxon, 1906). He arrived in Costa Rica at Puerto 

Limon and collected in the provinces of San José, 

Cartago and Alajuela. Some of the orchids of the Maxon 

herbarium were given to him by Pablo Biolley, who 

cultivated them in his garden in San José (Nash, 1907). 

Maxon spent a time during 1911 in Panama, where he 


162 

formed a large collection of orchids together with Pittier, 

exploring not only the Canal Zone but also Chiriquí and 

other regions. Pittier remembered the collections in El 

Boquete (Chiriquí): “The district is wonderfully rich in 

orchids… We hope to have soon in Washington living 

specimens of many of the specific types collected by 

Warscewicz in the same region” (Heckadon-Moreno, 

1998: 108). Somewhat later (1923) he was again in 

Panama, Costa Rica and Nicaragua, where he collected 

in the company of Harvey and Valentine. In Costa Rica 

he became a friend of Lankester and Otón Jiménez: 

“Maxon has just advised his departure from CR. Am 

regretful not to have seen him again. He + Otón Jiménez 

went to Varablanca, a wonderful orchid region...” 

(Letter from Lankester to Ames, July 27, 1923). He 

discovered several new species of orchids, described 

initially by Schlechter (who had worked together with 

Pittier in the identification of the specimens from the 

Smithsonian’s exploration) and later by Ames, many of 

which were dedicated to him: Cranichis pseudociliata 

Schltr. (Maxon & Hay 3208, Guatemala), Elleanthus 

caricoides Nash. (Maxon 692, Costa Rica), Lepanthes 

maxonii Schltr. (Maxon 5494, Panama), Malaxis 

maxonii Ames, (Maxon, Harvey & Valentine 7770, 

Nicaragua), Pelexia maxonii Ames, Pleurothallis 

monstrabilis Ames (Maxon & Harvey 8096, Costa 

Rica), Pleurothallis propinqua Ames (Maxon & Harvey 

8268, Costa Rica), and Stelis maxonii Schltr. (Maxon 

5697, Panama). Several species that were in the 

private collections maintained in the Canal Zone by 

Mrs. D. D. Gaillard and Mrs. H. H. Rousseau and which 

Schlechter described as new species, were incorporated 

to the Panamanian collection of orchids by Maxon 

and Pittier: Aspasia rousseauae Schltr., Epidendrum 

rousseauae Schltr., and Maxillaria rousseauae Schltr. 

The orchid garden of Charles Wesley Powell 

“The Powell orchid garden at Balboa is one of 

the most interesting sights of the Canal Zone, 

and botanically by far the most remarkable 

thing to be seen there. It is something unique 

in tropical America, if not in the whole world.” 

Paul C. Standley (1925: 359) 

In 1915, Charles Wesley Powell (1854-1927), in 

charge of a dispensary in the Canal Zone, became 

seriously interested in orchids and began to amass 

LANKESTERIANA 


a complete collection of Panamanian species. “Mr. 

Powell’s idea was to accumulate as representative a 

Panamanian collection of orchids as possible and take 

them to England, where he contemplated making his 

home...” (Anonymous, 1929: 335). Powell had lived 

during a short time in Guatemala and went to Panama 

in 1907, shortly after the construction of the canal had 

been initiated. During many years, often in the company 

of A. A. Hunter, he undertook a systematic exploration 

of many regions throughout the country, and especially 

of the high mountains of Chiriquí. What began as a 

pastime became with the years a true passion. A layman 

in botanical matters, Powell began cultivating orchids 

in his garden (Fig. 51D) and forming a good specialized 

library. From 1916 onwards, he had the support of 

Christopher Cheeseman, who collected orchids for 

Powell until the former’s death in 1927 (Pring, 1927: 

75). As soon as he realized that many of his plants were 

not described in his books, he made contact with Rolfe 

at Kew, to whom he sent in 1920 a series of herbarium 

specimens, but Rolfe died before he had a chance to 

study Powell’s collection (Standley, 1925: 359). Powell 

sent then another collection to the German orchidologist 

Dr. Rudolf Schlechter, who published a work about the 

orchids of Panama (Schlechter, 1922). In this work 

he described 184 species, of which 75 were new to 

science. Schlechter wrote to Powell in 1921: “Your 

exploration of the orchid flora of Panama is one of the 

most important facts in orchidology during the later 

years” (Letter to Powell, 14 December, 1921). Shortly 

thereafter Schlechter made an attempt to gain Lankester 

as a collector: “Do try to induce Mr. Lankester to send 

materials to me too” (Letter to Powell, 21 November, 

1922). 

In 1922 Powell began his relation with Ames, who 

wrote triumphantly: “Mr. Powell is now collecting for 

me. He will send nothing more to Schlechter” (Letter 

to Lankester, January 13, 1923). It is true that since 

that year Powell sent only duplicates to Schlechter. 

In addition, he kept Ames informed by transcribing 

to Ames every letter he wrote to or received from the 

German orchidologist. One of the species that Ames 

had looked for, for years, was Selenipedium chica 

Rchb. f. Great was his joy when he received, shortly 

before embarking for Europe, a cablegram from 

Powell confirming that he had found the desired plant 

(Fig. 52A).


With the specimens that Powell sent to Ames, the 

number of Panamanian species known to science 

increased to 341. Ames, trying to play his cards on 

both sides of the ocean, wrote to Powell in 1922: 

“Notwithstanding my friendly relations with Schlechter, 

nobody would receive with greater joy the news that 

you decided to keep America free from Germany in the 

realm of Panama orchids” (Letter to Powell, October 

10,1922). And Ames continued a few months later: “I 

wish we could keep Schlechter out of the American 

field” (Letter to Powell, December 12,1922). Ames 

went so far as to sign with Powell a formal contract 

in which the latter would collect orchids for him for 

US $100,00 per month. “There can scarcely be for 

any tropical country a record of one person who has 

contributed so much to the knowledge of the orchid 

flora” (Standley, 1925: 359). Ames praised the quality 

of his work: “His indefatigable zeal is one of the joys 

in my contemplation of Central American orchidology. 

His specimens are often works of art” (Letter from 

Ames to Lankester, August 24, 1923). George H. 

Pring, during a visit to Powell in 1923, wrote that “in 

examining Mr. Powell’s herbarium specimens I was 

particularly interested in the retention of the natural 

color of foliage and flowers” (Anonymous, 1924: 179). 

Powell collected an endless number of new species 

that in many cases were dedicated to him (especially 

by Schlechter), among them: Coryanthes powellii 

Schltr., Cycnoches powellii Schltr., Dichaea powellii 

Schltr., Dresslerella powellii (Ames) C. A. Luer, 

Encyclia powellii Schltr., Epidendrum powellii Schltr., 

Gongora powellii Schltr., Govenia powellii Schltr., 

Leochilus powellii Schltr., Lycaste powellii Schltr., 

Maxillaria powellii Schltr., Mormodes powellii Schltr., 

Ornithocephalus powellii Schltr., Palmorchis powellii 

(Ames) Schweinf. & Correll, Polystachya powellii 

Ames, Restrepia powellii Schltr., Rossioglossum 

powellii (Schltr.) Garay, Sarcoglottis powellii Schltr., 

Scaphyglottis powellii Schltr., Sobralia powellii Schltr., 

Stelis powellii Schltr., Trichopilia powellii Schltr., and 

Xylobium powellii Schltr. In 1925 he visited Lankester 

in Costa Rica, who in turn traveled to Panama in 1927: 

“I have just spent a fortnight with my fellow sufferer 

from orchiditis, CWP, + it was a very delightful time 

of talk and talk and then talk. I wish we could have 

had you there as High Priest of our cult” (Letter from 

Lankester to Ames, July 17, 1927). 

163 

Powell died shortly thereafter, being 72 years of age, 

on August 18, 1927. “... his friend, A. A. Hunter, 

chief of the postal office of Balboa, was put in charge 

of Powell’s orchidarium that had been bequeathed 

by him, in 1926, to the Missouri Botanical Garden” 

(Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 153). A lectotypification 

of Powell’s Panamanian orchids was undertaken by 

Christenson in 1991. 

Abel Aken Hunter ( —1936) was Powell’s great 

friend and had collected orchids with him since 

1915. In his Orchidaceae Powellianae Panamenses, 

Schlechter dedicated five new species to him: 

Coryanthes hunteriana Schltr., Encyclia hunteriana 

Schltr., Epidendrum hunterianum Schltr., Pleurothallis 

hunteriana Schltr., and Sarcoglottis hunteriana Schltr. 

After Powell’s death, Hunter took over the direction 

of the Tropical Station that the Missouri Botanical 

Garden had established in Panama, and maintained 

this position until his own death in 1936. In 1935 he 

collected intensively with Paul Allen, discovering no 

less than four new species: Epidendrum cocleense 

Ames, Hubb. & Schw. (Hunter & Allen 389): 

Masdevallia tenuissima C. Schweinf. (Hunter & Allen 

587): Ornithocephalus cochleariformis C. Schweinf. 

(Hunter & Allen 383), and Pleurothallis rotundata C. 

Schweinf. (Hunter & Allen 561). 

The Tropical Station of the Missouri Botanical 

Garden 

“Plans have been perfected by the Missouri 

Botanical Garden of St. Louis, Missouri, 

U.S.A., for the establishing and maintaining 

of an Orchid Botanical Garden on the Isthmus 

of Panama. It is designed to have sent there 

from all parts of the world the desirable plants 

from abroad, to cultivate, propagate, and have 

their flowers on display for the knowledge and 

pleasure of the people resident in the Canal 

Zone, and Republic of Panama” 

(Anonymous, 1926: 227) 

Early in the 20th century, the Missouri Botanical 

Garden began sending its researchers into tropical 

climates, seeking to catalogue the diverse species in 

these rich environments. The English horticulturist 

George Henry Pring (1885-1974), who had served an 

apprenticeship at Kew, had arrived at the Garden in 1906 


164 

as responsible for the orchid collection and with the goal 

to raise it to a level even higher than the collection at 

Kew. During Pring’s 63 years in Saint Louis, the orchid 

collection of Missouri increased from 300 to over 50,000 

plants. When the First World Orchid Conference was 

inaugurated in Saint Louis in 1954, Pring, then 69 years of 

age, had the honor to preside. Pring made trips to remote 

locations in Mexico and in 1923 visited the Panama Canal 

Zone, where he spent six months and met Powell. Pring 

collected together with A. A. Hunter in Chiriquí, trying 

to increase Powell’s collection (Pring, 1927). Famous 

for one of the world’s finest collections of living plants, a 

great interest arose for Panama in the Garden, especially 

because of the orchid collection of C. W. Powell and his 

offer to donate it to the institution. In 1926 the Missouri 

Botanical Garden created a ‘tropical station’ at the foot 

of Ancón Hill, on lands granted by the Canal Zone 

government. Powell retired this same year and when his 

collection passed into the custody of the Tropical Station, 

he was appointed as its first director (Fig. 52B). 

A. A. Hunter, Powell’s great friend, took over 

Powell’s position in 1927 and kept it until his death in 

1936. Due to the high costs of operation, the Tropical 

Station was transferred in 1939 to the Canal Zone 

Government. Paul Allen was its last director. During 

its almost 13 years of existence, the Tropical Station 

supplied the greenhouses in Saint Louis with a constant 

flow of living plants. Powell’s collection marked 

the beginning of the Garden’s reputation in orchid 

horticulture. Among its collections of plants no less 

than 75 new orchid species were described, the majority 

of which had been collected by Hunter and Allen. 

George Pring returned to Panama in 1928 and made 

several collections of orchids, among others: Catasetum 

warczewitzii Lindl. & Paxt., Acineta chrysantha (Morr.) 

Lindl., Oncidium anthocrene Rchb. f., Peristeria elata 

Hook., and Odontoglossum schlieperianum Rchb. f. 

The Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute 

“Let us propose to ourselves to find an area 

of tropical forest, large enough and unaltered, 

where men of science can come to study.” 

James Zetek (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 141) 

“When the Panama Canal was built, Lake Gatún 

was formed by the impounding of the Chagres River, 

the waters flooded the valleys and the hills became 

LANKESTERIANA 


islands. The highest peak, Barro Colorado…, became 

the largest island of the new lake” (Heckadon-Moreno, 

1998: 139). The island was declared a protected area in 

1923 and a small biological station was established on 

it. The Institute for the Research of Tropical America 

was established in order to manage the island and the 

station. Diverse scientific and academic institutions 

of the United States, including the Smithsonian 

Institution, were part of the Institute, that was directed 

by the National Research Council. James Zetek was 

appointed as the resident administrator. 

James Zetek (1886-1959), North American 

entomologist of Czech origin, had arrived in 

Panama in 1911 to research on malaria. A passionate 

conservationist, Zetek fought during twelve years 

for support, in Panama and abroad, to convert Barro 

Colorado into a natural park, an area of jungle in 

good condition, with many plants and animals, where 

the naturalists could expand their knowledge in all 

areas of the biological sciences. With the support of 

Panamanian President, Belisario Porras, and of the 

Governor of the Canal Zone, Jay J. Morrow, as well 

as of Thomas Barbour, from Harvard University, 

Zetek finally reached his goal (Croat, 1978: 49). 

From 1923 to 1956, Zetek would be the dedicated 

and visionary administrator of the Biological Station 

at Barro Colorado. His work was paramount. Fighting 

with limited budgets, surviving the years of the Great 

Depression and World War II, Zetek was called, with 

justice, the ‘guardian of Barro Colorado’ (Fig. 52C). 

In 1946 the United States Congress transferred Barro 

Colorado to the Smithsonian Institution, that has 

managed it ever since. Zetek continued as resident 

administrator until his retirement in 1956. In 1964 the 

station was named “Smithsonian Tropical Research 

Institute”. 

A large number of researchers have passed through 

Barro Colorado and by 1930, one hundred eighteen 

scientific papers had been published by naturalists 

who had studied on the island. Besides being an 

excellent administrator, Zetek continued with his 

scientific activities, becoming interested also in plants. 

“He collected fewer plants than most collectors of his 

time but his collections are among the most selective. 

Though Zetek was not a botanist by profession, 

his correspondence with Standley indicates that he 

had a keen botanical awareness” (Croat, 1978: 51).


He collected several orchids, among which we can 

find Catasetum bicolor Klotzsch, Chondrorhyncha 

lipscombiae Rolfe, and Trigonidium egertonianum 

Batem. Standley dedicated to him several species 

in other plant families, such as Eugeniea zetekiana 

in the Myrtaceae and Saurauia zetekiana in the 

Actinidiaceae. 

Other American collectors, 1900-1930. Other great 

North American institutions were also of importance 

for the biological exploration of Central America 

during the first decades of the XX century. Among 

them are the New York Botanical Garden, the U. S. 

National Museum and the Field Museum of Natural 

History of Chicago. 

Robert Statham Williams (1859-1945) was a selfeducated 

naturalist who began his botanical collections 

in the mining fields of Alaska during the years of 

1898 and 1899. A short time later, Williams came to 

the New York Botanical Garden with a position as 

an assistant. In 1901 he was sent by the Garden to 

South America, returning with a large collection of 

plants from Bolivia and Peru. Schlechter wrote about 

his collections in Bolivia: “The few orchids which I 

have seen are proof that the collection must contain 

many interesting things” (Schlechter, 1922b: 13). In 

1903 he was sent to the Philippines and he made his 

last excursion in the first months of 1908, to Panama, 

where he collected in the region of Penonomé and 

the eastern provinces (Standley, 1928: 45-46). Ames 

described interesting new species of orchids among his 

collections in Panama: Oncidium ebrachiatum Ames 

& C. Schweinfurth (Williams 975), Pleurothallis 

canae Ames (Williams 971), Pleurothallis praegrandis 

Ames (Williams 973), Pleurothallis williamsii Ames 

(Williams 976), Stelis parvibracteata Ames (Williams 

s.n.), and Stelis williamsii Ames (Williams 970). 

Ellsworth Paine Killip (1890-1968) (Fig. 52D), 

a botanist, was raised in the State of New York 

and graduated from Rochester University in 1911. 

From 1919 he was part of the staff of the U. S. 

National Museum, becoming head curator in 1946, 

after Maxon’s retirement. Killip specialized in the 

taxonomy of South American plants and traveled 

several times to Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Brazil, 

Argentina, Chile and the Antilles. He collected 

on several occasions together with Maxon and 

165 

Standley. He lived in Balboa from September 1917 

to May 1918, and during this time he made botanical 

collections to the east of Panama City. In the spring 

of 1922, while on his return from Colombia, he 

prepared another collection of plants in the area 

(Standley, 1938: 46-47). During his last excursion 

to Panama he collected some plants in Barro 

Colorado (1948). Killip made numerous collections 

of orchids from which some new species were 

described: Camaridium grandiflorum Ames (Killip 

3565, Panama), Erythrodes killipii Ames (Killip 

3561, Panama), Habenaria patentiloba Ames (Killip 

3124, Panama), Ornithocephalus lanuginosus Ames 

(Killip 3314, Panama), Pleurothallis falcatiloba 

Ames (Killip 3540, Panama), Pleurothallis killipii 

Garay, and Scaphyglottis laevilabia Ames (Killip 

3113, Panama). Other species were dedicated to him, 

such as Elleanthus killipii Garay and Epidendrum 

killipii Hágsater & L. Sánchez Saldaña. In 1929 

Killip worked for a period of time in Madrid, where 

he opened the old boxes containing the collections 

of the Royal Botanical Expedition to New Granada 

of José Celestino Mutis (1783-1808), until then 

forgotten and never studied. His ‘rediscovery’ led to 

the distribution of parts of the collections to different 

museums around the world and to a renewed interest 

in the work of Mutis. 

Leslie Alva Kenoyer (1883 - ) came to Panama 

in 1927 and worked for some time at Barro Colorado, 

where he made important studies and published an 

important work on the ecology of the tropical rain 

forest of Barro Colorado. During his stay on the island 

he collected some 700 plants, that were the base 

for the publication of a supplement to the flora that 

Standley had previously published in 1927 (Kenoyer 

& Standley, 1929). He collected some orchids, 

such as Habenaria alata Hook. (Kenoyer 249) and 

Scaphyglottis longicaulis S. Wats. (Kenoyer 251). 

Standley dedicated to him Solanum kenoyeri, in the 

Solanaceae. 

Although important collections were made in 

Panama during the first three decades of the XX century, 

“until 1930 the collectors who came to Panama visited 

only a relatively small portion of the country and, with 

the notable exception of Henri Pittier, most collected in 

a relatively restricted area, many of them never leaving 

the region of the isthmus” (Croat, 1978: 49-50). 


166 

Paul C. Standley and the Central American floras 

“When we remember the incredible number of 

seeds produced by orchids, we wonder only that 

they do not dominate vegetation everywhere in 

the Tropics.” 

Paul C. Standley (1925: 377) 

Paul Carpenter Standley (1884-1963) (Fig. 53A), 

botanist of the U. S. National Museum, arrived at the 

port city of La Libertad, El Salvador, on December 19, 

1921. Thus arrived for the first time in Central America 

the man who was probably the most important figure in 

the history of botanical exploration of the region during 

the first half of the XX century. In a conversation with 

Otón Jiménez, Pittier said: “Much can be expected 

from such a young and capable element” (Jiménez, 

1963: 2). For over forty years, Standley collected 

intensively in all of the countries of Central America 

and published a series of fundamental works about 

their floras. He acquired an intimate knowledge about 

the region, not only about its botanical aspects, but also 

about its culture and traditions. He was a friend of all 

Central American scientists of his time and contributed 

like no other person to further the study and research 

among the local naturalists and collectors, contributing 

to the development of the existing herbaria and to 

the creation of many new ones. “...Standley hoped 

that every Central American country would have a 

botanical library adequate for the study of its flora, 

and a comprehensive herbarium, formed by local 

collectors” (McCook, 1999: 119). 

Standley was an indefatigable worker. “Nothing 

interrupted his work when he collected, except for the 

few seconds he needed to light a new cigarette on the 

butt of the old one” (Jiménez, 1963: 4). As a collector 

he was able to amass collections of hundreds of plants 

in only a few days and as a writer he produced more 

publications about the flora of Central America than 

any other botanist before or after him. “He spoke good 

Spanish and wrote even better in Latin…” (Heckadon- 

Moreno, 1998: 167). He had a devilish work schedule 

of 12 to 14 hours a day, never married and was a 

chain-smoker: thus he spent his life. Standley’s Trees 

and Shrubs of Mexico (1920-1926) is still one of the 

most important books on the subject, a publication 

“that alone exceeded the lifetime achievement of most 

botanists” (Williams, 1963: 27). 

LANKESTERIANA 


Standley published a short article in 1924 (‘The 

Republic of El Salvador’), but the Lista preliminar 

de las plantas de El Salvador (Standley & Calderón, 

1925) was Standley’s first work about Central 

American flora. Published together with Dr. Salvador 

Calderón (1879-1940), the list was based on more than 

4,600 specimens that Standley and Calderón collected 

over a period of five months, from December 1921 to 

May 1922 (with the help of Dr. José Ma. Carrillo) and 

described more than 2,000 plants, including 63 species 

of orchids distributed in 28 genera. Among them we 

find Corymborkis forcipigera (Rchb. f. & Warsz.) L. 

O. Wms. (Standley 20132 – Ahuachapán), Cattleya 

aurantiaca (Bateman ex Lindl.) P. N. Don (Standley 

19977 – Ahuachapán) and Barkeria obovata (C. Presl.) 

Christenson (Standley 19429 – San Salvador). During 

the following decades, Standley returned often to El 

Salvador, where he had doctor Mario Levy van Severen 

as assistant and companion. Van Severen prepared a 

personal orchid herbarium that was later sent to Louis 

O. Williams and is now deposited at ‘El Zamorano’, 

in Honduras. Salvador Calderón (Fig. 53B) continued 

with Standley’s work and to his efforts we owe the 

creation of the Salvadorian Herbarium, housed in the 

Salvadorian Directorate of Agriculture. This herbarium 

comprised, in 1922, over 2,000 collections of local 

plants. The genus Calderonia, from the family of the 

Rubiaceae, was dedicated by Standley to Dr. Calderón. 

As in all works written by Standley, it was Oakes Ames 

who identified the species of Orchidaceae contained 

in this list. While in El Salvador, Standley went to 

Guatemala (1922), from where we have his collection 

of Pleurothallis purpusii Schlechter (Standley 23901). 

Standley had his first experience with the orchids of 

Panama in the years of 1912-1914, when, as an assistant 

to Pittier, he was in charge of the classification and 

identification of the plants collected during the great 

expedition of the Smithsonian. Therefore, when the 

Governor of the Canal Zone wrote to the Secretary of 

Agriculture of the United States in 1921, asking for the 

best expert in tropical plants to prepare a book about 

the vegetation of the canal, Standley seemed to be the 

most logical choice (Heckadon Moreno, 1998: 167). 

Standley arrived in Panama in November of 1923 

and in the following five months collected 7,500 

plant specimens in the Canal Zone. On January 

17, 1924 and during a week in November of 1925

A 


C D 

Figure 52. A — “Have found Selenipedium chica plant. Pleasant voyage. Powell”. Courtesy of Dr. Gustavo Romero. B — 

The Tropical Station of the Missouri Botanical Garden in 1928. Courtesy of the Missouri Botanical Garden. C — Aerial 

view of Barro Colorado. Courtesy of the Missouri Botanical Garden. D — Ellsworth Paine Killip (1890-1968). Courtesy 

of the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 

B 

167 


168 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 53. A — Paul Carpenter Standley (1884-1963). Courtesy of Jorge Gómez Laurito. B — Dr. Salvador Calderón 

(1879-1940). Frontispiece of Revista de la Escuela de Farmacia 3(37-38). C — Juvenal Valerio Rodríguez (1900-1971). 

Courtesy of his son, Juvenal Valerio. D — Wilhelm Heinrich Ferdinand Nevermann (1881-1938). Courtesy of Helga 

Nevermann. 


B


(during his second stay in Panama), Standley 

collected 800 additional plants on the island of Barro 

Colorado, recently established as a protected area. 

He also studied the specimens obtained in the XIX 

century by Fendler along the Chagres River and the 

collections of R. S. Williams, Pittier and Maxon. 

Standley’s first work about the Panamanian flora 

was his Flora of Barro Colorado Island, published 

in 1927 by the Smithsonian Institution. As was 

previously mentioned, the collections by Kenoyer 

were the base for the publication of a first supplement 

to this flora (1929). A second supplement was 

published by Standley in 1930. “A botanist from the 

north can find no better place than Barro Colorado 

Island in which to make his acquaintance with the 

luxuriant tropical vegetation that is so unlike the 

plant life of the temperate regions..... Except for the 

lack of the expected brilliant flowers, which seldom 

or never materialize in lowland tropical forest, the 

newcomer will find his dreams of tropical plant life 

fully realized” (Standley, 1927: 7). “When Standley 

collected it was always with a view to writing a 

flora, and he tried to obtain as large a representation 

of species as possible” (Williams, 1963: 27). The 

monumental Flora of the Panama Canal Zone 

was published in 1928. In this flora, the section 

on Orchidaceae was again the work of Ames, who 

described 134 species in 57 genera. 

The two visits by Standley to Panama were 

followed by extensive collecting trips to Costa 

Rica, a country that Standley visited during the first 

months of 1924 and then again between December 

of 1925 and March of 1926. Standley collected in 

Costa Rica an enormous amount of material (over 

15,000 plant specimens) with the result of no less 

than 30 orchid species that were new to science. 

Worthy of mention are the following: Brachionidium 

pusillum Ames & Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 

49068), Brachionidium valerioi Ames & Schweinf. 

(Standley & Valerio 50759), Dichaea standleyi 

Ames (Standley 37440), Epidendrum anoglossoides 

Ames & Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 50731), 

Epidendrum exiguum Ames & Schweinf. (Standley & 

Valerio 47036), Epidendrum guanacastense Ames & 

Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 45089), Epidendrum 

triangulabium Ames & Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 

45970), Eurystyles standleyi Ames (Standley 33747), 

169 

Habenaria aviculoides Ames & Schweinf. (Standley 

& Valerio 42118), Lepanthes acoridilabia Ames & 

Schweinf. (Standley 42717), Lepanthes standleyi 

Ames (Standley 33800), Lockhartia integra Ames 

& Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 44675), Maxillaria 

chartacifolia Ames & Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 

45989), Maxillaria parvilabia Ames & Schweinf. 

(Standley 32939), Maxillaria valerioi Ames & 

Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 46940), Octomeria 

valerioi Ames & Schweinf. (Standley & Valerio 

44769), Pleurothallis casualis Ames (Standley 

36517), Pleurothallis quinqueseta Ames (Standley 

36283), Pleurothallis simplex Ames & Schweinf. 

(Standley & Valerio 44023), Pleurothallis standleyi 

Ames (Standley 33607), Scaphosepalum standleyi 

Ames (Standley 34447), Stelis standleyi Ames 

(Standley 39483), Stenorrhynchos standleyi Ames 

(Standley 34429), Telipogon ampliflorus Schweinf. 

(Standley 42021), and Telipogon standleyi Ames 

(Standley 34120). In Costa Rica, Standley became 

acquainted with the most relevant naturalists of his 

time: Anastasio Alfaro, Alberto M. Brenes, Amparo 

de Zeledón, Otón Jiménez, Ferdinand Nevermann 

and Charles Lankester. He always remembered the 

gesture of the Lankesters in December of 1925, while 

he was collecting in the region of Santa María de 

Dota: “The writer has not forgotten that they sent a 

special messenger upon a two days’ journey to bring 

a greeting at Christmas time”(Standley, 1937: 59). 

Of special importance for the success of Standley’s 

excursions and for his growing relationship with 

Central America was the figure of Juvenal Valerio 

Rodríguez (1900-1971). Recommended initially by 

Otón Jiménez, Valerio was Standley’s companion 

during his first visit to Costa Rica during a short tour 

to the Bajo de la Hondura. When Standley returned 

in 1925, Valerio never left his side, being his guide to 

the region of Santa María de Dota and the Cerro de 

las Vueltas, in an extensive tour through Guanacaste 

and finally to the lowlands of the Atlantic coast.. The 

botanist Rubén Torres Rojas (1890-1978) was also a 

frequent companion of Standley and Valerio during 

their excursions across the country (Grayum et al., 

2004: 20). Juvenal Valerio (Fig. 53C) was born in 

Santo Domingo de Heredia. He showed a true passion 

for nature since he was a boy and so clear was his 

vocation that in 1919 and 1920, during a leave of 


170 

absence of the professor of Natural Sciences at the 

Normal School, Valerio was called to substitute for 

him, being at the same time a student and the teacher 

of his classmates. 

In 1924 Juvenal Valerio was called by the Ministry 

of Education to assist Standley during his excursions 

in Costa Rica. Standley wrote in 1926: “I have great 

hopes in what Valerio will collect in Guanacaste. He 

knows now how to make collections and when he has 

gone out alone, he has made the greatest collections, 

larger than those of any botanist that I know” (Letter 

to Otón Jiménez, 1926). In 1937, Valerio was Director 

of the National Museum of Costa Rica. Through his 

relation with Standley, he was invited in 1940 as a 

special guest to the VIII Pan-American Scientific 

Congress in Washington, D.C. A short time later, in 

1942, he became, together with Standley, one of the 

founders of the Pan-American Agricultural School 

“El Zamorano”, in Honduras. Don Juvenal returned 

to Costa Rica and continued until his death dedicated 

to the study of the national flora, as a researcher at 

the Tropical Agricultural Center for Research and 

Education (CATIE), in Turrialba, and as a teacher at 

the University of Costa Rica. When he died, his body 

was carried to his home town, where he had asked to 

be buried. The whole country reacted in indignation 

when the local priest refused to let Valerio’s remains 

into the church, for the only reason that he had 

been a mason. Many orchid species carry his name: 

Brachionidium valerioi Ames & C. Schweinf., 

Lepanthes valerioi Luer, Maxillaria valerioi Ames 

& C. Schweinf., Octomeria valerioi Ames & C. 

Schweinf., Ornithocephalus valerioi Ames & C. 

Schweinf. and Schiedeella valerioi (Ames & C. 

Schweinf.) Szlach. & C. J. Sheviak . 

Standley and Valerio planned to publish a flora of 

Costa Rica in Spanish. Valerio argued to his superiors 

that a Spanish edition was essential so that it would 

be accessible to naturalists, students and the public 

of Costa Rica. But Valerio’s hopes vanished after the 

elections in the spring of 1936. Although the first 

fascicles were published, the new government, due 

to the economic crisis, cancelled the publications of 

all works of general interest, including the Flora de 

Costa Rica. The Field Museum of Chicago published 

the Flora of Costa Rica in four parts, between 

October of 1937 and November of 1938. 979 species 

LANKESTERIANA 


of Orchidaceae were mentioned in its Part I (1937). 

“[Valerio] was a tireless worker, always patient and 

considerate, even when he had frequent reason for 

provocation to quite other moods. His kindness and 

friendship will always be treasured by one who often 

has sorely tried both” (Standley, 1937: 60-61). 

From November 1927 to March 1928 Standley 

explored the region of Tela, in the northeastern coast 

of Honduras, using as his headquarters the Experiment 

Station of Lancetilla, of the Tela Railroad Company. 

With the collaboration of Wilson Popenoe, director 

of the station, and of Victor M. Cutter, president of 

the United Fruit Company, Standley wrote a Flora of 

Lancetilla Valley that was published in 1931. Standley 

enumerated in this work 50 species of Orchidaceae 

in 25 genera. Oakes Ames was again responsible 

for the determination of the orchids, as was usual 

in all of Standley’s floras. One year earlier, in 1930, 

Standley had published a Flora of Yucatán (Standley, 

1930b), in which he mentioned 21 species of orchids 

in 13 genera. However, Standley admitted that he 

had never visited the region and that his work was 

based solely on herbarium specimens. “Of the various 

floras prepared by the present writer, this is the only 

one covering a region in which he has not himself 

collected. His personal experience with the Yucatan 

flora is a remote and intangible one, consisting as it 

does of a view of the low green shore from the deck 

of a ship bound southwards to Guatemala” (Standley, 

1930b: 166). In fact, the orchids enumerated by 

Standley were those collected by George Gaumer 

some years earlier. Finally, Standley prepared, in 

collaboration with his good friend S. J. Record, The 

forest and flora of British Honduras (1936). Samuel 

Jones Record (1881-1945) collected in Guatemala, 

Belize and Honduras between 1926 and 1927 and 

was in Belize with Standley in 1936. In this work, 

Standley and Record mentioned 21 species of orchids 

in 13 genera. One of the few specimens of orchids 

collected by Record was Erythrodes querceticola 

(Lindl.) Ames (Record s.n., Belize). The story of 

Standley and the orchids of Central America does not 

end here. We will come back to this great character in 

the next chapters, because Standley would continue to 

be an outstanding figure in the history of the Central 

American flora until his death in 1963. 

Wilhelm Heinrich Ferdinand Nevermann (1881-


1938) (Fig. 53D), was born in Hamburg and arrived 

in Costa Rica on board of the steamer “Reventazón”, 

of the United Fruit Company’s Great White Fleet 

in October 1909, having graduated with honors 

as a mechanical engineer a few years earlier. After 

exploring the whole country and having formed a 

family, Nevermann acquired in 1918 a farm which he 

called ‘Hamburgo’, in El Cairo de Siquirres, in the 

Atlantic region of Costa Rica. While investigating the 

insects that attacked his banana plantations, an interest 

arose in Nevermann by which he became not only 

one of Costa Rica’s most important entomologists, 

but a world authority on this subject. The call by the 

German government after World War I to all German 

citizens living abroad to help refurbish the collections 

of the German museums that had been destroyed 

was followed by Nevermann, who with increasing 

frequency sent his insect collections to Germany. In 

these years he established close relations with Berlin’s 

Museum and Botanical Garden. But Nevermann 

“not only sent insects but also plants. There is a 

beautiful white orchid, Coryanthes nevermannii, 

which we owe to him” (Anonymous, 1938: 341). This 

reference is curious because there is no record of an 

epithet ‘nevermannii’ in the international registers 

of botanical nomenclature. The answer to this riddle 

can be found in a letter by Rudolf Schlechter to 

Nevermann dated May 8, 1925: “The two orchids 

which were sent to me interested me vividly. The 

double inflorescence with the big pendent flowers 

is a new species of Coryanthes, which I will soon 

describe as Coryanthes nevermannii Schltr. It is the 

first species of Coryanthes that until now I have 

known from Costa Rica. It is for me a special pleasure 

to dedicate this plant to you. Not smaller interest 

raised the slender-leaved Vanilla. This one also has 

not yet received a name. It will carry your name as 

Vanilla nevermannii Schltr.” (Letter from Schlechter 

to Nevermann, May 8, 1925). Schlechter died six 

months later, in November 1925, and the species 

dedicated to Nevermann were never published. When 

in 1943 Schlechter’s herbarium was consumed by 

the bombs, all evidences of Nevermann’s collections 

disappeared. Thus we will never know for sure 

which species correspond to Coryanthes and Vanilla 

nevermannii. Last mentioned was Coryanthes 

nevermannii by Charles Lankester in his manuscript 

171 

Costa Rican Orchids, when he writes about the 

orchids of the Atlantic coast of Costa Rica: “Another 

500 feet of elevation brings Stanhopea ecornuta, 

Aspasia epidendroides and rarities like Coryanthes 

nevermannii into the picture, …” (Lankester, 1944: 

16). and in a letter to Ames from 1928: “Coryanthes 

nevermannii - I cannot find publication of this name, 

but Nevermann certainly told me Schlechter had 

dedicated it to him. I … will write to Nevermann 

for confirmation” (Letter from Lankester to Ames, 

December 4, 1928). 

Schlechter had previously described a new 

orchid species based on a collection by Nevermann: 

Gongora unicolor Schltr. (Las Mercedes, Ebene 

von Limon - Nevermann, im November 1921) and 

mentioned another of his collections: Trichocentrum 

brenesii Schltr. (Nevermann s.n., without indication 

of locality). 

In 1936 Nevermann took over the Chair of 

Entomology at the National School of Agriculture. 

A short time later he died in an unfortunate accident. 

During the night of June 30, 1938, while studying the 

nocturnal behavior of a species of ant, he was shot by 

the son of a neighbor who mistook him for an intruder. 

He died three days later in the United Fruit Company’s 

hospital in Puerto Limón and his remains were buried 

in the Lutheran Cemetery of San José (Anonymous, 

1938: 334). Standley visited Nevermann in his farm, 

where he collected several species of orchids. “To Mr. 

Ferdinand Nevermann there are special obligations for 

a most pleasant and profitable visit to his fincas in the 

lowlands along the Reventazón River. Enviable is the 

botanist who receives a welcome from so considerate 

a host, or visits the forest with so competent a guide” 

(Standley, 1937: 59). Among Standley’s orchid 

specimens we find at least one new species collected 

at the finca ‘Hamburgo’ of Ferdinand Nevermann: 

Lepanthes confusa Ames & Schw. (Standley & Valerio 

48709, Costa Rica: Limón: Hamburg Finca, on the 

Rio Reventazón below Cairo, alt. 55 m).Standley 

dedicated to Nevermann several species in other plant 

families, among them Dichapetalum nevermannianum 

in the Dichapetalaceae and Ardisia nevermannii in 

the Myrsinaceae. Other botanists visited Nevermann, 

among them Carroll W. Dodge, who in 1930 collected 

in his farm a specimen of Cryptarrhena lunata R. Br. 

(C.W. Dodge 7757). 


172 

norThern cenTral amerIca: 1900-1930 

“Poor Mexico, so far from God and so close to 

the United States.” 

Porfirio Díaz, Mexican dictator 

During the first decades of the XX century, El 

Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua remained largely 

unexplored, with the exception of the regions 

where the United Fruit Company established its 

experimental stations in the banana plantations of 

the Atlantic. After Standley, these three countries 

were completely forgotten by orchidology for 

nearly fifty years. If one observes the collections 

of the main herbaria, it becomes clear that the 

number of specimens collected was ridiculously 

small as compared with the work that was done in 

Guatemala, Costa Rica and Panama. And leaving out 

L. O. Williams’ list of 1956, nothing was published 

about the orchids of these countries until well into 

the second half of the XX century. 

After Standley’s Flora of the Lancetilla Valley, 

and with the sole exception of a brief account in 

the work by Yuncker (1938), nothing else was ever 

written about the orchidaceous flora of Honduras. 

El Salvador did not fare much better, with the 

exception of the works of David Joaquín Guzmán 

Martorell (1843-1927). Guzmán received his 

doctorate in Medicine in Paris (1863-1868), which 

he concluded with his Essai de topographie physique 

et médicale de la République de El Salvador, 

Amérique Centrale (1869). He was founder and first 

director of the National Museums of El Salvador 

and Nicaragua (in the company of the naturalist 

Diocleciano Chaves, 1897), as well as of the 

Botanical Garden of San Salvador, in May of 1886. 

The first National Exhibition in 1904, which took 

place in the Model Farm of San Salvador (today the 

National Zoo) was also organized by him. Guzmán 

wrote Especies útiles de la flora salvadoreña (San 

Salvador, 1918 and 1926), in which he described 900 

species of the flora and mentioned fifteen species 

of orchids native to his country (the showier ones), 

which he considered only from the point of view 

of their usefulness (as Vanilla pompona Schiede) 

or ornamental value, adding some instructions for 

their cultivation. The list of orchids of El Salvador 

LANKESTERIANA 


of David Guzmán is based on a previous study by 

Dr. Darío González (1833-1910), who, together 

with Guzmán, was a pioneer of the botanical study 

of the country. Both were loyal followers of the 

liberal philosophy, anticlericals who believed in laic 

education as the principal tool for the development 

of the country and who held important positions 

in El Salvador’s educational institutions. Guzmán 

and González played an active role in the campaign 

that led to the expulsion of the Order of the Jesuits 

from El Salvador (1872). According to González, 

the most important Salvadorian orchid species were 

Epidendrum atropurpureum, Epidendrum radicans, 

Epidendrum ciliare, Arpophyllum spicatum, 

Cattleya skinneri, Cattleya aurantiaca, Lycaste 

suaveolens, Stanhopea bucefalus, Odontoglossum 

grande, Oncidium ampliatum, Trichopilia tortilis, 

Trichopilia suavis, Vanilla pompona, Odontoglossum 

salvadorense and Laelia rubescens. Additionally 

he mentions several species that are grown in 

El Salvador and were introduced from Mexico, 

Guatemala, Costa Rica and Panama. Guzmán had a 

close relation to the Costa Rican naturalists of his 

time and in his works he frequently mentions Pittier 

and Wercklé. The French Félix Choussy, an engineer 

of the National Agronomy Institute of Paris, directed 

during the first years of the century the School of 

Agronomy of San Salvador. Several fascicles on the 

Salvadorian flora, based on Choussy’s herbarium, 

were published years later (Choussy, 1976). Four 

species of orchids were mentioned: Habenaria 

alata Hook., Cattleya skinneri Batem., Sobralia 

macrantha Lindl and Stanhopea costaricensis Rchb. 

f. The Lista preliminar de las plantas de El Salvador 

(1925) by Standley and Calderón was published in 

1925, but it was Hamer, in 1974, who began the 

systematic study of the orchids of the country, with 

the publication of his Orquídeas de El Salvador 

(Hamer, 1974 & 1981). 

In Nicaragua, Diocleciano Chaves (1844-1936), 

together with the Brothers of La Salle Antonio Garnier 

and Artemio René, accomplished great botanical 

work in the area around Managua (1923-1929), 

gathering over 6,000 collections, some of them in the 

company of William R. Maxon. In 1886 he received 

the commission from President Zelaya to establish 

the National Museum. The museum was inaugurated


in 1900 and its first director was the aforementioned 

Salvadorian David J. Guzmán. Antonio Garnier 

would continue his botanical collections until 1938. 

Under his specimens we find Maxillaria tenuifolia 

Lindl., Epidendrum lacustre Lindl., Prosthechea 

chacaoensis (Rchb. f.) W.E. Higgins, Cyclopogon 

elatus (Sw.) Schltr., Cattleya aurantiaca (Bateman 

ex Lindl.) P.N. Don and Lockhartia amoena Endres 

& Rchb. f. Miguel Ramírez Goyena (1857-1927), 

third director of the National Museum of Nicaragua, 

published 1909 a Flora nicaragüense (1909) in 

which he mentioned 94 species of orchids. “A flora 

of Nicaragua published in 1909-1911 probably is not 

really a flora of Nicaragua, and so far as I know was 

not based on specimens. A persistent rumor has it that 

this ‘flora’ was written in Honduras but funds could 

not be found to publish it there. The title was changed 

and funds found for publication in Nicaragua. Many 

plant names do not represent plants found in any 

Central American country” (Williams, 1972: 205). 

However, Ramírez Goyena was important in the 

development of the natural sciences in Nicaragua. The 

herbarium of the Autonomous National University of 

Nicaragua-León carries his name. After this, seventyfive 

years had to pass until F. Hamer began his long 

series of publications (beginning in 1982) about 

Nicaraguan orchids, with the first fascicle of Icones 

Plantarum Tropicarum (Hamer, 1982-1985). One 

of the few collections of Orchidaceae that we know 

from Nicaragua during this period is that of Franz 

Eccarius Schramm (1873-1949), a missionary of the 

Moravian Evangelical Church who in 1924 collected 

the type of Campylocentrum sullivannii Fawc. & 

Rendle (Schramm s.n., Costa de los Mosquitos). 

The cause for the slow advance of the botanical 

sciences during this period can perhaps be found in 

the statement of Pérez Brignoli: “Education played 

a secondary role. The ambitious plans of common 

education, typical of the liberal period, remained, 

with the exception of Costa Rica, on paper. The 

vast majority of the rural population never escaped 

illiteracy. In the national budgets, the assignments 

for ‘Public Instruction’ were always surpassed by 

the expenses of the military. The universities had 

a mediocre existence, reduced to the formation of 

lawyers and a few other liberal professions...” (Pérez 

Brignoli, 1985: 140). 

173 

Yucatan, Guatemala, Belize and Honduras. One of 

the largest collections of plants from Yucatán was that of 

Georg Eduard Seler (1849-1922) and his wife Caecilie 

Seler-Sachs (1855-1933). Eduard Seler, without doubt, 

stands out among the numerous German researchers 

who dedicated their life to the study of the national and 

cultural history of Mexico and Central America. Since 

the last years of the XIX century, Seler’s writings 

were fundamental to the study of the autochthonous 

Mesoamerican cultures, so much that Seler became 

the ‘father of American studies’, both in Germany and 

in Mexico. The merits of his wife Caecilie must also 

be credited. She was Seler’s companion on all of his 

travels, which could be financed thanks to her personal 

wealth. Caecilie Seler made important investigations, 

complementary to those of her husband, wrote and 

published the travel journals and edited the works of her 

husband after his death. She was also an extraordinary 

pioneer in natural and archeological photography. The 

Selers collected in Guatemala and Chiapas between 

1887 and 1899; in Yucatán in 1902-1903; in Yucatán 

and Campeche in 1907 and again in Yucatán in 1911. 

Th. Loesener published an interesting account of their 

travels in Plantae Selerianae (Loesener, 1899 & 1906) 

with descriptions of the orchids by R. Schlechter. 

Among their Guatemalan collections Schlechter 

described four new species: Epidendrum papyriferum 

Schltr. (Seler 2316, Huehuetenango), Microstylis 

minutiflora Schltr. (Seler 2347, Huehuetenango), 

Habenaria selerorum Schltr. (Seler 2492, Alta 

Verapaz), named in his honor, and Stelis guatemalensis 

Schltr. Other collections by Seler mentioned by Ames 

were: Epidendrum cochleathum L. (Seler 2328), 

Epidendrum diffusum Sw. (Seler 2320), Habenaria 

limosa (Lindl.) Hemsl. (Seler 2294), Nageliella 

angustifolia (Booth ex Lindl.) Ames & Correll (Seler 

2623), Odontoglossum bictoniense (Batem.) Lindl. 

(Seler 2326), Oncidium suttoni Batem. ex Lindl. (Seler 

2454), and Spiranthes cinnabarina (Llave & Lex.) 

Hemsl. (Seler 2396). 

Albert Wendt (1887-1958), a collector of German 

origin, was in Guatemala in 1900 and collected the 

type of Lepanthes oreocharis Schltr. (A. Wendt s.n.). 

The botanist Orator Fuller Cook (1867-1949) and the 

geologist Robert Fiske Griggs (1881-1962) collected 

in Guatemala between 1902 and 1906. In the year 

of 1903 Cook spent a brief time in Costa Rica and 


174 

visited also Chiapas in 1906. Cook had graduated from 

Syracuse University and was later employed by the 

New York State Colonization Society, making three 

trips to Liberia to prepare for the ‘repatriation of the 

American Negro’. In 1898 he entered the service of 

the United States Agricultural Department and was in 

charge of the introduction of tropical plants. He was an 

authority on pre-Columbian agriculture. 

Robert F. Griggs would later be famous for directing 

the expeditions to Alaska of the National Geographic 

Society between 1915 and 1919. From Cook and Griggs 

we have several collections of Orchidaceae, all made in 

Guatemala: Cyrtopodium punctatum (L.) Lindl. (Cook 

& Griggs 368), Leochilus labiatus (Sw.) O. Ktze. 

(Cook & Griggs 24), Pleurothallis circumplexa Lindl. 

(Cook & Griggs 456), Scaphyglottis confusa (Schltr.) 

Ames & Correll (Cook & Griggs 401), Scaphyglottis 

minutiflora Ames & Correll (Cook & Griggs 267), 

Scaphyglottis prolifera Cogn. (Cook & Griggs 840), 

and Spiranthes funckiana A. Rich. & Gal. (Cook & 

Griggs 66). 

“... A young botanist from the United States 

collected nearly a thousand numbers in Belize between 

1905 and 1907… Morton E. Peck (1871-1959) 

probably doubled the number of Belize specimens 

which then existed in the world’s herbaria” (Balick 

et al., 2000: 15). It was the first large collection to 

come from the colony (Williams, 1972: 203). Before 

Peck’s arrival, the region was practically unknown 

botanically. Peck came to Belize sponsored by the 

Iowa State College and collected mainly in the 

region of the Manatee River (district of Belize). His 

specimens were identified by B. Robinson of the Gray 

Herbarium and we find among them 53 species of 

plants new to science. Among Peck’s collections we 

find Corymborkis forcipigera (Rchb. f. & Warsz.) L.O. 

Williams (Peck 610), Habenaria mesodactyla Griseb. 

(Peck 966) Huntleya fasciata Fowlie (Peck s.n.), and 

Huntleya lucida (Rolfe) Rolfe (Peck s.n.). 

Charles Clemons Deam (1871-1959) began 

collecting plants in the last years of the XIX century, 

when his doctor ordered long walks to counteract ill 

effects of his job. From then on he dedicated most of 

his time to botanical interests. At first he considered 

the whole world his subject and made some trips to 

Central America at the turn of the century to collect 

plants there. Soon after, though, he decided to 

LANKESTERIANA 


concentrate on Indiana and by the end of his career 

claimed that he had been in and collected plants from 

every township of the state. By the time he gave 

his herbarium to Indiana University it contained at 

least 63,000 specimens, some of which he was first 

to identify. Deam traveled to México in 1900 (he 

collected in Oaxaca and Morelos) and to Guatemala 

in 1904 and 1909, where his collections centered on 

the regions of Zacapa, Izabal and Petén. In Guatemala 

he discovered the type of Epidendrum deamii Schltr. 

(Deam 6198, Guatemala) and collected many other 

orchids, such as: Epidendrum adenocarpum La Llave 

& Lex. (Deam 6249B), Epidendrum aromaticum 

Batem. (Deam 6073), Epidendrum chinense (Lindl.) 

Ames (Deam 212), Nageliella purpurea (Lindl.) L. 

O. Williams (Deam 6084), and Spiranthes tonduzii 

Schltr. (Deam 96). Charles Deam had a strong, 

frequently violent temper. He became a botanist of 

world fame although he never earned a university 

degree. In his honor, his admirers named Lake Deam, 

in Hoosier National Park. Three universities gave him 

honorary titles. 

William Ashbrook Kellerman (1850-1908) was the 

first professor of Botany at the University of Eastern 

Ohio and founded the herbarium of this learning 

center in 1891. In 1905 he began a series of travels to 

Guatemala, convincing the University to approve the 

idea of a School of Tropical Botany. Unfortunately, 

Kellerman’s career ended abruptly, a fatal victim 

of a tropical disease during his fourth excursion to 

Guatemala. Ames & Correll mention some of his 

collections of Orchidaceae in Guatemala: Epidendrum 

clowesii Batem. ex Lindl. (Kellerman 6036), Laelia 

glauca (Lindl.) Benth. (Kellerman 5566), Maxillaria 

densa Lindl. (Kellerman 6703), Maxillaria variabilis 

Batem. (Kellerman 7043), Prescottia tubulosa (Lindl.) 

L. O. Williams (Kellerman 5577), and Spiranthes 

hemichrea Lindl. (Kellerman 6564). 

In 1904, U. S. botanist George P. Goll ( - ), who 

worked for the Smithsonian Institution, collected 

several species of orchids in Guatemala, among them 

the type of Cranichis pseudociliata Schltr. (Goll 205). 

Goll also collected: Campylocentrum micranthum 

(Lindl.) Rolfe (Goll 71), Cranichis sylvatica A. Rich. 

& Gal. (Goll 205), Habenaria monorrhiza (Sw.) Rchb. 

f. (Goll 172), Oncidium ensatum Lindl. (Goll 135), and 

Sobralia decora Batem. (Goll 48).


Frederick Lewis Lewton (1874-1959), collaborator 

of the Smithsonian Institution, made several 

collections of Orchidaceae in Guatemala during 

the year 1906, among which we find specimens of: 

Dichaea hystricina Rchb. f. (Lewton 439), Dichaea 

panamensis Lindl. (Lewton 272), Notylia barkeri 

Lindl. (Lewton 276), Oncidium pusillum (L.) Rchb. f. 

(Lewton 293), Oncidium sphacelatum Lindl. (Lewton 

305), and Scaphyglottis minutiflora Ames & Correll 

(Lewton 268). In 1912, Lewton was named curator 

of the Division of Textile Plants of the U. S. National 

Museum. He is remembered in Polygala lewtonii 

Small (Polygalaceae), collected by him in 1894. 

Theodore Dru Alison Cockerell (1866-1948), a man 

who was an internationally known scientist, a prolific 

writer, and a highly regarded teacher at the University 

of Colorado in Boulder, was the elder brother of the 

noted British scholar Sir Sydney Cockerell and labored 

in relative obscurity in America while his brothers and 

their families were basking in the limelight of smart 

British society. He became the greatest specialist on 

bees in the world. His contribution to the understanding 

of wild bees is monumental and by 1938 he had 

published the names and descriptions of 5,480 new 

species and subspecies. Of special interest to this 

story is his discovery of “the orchid bee” Euglossa 

imperialis Cockerell (1922), the most abundant orchid 

bee in lowland forest in Panama. Cockerell published 

his Notes on Lycaste (1919), where he described 

Lycaste alba (Dombrain) Cockerell as a new species, 

based on living plants that his wife had brought from 

Guatemala several years earlier. Rolfe refuted the 

new species, that has since then been maintained as a 

variety of Lycaste skinneri (Bateman ex Lindl.) Lindl. 

Sidney Fay Blake (1892-1959) was a precocious 

botanist, who at the age of 18 had already written 

three important papers on botanical matters. He 

graduated from Harvard University and in 1918 was 

named assistant botanist of the U. S. Department of 

Agriculture. He traveled in this position to Honduras 

and Guatemala in 1919. In this last country he 

collected some orchids: Spiranthes guyanensis (Lindl.) 

Cogn. (Blake 7609), and Spiranthes tortilis (Sw.) L. C. 

Rich. (Blake 7567). Blake became famous for his work 

Geographical Guide to the Floras of the World , which 

he published together with Alice Cary Atwood (Blake, 

1942-1961). 

175 

Joseph Harry Johnson (1894-1987) arrived in 

Guatemala in December of 1919 and made very 

important collections in the region of Alta Verapaz. A 

dozen new species were described among Johnson’s 

collections: Epidendrum neurosum Ames (Johnson 

141), Epidendrum pachyrachis Ames (Johnson 

305), Epidendrum prorepens Ames (Johnson 234), 

Lepanthes appendiculata Ames (Johnson 879), 

Lepanthes inaequalis Schltr. (Johnson 886), Lepanthes 

johnsonii Ames (Johnson 420), Pleurothallis abjecta 

Ames (Johnson 905), Pleurothallis amethystina Ames 

(Johnson 878), Pleurothallis johnsonii Ames (Johnson 

901), Pleurothallis samacensis Ames (Johnson 765), 

Stelis chihobensis Ames (Johnson 939), and Stelis 

johnsonii Ames (Johnson 252). 

Herbert Spinden (1879-1967) was born in South 

Dakota. During his teen years, he worked on the 

railroad and eventually went to Alaska in search of 

gold. Spinden went on to attend Harvard University 

from 1902 until 1909, where he received his Ph.D. in 

Anthropology. In 1920 he took the position of curator 

at the American Indian Art and Primitive Cultures 

Museum at the Brooklyn Institute and spent the rest 

of his life studying the Mayan civilization. He visited 

the main archeological sites in Yucatán, Guatemala, 

Honduras and Belize. He tried unsuccessfully 

to convince Ames to travel with him to Yucatan. 

During one of his trips to Central America in 1923, 

and probably induced by Ames, he collected several 

species of orchids in the north coast of Honduras and 

in Guatemala: Brassia caudata (L.) Lindl. (Spinden 

s.n., Honduras), Chysis bractescens Lindl. (Spinden 

s.n., Guatemala), Epidendrum cochelatum L. (Spinden 

s.n., Guatemala), Epidendrum condylochilum Lehm. 

& Kraenzl. (Spinden s.n., Guatemala), Epidendrum 

stamfordiaunum Batem. (Spinden s.n., Guatemala), 

Ionopsis utricularioides (Sw.) Lindl. (Spinden s.n., 

Honduras), Maxillaria densa Lindl. (Spinden s.n., 

Guatemala), Maxillaria tenuifolia Lindl. (Spinden 

s.n., Guatemala), Meyracyllium trinasutum Rchb. f. 

(Spinden s.n., Guatemala), Oncidium sphacelatum 

Lindl. (Spinden s.n., Guatemala), Scaphyglottis behrii 

(Rchb. f.) Benth. & Hook. (Spinden s.n., Honduras), 

Stelis perplexa Ames (Spinden s.n., Honduras), and 

Pleurothallis ophiocephala Lindl. (Spinden s.n., 

Guatemala). Later, in 1924, he published a work on 

which he had been working on for four years and with 


176 

the subject of the reduction of the Maya dates. In this, 

he gave the correlation of dates with our calendar and 

the Maya calendar. In 1930, John E. Teeple proved the 

dates to be wrong, a devastating blow to Spinden. He 

spent the rest of his life defending his correlation. 

Winslow Roper Hatch (1908- ) and Carl Louis 

Wilson (1897-) collected in Guatemala in 1926. We 

know their specimens of Habenaria quinqueseta 

(Michx.) Sw. (Wilson 39B), Brassavola nodosa (L.) 

Lindl. (Wilson s.n.), Pleurothallis dolichopus Schltr. 

(Hatch & Wilson 369), Pleurothallis glandulosa 

Ames (Hatch & Wilson 344) and Maxillaria purpurea 

(Spreng.) Ames & Correll (Hatch s.n.). Hatch collected 

later in Costa Rica (1937). 

Clayton Dissinger Mell (1875-1945), who had 

worked with Record on Timbers of Tropical America 

(1924), collected in Nicaragua and Mexico (Oaxaca, 

Veracruz and Chiapas) between 1923 and 1945. From 

Chiapas we have his collection of Bletia tenuifolia 

(Mell 2084, 1933). 

Duncan Stevenson collected from 1927 until 1929 

together with J. N. Oliphant ( - ) in the Cayo district 

of Belize and in the Cockscomb Mountains. Among 

his collections we find Sobralia bradeorum Schltr. 

(Stevenson s.n.). 

Of much greater importance was Cyrus Longworth 

Lundell (1907-1994) who collected in Guatemala, 

Belize, Yucatán, Quintana Roo and Honduras in the 

years of 1928-1938. Lundell collected a large number 

of specimens and the plants of Belize and Guatemala 

constitute an important base for his numerous 

publications of the plants of the Maya regions, 

especially his monumental work The Vegetation of 

Peten (1937). Types of new species of Orchidaceae 

discovered by Lundell were: Pleurothallis yucatanensis 

Ames & C. Schweinf. (Lundell 912, Yucatán), and 

Ponthieva parviflora Ames & C. Schweinf. (Lundell 

1213, Campeche). Among other collections of 

orchids by Lundell we find: Habenaria bractescens 

Lindl. (Lundell 3324, Guatemala), Dichaea muricata 

(Lundell 6552, Belize), Vanilla planifolia Andrews 

(Lundell 164, Guatemala), Sobralia decora Batem. 

(Lundell 2961, Guatemala), Spiranthes guyanensis 

(Lindl.) Cogn. (Lundell 3704, Guatemala), Spiranthes 

orchioides (Sw.) A. Rich. (Lundell 3484, Guatemala) 

and Stelis ciliaris Lindl. (Lundell 2141, Guatemala). 

In 1933 Lundell was in charge of supervising the 

LANKESTERIANA 


collections of Percival Gentle in Belize (see later). 

Thus he became one of the foremost experts in the 

flora of the region. His later explorations in the region 

of Petén were fundamental for the completion of Ames 

& Correll’s work on the orchids of Guatemala and 

Belize. Of great importance was also the botanical 

expedition to Yucatán and Quintana Roo, undertaken 

by Lundell from May through August, 1938 (See 

Lundell, 1938). 

Conrad Vernon Morton (1905-1972), botanist and 

a world authority in ferns, collected during a period 

of time in Guatemala (1928), from where we know 

of his specimens of: Epidendrum chinense (Lindl.) 

Ames (Morton 425), and Isochilus major Cham. & 

Schlecht. var. amparoanus (Schltr.) Correll (Morton 

263). Morton came to the Smithsonian as assistant of 

the Division of Plants of the U. S. National Museum. 

In 1948 he was appointed Curator of the newly 

established Division of Ferns, Department of Botany. 

Morton was made Senior Botanist in 1970, a position 

he retained until his death. 

During the same period (1928) Hugh Charles 

Sampson (1878-1953) and John Sidney Karling (1898- 

1995) came to Belize, where they collected some 

specimens of Orchidaceae: Catasetum integerrimum 

Hook (Sampson s.n.), Clowesia russelliana (Hook.) 

Dodson (Sampson s.n.), Encyclia bractescens (Lindl.) 

Hoehne (Sampson s.n.), Encyclia chacaoensis (Rchb. 

f.) Dressler & Pollard (Sampson s.n.), and Oncidium 

carthagenense (Jacq.) Sw. (Karling s.n.). 

Avery significant series of collections of plants were 

made by William A. Schipp (1891-1967), beginning 

in 1929 and continuing for many years. Schipp, of 

Australian origin, came to Belize determined to make 

his living as a botanical explorer. His Flora of British 

Honduras, Price List of Seeds and Herbarium Material 

(1933-34) is really only a list of his collections and 

emphasizes items for sale (Balick et al., 2000: 18). 

Schipp had among his clients the main herbaria of 

Europe and the United States. Determinations were 

made by Paul C. Standley at The Field Museum in 

Chicago and forwarded to Schipp in exchange for a 

set of duplicates.He collected several orchids (all in 

Belize), among which we find: Bletia purpurea (Lam.) 

DC. (Schipp 782), Brassia maculata R. Br. (Schipp 

S-843), Campylocentrum micranthum (Lindl.) Maury 

(Schipp 8-841), Campylocentrum poeppigii (Rchb.


f.) Rolfe (Schipp S-39), Chysis laevis Lindl. (Schipp 

S-838), Corymborkis forcipigera (Rchb. f. & Warsz.) 

L. O. Williams (Schipp 8-302), Ionopsis utricularioides 

(Sw.) Lindl. (Schipp 917), Jacquiniella equitantifolia 

(Ames) Dressler (Schipp 852), Masdevallia tubuliflora 

Ames (Schipp S-102), Oncidium ensatum Lindl. 

(Schipp 780), Ornithocephalus bicornis Lindl. ex 

Benth. (Schipp S-839), Pleurothallis marginata Lindl. 

(Schipp 918), and Psygmorchis pusilla (L.) Dodson & 

Dressler (Schipp 879). Shipp’s collections in Belize 

and Guatemala were of excellent quality and as many 

as 154 were types for new taxa. His departure from 

Belize in 1937 marked the end of a golden age of 

sorts. During his tenure a Department of Forestry was 

active and numerous articles and several books were 

published about the flora. 

Joseph Charles Comeille Bequaert (1886-1982), 

a Belgian naturalist who would become years later 

the foremost expert in the freshwater mollusks of the 

Belgian Congo, collected in Yucatán, near the famous 

ruins of Chichén Itzá, during the year of 1929. Shortly 

thereafter he went on to Guatemala, where he collected, 

among others: Dichaea muricata (Sw.) Lindl. 

(Bequaert 47), Habenaria repens Nutt. (Bequaert 50), 

Spiranthes trilineata var. thelymitra (Rchb. f.) L. O. 

Williams (Bequaert 6), and Stelis bidentata Schltr. 

(Bequaert 48). 

The first known collection of Orchidaceae by James 

Beach Edwards is the type of Octomeria hondurensis 

Ames (Edwards 304, Lago Yojoa, Honduras), that is 

dated October 29, 1929. From then on and until March 

1934, we find at least thirteen new species which 

Edwards discovered, most of them described by Ames, 

for whom Edwards worked: Bletia edwardsii Ames 

(Edwards 24), Bletia papillifera Ames (Edwards 

277), Epidendrum comayaguense Ames (Edwards 

333), Epidendrum cystosum Ames (Edwards 675), 

Epidendrum dickinsonianum Withner (Edwards 

400), Epidendrum edwardesii Ames (Edwards 

122), Habenaria hondurensis Ames (Edwards 

267), Hexadesmia hondurensis Ames (Edwards 

334), Oncidium hondurense Ames (Edwards 101), 

Pleurothallis comayaguensis Ames (Edwards 338), 

Pleurothallis oscitans Ames (Edwards 515), Sobralia 

177 

edwardsii Ames (Edwards 299), and Vanilla insignis 

Ames (Edwards 407). Edwards spent apparently a 

short time in Guatemala, from where we know of only 

one collection: Maxillaria elatior (Rchb. f.) Rchb. 

f. (Edwards 609, November 1933). In a letter from 

Ames to Lankester we read: “Mr. J. B. Edwards has 

been finding some interesting orchids in Honduras, 

near Tegucigalpa, He has turned up some of the fine 

old things that used to appear in collections forty years 

ago but have given way to the unpraiseworthy craze 

for hybrids” (June 11, 1933). He seems to have been a 

discriminating and careful collector. After almost four 

years of collecting in Honduras, he gathered no more 

than 750 orchids; however, the number of new species 

is proportionally very high. 

Other collectors in Mexico during the first years of 

the XX century 

“…a good many German and Belgian 

collectors have been here; I would have found 

more plants if it was not for that”. 

C. A. Purpus 

(In a letter to Brandegee, January 1907) 

The botanical exploration of southern Mexico 

stopped almost completely for a long time, due to 

the chaos that reigned in the country and the perils 

to which naturalists (especially U. S. citizens after 

1916 38 ) were exposed during the violent years of 

the Mexican Revolution. During a great part of the 

history of Mexico, a small minority had control of 

both power and the largest part of the country’s wealth, 

while the majority of the population lived in misery. 

As the gap between rich and poor widened during the 

dictatorship of General Porfirio Díaz, the low classes 

lost their political voice. Opposition to Díaz surged 

when Francisco Madero, educated in Europe and 

California, initiated a series of strikes throughout the 

country. Díaz was forced to hold elections in 1910, and 

although he tried to ignore the results, he was forced 

to resign in 1911. Madero became president but found 

opposition in Emiliano Zapata, who was not willing 

to wait for the orderly implementation of the agrarian 

reform that Madero proposed. Thus began a time in 

38 In response to an attack by the troops of Pancho Villa to the city of Columbus (New Mexico), the United States sent troops to 

invade Mexico. This generated a strong anti-American feeling among the Mexican population and was often the cause for violent 

actions against citizens of this country. 


178 

which the country divided itself in the support of 

different factions, and groups of ‘guerrilleros’ swept 

the countryside, destroying and burning haciendas 

and ranches. Madero was taken prisoner and executed 

and the country lived in a state of chaos and disorder 

during many years. Pancho Villa dominated the north 

and several groups fought for political power. Finally, 

Venustiano Carranza came to the Presidency and 

organized an important convention that promulgated 

the Constitution of 1917, still in force, and in which 

the agrarian reform played an important role. Carranza 

was followed by others who continued his reforms and 

who founded, years later, the ‘Partido Revolucionario 

Institucional’ (=‘Revolutionary Institutional Party’), 

that became the dominant political force during the 

following 70 years. The Botanical Garden of the Forest 

of Chapultepec was founded in 1922, with Alfonso 

Herrera as director. It would become over the years 

one of the fundamental institutions in the botanical 

research of Mexico. 

Cyrus Guernsey Pringle (1838-1911) (Fig. 54A) 

was one of the first North American and European 

botanists who arrived in Mexico in the last years of the 

XIX century and first decades of the XX, and collected 

extensively in the Pacific states of the United States, 

Cuba (1903) and in Mexico (between 1880 and 1909). 

In 1902, Pringle was appointed curator of the herbarium 

at the University of Vermont, where he deposited his 

large collection of plants. At the time of his death he 

had accomplished a surprising amount of botanical 

work. He had distributed to various herbaria over 

500,000 specimens of some 20,000 different species. 

Among these, 29 new genera and over 1,200 new 

species could be found. Pringle was called “the Prince 

of botanical collectors”. His Mexican collections were 

described in Plantae Mexicanae, published in parts 

in the periods between 1885-1887 and 1889-1906. In 

our area of study, Pringle collected two new species 

of orchids: Pelexia pringlei Fernald (Pringle 8122, 

Veracruz), Spiranthes pringlei S. Watson (Pringle 8197, 

Veracruz). Many others were dedicated to him, among 

them: Corallorhiza pringlei Greenm., Cyclopogon 

pringlei (S. Watson) Soto Arenas, Encyclia pringlei 

(Rolfe) Schltr., Epipactis pringlei Gand., Habenaria 

pringlei B.L. Rob., Malaxis pringlei Ames, Microstylis 

pringlei S. Watson, and Pleurothallis pringlei Schltr. 

The first orchids collected by Pringle were described 

LANKESTERIANA 


by Benjamin Lincoln Robinson (1864-1935), who had 

been assistant to Sereno Watson at the Gray Herbarium 

and whom he succeeded as curator in 1892. Robinson 

held this position with almost no interruptions until 

his death. Robinson described Habenaria pringlei in 

1892 in Descriptions of new plants collected in Mexico 

by C. G. Pringle and Isochilus unilateralis in 1894 

in Descriptions of new and hitherto imperfectly known 

plants collected in Mexico by C. G. Pringle. 

In the history of the Missouri Botanical Garden Jesse 

More Greenman (1867-1961) played a preeminent 

role. Greenman made important collections in Mexico 

in the years of 1906-1912 and in 1922 traveled through 

Central America, where he collected between January 

and April in Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua and 

Guatemala. From this journey we have the following 

specimens of orchids: Pleurothallis floribunda Poepp. 

& Endl. (Greenman 5481, Costa Rica), Stelis sp. 

(Greenman 5492, Costa Rica), Sobralia powellii Schltr. 

(Greenman 5788, Nicaragua), and Cohniella cebolleta 

(Jacq.) Christenson (Greenman 5906, Guatemala). 

But Greenman’s importance is not primarily based on 

his collections, but on his position of curator of the 

herbarium of the Missouri Botanical Garden, a position 

he held from 1913 until 1948, a period in which he 

gave enormous support to students and collectors to 

collect in the American tropics, using as headquarters 

the Tropical Station which the Garden had founded in 

Panama in 1926 (Riley, 1995: 20). Under Greenman’s 

supervision students were formed of the stature of 

Mildred Mathias and above all Julian Steyermark, 

who with the years would become an important figure 

in our history. The herbarium increased during his 

tenure from 600,000 to 1,500,000 specimens. Robert 

Woodson, assistant and successor of Greenman, began 

the project of the Flora of Panama , that was published 

between the years of 1943 to 1980 and gave a great 

impulse to the orchidology of the southern part of our 

region (D’Arcy, 1980). Greenman was honored by L. 

O. Williams in his description of Bletia greenmaniana, 

a new species described from a specimen collected by 

Bourgeau in 1865 in the region of Orizaba, Mexico 

(Bourgeau 2812). In 1898 Greenman described several 

new species of orchids in Diagnoses of new and critical 

Phanerogams: Corallorhiza involuta Greenm., and 

Corallorhiza pringlei Greenm., and in 1900, in New 

species and varieties of Mexican plants (Orchidaceae):


Spiranthes pringlei var. minor Greenm., Spiranthes 

nelsonii Greenm., and Spiranthes tenuiflora Greenm. 

“Without any doubt, Carlos Alberto Purpus [1851- 

1942] figures among the most productive of collectors 

who have been in our country. His collections in 

Mexico possibly exceed 17,000 examples…” (Sousa 

Sánchez, 2002). After having completed his studies 

in Pharmacy, Purpus traveled in 1887 to the United 

States, to collect plants for a nursery in Darmstadt, 

Germany, the city where he had studied. He visited 

Mexico for the first time in 1898, collecting on the 

peninsula of Baja California and in 1905 he arrived 

at Veracruz, at the Hacienda El Mirador of Florentino 

Sartorius in Zacuapam, Veracruz. Zacuapam would 

be his residence and center of operations for the rest 

of his days. In 1907, Purpus was named a botanical 

collector, without pay, of the University of California, 

Berkeley. His collections of Mexican plants would be 

in charge of Townshend Stith Brandegee, who would 

make the determinations. The collections by Purpus 

led to a series of articles published by Brandegee, 

between 1909 and 1912, under the title of Plantae 

Mexicanae Purpusianae. The Mexican Revolution 

broke out shortly after Purpus had settled in Veracruz. 

Purpus wrote: “Because of the conditions of insecurity 

that prevail in many states, I could only explore in 

Veracruz and part of Puebla. Thus, I visited Tehuacán 

and Esperanza. It would have been very risky to 

make more distant excursions. The Zapatistas were 

everywhere” (In a letter to Brandegee, 1914). The 

year 1908 was one of the pleasantest of Purpus’ life in 

Mexico: he was visited by his brother, Joseph Anton, 

who worked as an inspector of the Botanical Garden 

of Darmstadt (Germany) in the company of his chief, 

director of said garden, and by his friend Brandegee. 

“In 1913 he made a series of trips to Chiapas, a state in 

which there are data [from his collections] until 1925. 

His localities in Chiapas are always related to coffee 

plantations, property of Germans who emigrated from 

Guatemala during the 1890’s, especially to the region 

of Soconusco” (Sousa Sánchez, 2002). In 1915 a period 

of recession begins, owing to lack of communication, 

and to the dangers implicit in the Revolution. During 

this period the letters of Purpus are a series of dreams 

that the normal lines of communication may return 

soon, of unrealized plans of future visits to Chiapas 

and even to South America. Otto Nagel, of whom 

179 

we will talk later and who became a good friend of 

Purpus, came to Veracruz in 1925 and stayed at his 

house for several years (Hartmann, 1968: 191). But 

Purpus never left El Mirador. There he died, in the 

hacienda that will always have a place of honor in 

the history of the orchids of northern Mesoamerica, 

on January 17, 1941, being 90 years of age. Purpus 

collected many orchids, among them the following 

ones, new to science. Many of them carry his name: 

Encyclia purpusii Schltr. (Purpus s.n.), Epidendrum 

incomptoides Ames (Purpus 299), Govenia purpusii 

Schltr. (Purpus 2613), Lepanthes congesta R. E. 

Schultes (Purpus 1355), Odontoglossum purpusii 

Schltr. (Purpus s.n.), Pleurothallis purpusii Schltr. 

(Purpus s.n.), Sarcoglottis purpusiorum Schltr. 

(Purpus s.n.), Scaphyglottis purpusii Schltr. (Purpus 

2153), Stanhopea purpusii Schltr. (Purpus s.n.), 

Stelis confusa Schltr. (Purpus 2122), and Stelis 

purpusii Schltr. (Purpus 2111). His friend and mentor 

Brandegee honored him with a genus of the Rosaceae: 

Purpusia. 

Johann Heinrich Rudolf Schenck (1860-1927) had 

collected in Namibia (German West Africa) in 1885 

and Brazil (1885-1887), from where we know of his 

collection of the type of Pogoniopsis schenckii Cogn. 

(Schenck 2765, Rio de Janeiro). In 1908-1909 he 

collected in Mexico in the company of Joseph Anton 

Purpus, brother of C. A. Purpus. During a short time 

they coincided at the hacienda El Mirador with T. S. 

Brandegee. Schenck was known for his Text Book of 

Botany at High Schools (1894), that was used until the 

second half of the XX century, and for the publication 

of the famous Vegetationsbilder (=‘Images of nature’), 

that were published between 1902 and 1920. 

While the intention of Brandegee was to prepare 

herbarium specimens, J. A. Purpus and Dr. Schenck 

collected primarily living plants, especially succulents, 

that were to form part of the collection of the Darmstadt 

Botanical Garden. The work rhythm to which C. A. 

Purpus was accustomed, plus the hardships of the 

regions through which they traveled, were too much 

for the European botanists; J. A. Purpus fell ill with 

malaria and Dr. Schenck with intestinal problems. 

On October 14, 1909, they embarked in Veracruz 

for the return journey to Europe (Sousa Sánchez, 

2002). Among his Mexican collections Schlechter 

discovered the type of Epidendrum subuliferum Schltr. 


180 

(Schenck 673). Cogniaux and Kraenzlin dedicated 

several species to him, among them: Epidendrum 

schenckianum Kraenzl., Habenaria schenckii Cogn., 

Stelis schenckii Schltr., and Zootrophion schenckii 

(Cogn.) Luer. 

The exact date in which Sander hired the French 

collector Louis Forget (- 1915) (Fig. 54B) is not clear. 

However, it is said that he had started collecting for 

Sander thirty years before he died (Swinson, 1970: 

224). This puts the beginning of his colleting activity 

for the St. Albans firm at around 1885. On the other 

side, in a letter to Sander dated May 27, 1897, Forget 

writes: “Being forced to return to England by your 

disgraceful treatment I received from your house 

which has thoroughly disgusted me, I have determined 

to resign my post as a collector ... It is now seven 

years since I started collecting for you, and I think you 

should have had more confidence in me ... as I have 

always done my best for you”. This would put the date 

of his initial contract with Sander at 1890. Anyway, 

although he collected for Sander for a long period of 

time, and was in his contract almost until his final day, 

it is clear that his relations with his employer were not 

always happy. After this letter, Forget came home, but 

soon his problems were sorted out and he was back in 

the jungles. But to judge from his correspondence, the 

money situation did not improve: “I am perplexed... 

I do not know what to do ... when will you send the 

draft?” (Swinson, 1970: 128). Forget collected mainly 

in South America, but in 1910 he was sent to Mexico, 

in the search of Laelia gouldiana. Forget arrived in 

Veracruz in November of 1910, with an order from 

Sander which read: “When you find the plant I would 

like 3,000 as quickly as you can send them.” Forget 

finally found the plant, after only four days of search. 

On February 10, 1911, Sander wrote to the director 

of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew: “It is 23 years 

since I collected this beautiful species, and until 

Monsieur Forget sent this consignment no plants had 

been collected... This Laelia flowers at Christmas ... 

over two hundred spikes, each carrying many flowers, 

and Forget writes it was a dazzling and wonderful 

sight” (Swinson, 1970: 191-193). Several orchids were 

dedicated to him: Brassia forgetiana Sander, Cattleya 

forgetiana Rolfe, and Masdevallia forgetiana Kraenzl. 

Sander brought in 1917 Epidendrum tricarinatum to 

flower, Forget’s last discovery from Peru. “This bright 

LANKESTERIANA 


purple flower was to serve as Forget’s epitaph, for he 

had died of a heart attack in Rennes on the 10 th August, 

1915. Of him Sander wrote: ‘He was absolutely fearless 

out in the forests, but disliked intensely the noise and 

bustle of London and any large town. ... Louis Forget 

was every inch a man’ ” (Swinson, 1970: 226). 

Per Karl Hjalmar Dusen (1855-1926) was an 

important Swedish botanist who collected mainly in 

Brazil. Born in Vimmerby, he studied at the Technical 

University of Stockholm and traveled in 1901 to 

Brazil, where he worked as an assistant at the National 

Museum in Rio de Janeiro. Kraenzlin described his 

collections (1921) and the epithet dusenii is frequent 

in the orchidaceous flora of that country. From one of 

his collections in Parana he was honored with a new 

orchid species Cryptophoranthus dusenii Schltr. He 

was in Mexico around 1912 and collected the type 

of Epidendrum heteroglossum Kraenzl. (Dusen s.n., 

Veracruz). He collected over 84,000 plants during 

his life. His herbarium is at the Imperial Museum for 

Natural History in Stockholm (Anonymous, 1949: 33). 

Charles Russell Orcutt (1864-1929) had collected in 

Baja California between 1882 and 1886 and came to 

Veracruz in 1910, where he collected Dichromanthus 

cinnabarinus (La Llave & Lex.) Garay (Orcutt 4286) 

and the type of Schiedella pubicaulis (L. O. Williams) 

Burns-Bal. (Orcutt 5056). 

The Lancetilla Experiment Station. It seems strange 

to talk about somebody who was an expert in avocados 

in a history about orchids. Frederick Wilson Popenoe 

(1892-1975) established in 1925 the Lancetilla 

Experiment Station as a farm for the research on 

banana of the United Fruit Co. The name Lancetilla 

derives from a small but very spiny indigenous palm 

(Astrocaryum standleyanum) whose spines have 

the shape of small lances and is found with relative 

frequency in the valley of Tela. The land on which 

the station is located, eight kilometers to the south of 

Tela, was originally the property of the Atlantic Fruit 

Co. and was later transferred to the United Fruit Co. 

Although Lancetilla was established originally for 

the research on bananas, it very soon expanded its 

activities. Thanks to Popenoe’s efforts, research was 

extended to other areas. When Popenoe left Lancetilla 

in 1941, the garden’s collection contained 764 varieties 

of plants, 636 species, 392 genera and 105 families


on a total of 78 hectares. The United Fruit Company 

kept control and maintained the station until 1974, 

when the gardens were donated to the government of 

Honduras. The government neglected the installations, 

causing the loss of many of the precious plants. After 

several years under government control, the garden 

was transferred to the administration of the esnaCiFor, 

the National School for Forestry Sciences. Since then, 

Lancetilla has managed to become auto sufficient and 

very productive as a center of research and production. 

Under the name of Lancetilla Botanical Garden, it is 

the second in importance of its kind in the world. 

In 1929 Wilson Popenoe and his wife acquired the 

ruins of a colonial mansion in Antigua, Guatemala, and 

began a complete restoration. Today, occupied by their 

daughters, ‘Casa Popenoe’ is one of the most important 

colonial buildings in Antigua and a must-see for any 

tourist. Finally, Wilson Popenoe became in 1942 the 

founding director of the Pan American Agricultural 

School “El Zamorano”, near Tegucigalpa, of which 

we will talk later. Popenoe received honorary degrees 

from Pomona College and the University of Florida 

and many awards in recognition of his work from 

scientific societies and foreign governments. 

He was during his whole life a passionate researcher 

on avocados (Persea americana) and traveled across 

the American continents in search of new species to 

improve those that were under cultivation. His most 

important discoveries were the base for his Manual of 

Tropical and Subtropical Fruits, published in 1920. 

Standley dedicated to him many species of other 

families, among them Begonia popenoei from the 

Begoniaceae and Ficus popenoei from the Moraceae. 

Lancetilla has only an indirect relation to our 

history. But during many years it was a place that 

attracted naturalists from all over the world, who 

used the Experiment Station as their headquarters 

and made great contributions to the knowledge of the 

flora of the region. As Standley wrote: “Never have 

I worked amid such agreeable surroundings, with so 

many comforts, and with so many conveniences for 

the successful prosecution of field work. Fortunate 

are those who have the opportunity of working in 

such a congenial atmosphere as prevails in Lancetilla” 

(Standley, 1931: 49). 

In the neighboring town of San Pedro Sula, the 

brothers Héctor and Tito Pérez Estrada established 

a private botanical garden, at the same time of the 

establishment of Lancetilla. Wilson Popenoe wrote: 

“... the brothers Pérez Estrada are two unique 

characters in Honduras, as their garden is unique 

not only in this country but in the whole territory 

between Mexico and Panama... For many years 

they have cultivated hundreds of exotic plants that 

have been introduced from all regions of the world, 

transforming this garden into a beautiful flower 

garden of Nature...” (Escoto, 2002: 102-103). The 

garden was reestablished in 1994 under the name of 

‘Jardín Botánico Municipal Pérez Estrada’. Tito Pérez 

Estrada was considered the first botanist of San Pedro 

Sula. To him we owe the only known biographical 

sketch about the life of Dr. Karl Thieme (Estrada, 

1952). 

from The ‘good neIghbor’ polIcy 

To world war II 

181 

“In the field of world policy I would dedicate 

this nation to the policy of the good neighbor 

— the neighbor who resolutely respects himself 

and, because he does so, respects the rights of 

others”. 

Franklin Delano Roosevelt 

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) 

took office in 1933 determined to improve relations 

with the nations of Central and South America. 

Under his leadership the United States emphasized 

cooperation and trade rather than military force to 

maintain stability in the hemisphere. Roosevelt’s 

Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, participated in the 

Montevideo Conference of December 1933, where 

he backed a declaration favored by most nations 

of the Western Hemisphere: “No state has the right 

to intervene in the internal or external affairs of 

another”. Roosevelt stated, “The definite policy of the 

United States from now on is one opposed to armed 

intervention”. In 1934, at Roosevelt’s direction, the 

1903 treaty with Cuba that gave the United States 

the right to intervene to preserve internal stability 

or independence was abrogated. Although domestic 

economic problems and World War II diverted 

attention from the Western Hemisphere, Roosevelt’s 

Good Neighbor policy represented an attempt to 


182 

distance the United States from earlier interventionist 

policies, such as the Roosevelt Corollary and military 

interventions in the region during the 1910s and 1920s. 

The Great Depression in the United States was a hard 

blow to the Central American economies. “The Central 

American countries, small producers in the concert of 

nations, were extremely vulnerable to the fluctuations 

of the external situation. Their economies were not 

diversified and the main export products -coffee and 

bananas- where nothing but ‘dessert’ on the tables of 

the European or American consumers” (Pérez Brignoli, 

2000: 127-128). Their societies were marked by deep 

social inequalities that soon led to the formation of 

the first labor unions and the first communist parties 

in the region. Central America led a political life 

of exclusions. “In practice, the life of the liberal 

institutions and laws was above all this: an immense 

monologue of the ruling classes with themselves” 

(Pérez Brognoli, 2000: 129). Coups d’etat, controlled 

elections and candidates imposed by the government 

were the rule in political life. 

The concentration of power in a few hands and the 

preeminence of the military produced such typical 

dictators as Manuel Estrada Cabrera (1857-1948), in 

Guatemala, the ‘Señor Presidente’ in Miguel Ángel 

Asturias’ magnificent novel. After Cabrera, Guatemala 

was ruled from 1931 to 1948 by General Jorge Ubico 

(1878-1946), “Educator and Protector of the Youth”. 

It was General Jorge Ubico who signed the presidential 

decree declaring Lycaste skinneri var. alba as the 

National Flower of Guatemala, on February 11, 1934. 

He followed the recommendation of Mrs. Leticia M. 

de Southerland, president of the International Flower 

Exhibition held in Miami in 1933. 

General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez (1882- 

1966) served as president of El Salvador from 1931 

to 1944. His regime was a strict dictatorship that 

suppressed a Communist-led uprising during its 

initial days in office, with an estimated number of 

fatalities of between 10,000 and 30,000. Nicaragua and 

Honduras followed similar paths. While Nicaragua in 

1934 came under the rule of the Somoza dynasty, that 

would control the country until 1979, Tiburcio Carías 

Andino (1876-1969), “Doctor and General”, ruled in 

Honduras from 1933 to 1948 with a very strong hand 

for the Hondurans and a white glove for the United 

Fruit Company. 

LANKESTERIANA 


To the South, Costa Rica and Panama became 

the exceptions. In Costa Rica, although the country 

suffered as much as its neighbors from the results of 

the economic world crisis, regular elections were held 

during this period. Political life in the country was only 

disrupted by the great strike in the banana plantations of 

the Atlantic region (1934) and by the short civil war of 

1948. Panama battled hard to maintain its democratic 

regime, with the omnipotent United States often being 

the judge over bitterly fought political campaigns. 

To the North, Lázaro Cárdenas (1891-1970) was 

elected president of Mexico in 1934 and founded the 

National Revolutionary Party, predecessor of the present 

Institutional Revolutionary Party. Under the slogan 

of “Mexico for the Mexicans”, Cárdenas confronted 

the United States after expropriating the foreign oil 

companies. His six-year term marked a turning point 

after the turbulent post-revolutionary years and was a 

period of political stability, characterized by important 

advances in education and public works. In Belize, 

still a British colony, Antonio Soberanis Gómez (1897- 

1975) became in 1934 a strong union leader and a 

precursor of the independence movement. 

Orchidology in Central America, 1930-1950 

“When we solve the riddles of the forests, we 

will know the history of tropical life”. 

Rehn (1927: 26) 

After the deaths of Rolfe (1921), Schlechter (1925) 

and Kraenzlin (1934), European Botany lost its ground 

in Central America, and orchidology became an 

American monopoly that would last until the present 

days. At Harvard, Ames and Schweinfurth continued 

working on the Orchidaceae of Central America in an 

enormous personal effort that lasted until the end of 

their lives. But the botanical exploration of the region 

came more and more under the influence of two great 

institutions: the Field Museum of Natural History in 

Chicago and the Missouri Botanical Garden at Saint 

Louis. 

When Paul C. Standley joined the staff in 1927, 

the interests of the Field Museum centered mainly on 

Mexico, Guatemala and Belize. During the XX century, 

the Museum sponsored or co-sponsored more than sixty 

botanical expeditions to the American tropics. 

The Missouri Botanical Garden became the leading

A 

C 


Figure 54. A — Cyrus Guernsey Pringle (1838-1911). Courtesy of the Oakes Ames Herbarium, Harvard University. B — 

Louis Forget on his way through a village in Colombia with a consignment of Cattleyas collected for Sander. In Black, 

1973: 66. C — Robert Everard Woodson (1904-1963). In Anderson & Van Schaak, 1964: 46. D — Paul Hamilton Allen 

(111-1963). Courtesy of L. D. Gómez. 

B 

D 

183 


184 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 55. A — Louis Otho Williams (1908-1991). Courtesy of L. D. Gómez. B — Otto Porsch (1875-1959). Courtesy 

of Ronald Díaz Bolaños. C — Giorgio Cufodontis (1896-1974). Courtesy of Ronald Díaz Bolaños. D — Walter Kupper 

(1874-1953). Courtesy of Günter Gerlach. 


B

institution in the research of the orchids of Panama, 

especially after Paul H. Allen arrived at the Tropical 

Station in 1934. Both the Field Museum and the 

Missouri Botanical Garden established the world’s 

major collections of Central and South American 

plants. 

The Flora of Panama (I) 

“In the western hemisphere, the mountainous 

area comprising the present Republics of Costa 

Rica, Panama and Colombia probably has 

the richest, and most highly developed of the 

several complex orchid floras…” 

Paul H. Allen (1953: 20) 

In the 1930s and 1940s, a number of resident and 

foreign botanists had collected orchids in Panama. 

However, although Pittier had included the country’s 

orchids in the final reports of the biological survey of 

the Smithsonian (1912), Schlechter had published his 

Orchidaceae Powellianae Panamenses (1922) and the 

Orchidaceae were part of Standley’s floras of Barro 

Colorado (1927) and the Canal Zone (1928), no formal 

orchid flora of Panama would be published until the 

last years of the first half of the XX century. 

“[French-born] A. M. Butcher, who had changed 

his name from Bouché, brought his family to the 

isthmus in 1907 and went to work for the Canal on the 

construction of the Gatún Spillway and hydroelectric 

plant that supplied the electricity and power to run the 

Canal” (Anonymous, 1970: 3). Two sons of Butcher 

(or Bouché) are important in our story. One of them, 

Adrien, kept his original French family name; the 

other, Henry, went along with his father and named 

himself Butcher. 

During his many years on the Isthmus, Adrien 

M. Bouché (1898 - ) “spent his spare time rambling 

around the country as a botanist, researching local 

plants and passing on the information he gathered 

to drug companies, research laboratories and other 

scientific institutions…. His extensive plant research 

has not been limited to pharmaceutical plants alones. 

Bouché has also devoted many years to collecting and 

studying flowering plants and parasites and has several 

varieties of orchids named for him”(Anonymous, 

1970: 3). Among his collections is the type of 

Sobralia bouchei Ames & Schweinf. (A.M. Bouché 


185 

s.n.- 1930). Other collections by Bouché include 

Oncidium ochmatochilum Rchb. f. (A.M. Bouché 

9), Epidendrum oncidioides var. ramonense (Rchb. 

f.) Ames, Hubb. & Schweinf. (A.M. Bouché 10),and 

Sobralia atropubescens Ames & C. Schweinfurth 

(A.M. Bouché 2755). 

Henry P. Butcher was known for his keen knowledge 

of the orchids of Panama and collected for more than 

50 years between 1933 and 1986, although he had 

never received any botanical education. He lived in the 

area of Volcán, province of Chiriquí, and among his 

specimens we find Sievekingia suavis Rchb. f. (Butcher 

s.n.), Kegeliella kupperi Mansf. (Butcher s.n.), 

Stanhopea pulla Rchb. f. (Butcher s.n.), Coryanthes 

maculata Lindl. (Butcher s.n.), Telipogon dendriticus 

Rchb. f., and the type of Gongora maculata Lindl. 

var. latibasis C. Schweinf. & Allen (Butcher s.n.). 

Dressler wrote to him, with some frustration: “This 

business of new species turning up in two or three 

places at once is unnerving. It makes me wonder if we 

really know anything about Central American orchids 

or not” (Letter from Dressler to Butcher, July 1, 1963). 

So many species were discovered thanks to Butcher’s 

collections that Dressler wrote to him in 1963: “Cal 

[Dodson] and I have been talking for a couple of years 

of doing a supplement to the Orchids of Panama. 

… There have been many species added to the flora 

of Panama since the orchid section was published, 

especially through your collections…” (Letter from 

Dressler to Butcher, May 10, 1963). Named in Butcher’s 

honor were: Dryadella butcheri Luer, Masdevallia 

butcheri Luer, Pleurothallis butcheri L.O. Williams, 

Sievekingia butcheri Dressler, Stelis butcheri Luer, 

Stellilabium butcheri Dressler, Telipogon butcheri 

Dodson & R. Escobar. Of interest are Butcher’s Notes 

from Panama (1959 & 1965), where he describes his 

orchid collecting adventures in that country. Butcher 

had a life-long relation with the Missouri Botanical 

Garden and with many renowned botanists from 

his time: Louis Williams, Walter Lindsay, Alex D. 

Hawkes, Alphonse Heller, Robert E. Woodson, Leslie 

A. Garay, Carl Withner, Clarence Horich, P. Allen, 

Robert L. Dressler and Charles Schweinfurth. 

E. D. Starry collected in Panama in July and August, 

1931. Among his specimens we find Palmorchis 

powellii (Ames) C. Schweinf. & Correll (Starry 323) 

and Catasetum viridiflavum Hook. (Starry 119). 


186 

Otis Shattuck collected several orchid specimens 

between 1931 and 1937, such as Elleanthus trilobulatus 

Ames & C. Schweinf. (Shattuck 123), Pleurothallis 

verecunda Schltr. (Shattuck 722), Pleurothallis 

ovatilabia Ames & C. Schweinf. (Shattuck 226), 

Epidendrum stangeanum Rchb. f. (Shattuck 454) and 

Epidendrum moyobambae Kränzl. (Shattuck 216). 

Miconia shattuckii Standl. of the Melastomataceae 

was named in his honor. 

Robert Hugo Woodworth (1902 - ) and Paul Anthony 

Vestal (1908 - ) were in the Canal area in February and 

March of 1932. Among their over 700 collections are 

Epidendrum anceps Jacq. (Woodworth & Vestal 66a), 

Epidendrum ibaguense H.B.K (Woodworth & Vestal 

703), Scaphyglottis behrii (Rchb. f.) Bent. & Hook. 

(Woodworth & Vestal 592), Catasetum viridiflavum 

Hook. (Woodworth & Vestal s.n.), and Trigonidium 

egertonianum Batem. (Woodworth & Vestal 593). We 

remember Woodworth in Machaerium woodworthii 

Standl. of the Fabaceae and Vestal in Ipomoea vestalii 

Standl. of the Convolvulaceae. 

Russell Jacob Seibert (1914 - ) came to the country 

in 1935 and collected in the Canal Zone, Chiriquí 

and Bocas del Toro until 1940, often in the company 

of Woodson and Allen. His orchid specimens include 

Habenaria bicornis Lindl. (Seibert 326), Cleistes rosea 

Lindl. (Seibert 594), Elleanthus capitatus (Poepp. & 

Endl.) Rchb. f. (Seibert 140), Palmorchis trilobulata 

L. O. Williams (Seibert 459), Lepanthes chiriquenses 

Schltr. (Seibert 174) and the type of Telipogon seibertii 

Dodson & R. Escobar (Woodson, Allen & Seibert 961, 

Chiriquí 1938). 

William Randolph Taylor (1895-1990) collected 

several orchid specimens in 1934: Pleurothallis 

ghiesbreghtiana A. Rich. & Gal. (Taylor 1511), 

Hexisea bidentata Lindl. (Taylor 1509), Trigonidium 

egertonianum Batem. (Taylor 1515), Oncidium 

ampliatum Lindl. (Taylor 1512), and Lockhartia 

micrantha Rchb. f. (Taylor 1510). 

Among the orchid collections of E. M. Kieswetter 

(1937) we find Epidendrum anceps Jacq. (Kieswetter 

s.n.), Warrea costaricensis Schltr. (Kieswetter s.n.), 

Ondontoglossum cariniferum Rchb. f. (Kieswetter 

s.n.), Oncidium cabagrae Schltr. (Kieswetter s.n.) and 

Oncidium globuliferum H.B.K (Kieswetter s.n.). 

In 1938, Mary Elizabeth Spence Davidson collected 

in Chiriquí the type specimen of Pleurothallis 

LANKESTERIANA 


cardiochila L. O. Williams (M. E. S. Davidson 119 

– Chiriquí). Other of her orchid specimens were 

Elleanthus aurantiacus (Lindl.) Rchb. f., (M. E. 

S. Davidson 123), Stelis skutchii Ames (M. E. S. 

Davidson 270), Stelis storkii Ames (M. E. S. Davidson 

988), Stelis vestita Ames (M. E. S. Davidson 696), 

Pleurothallis urbaniana Rchb. f. (Davidson 187), 

Maxillaria pittieri (Ames) L.O. Williams (Davidson 

117), and Masdevallia attenuata Rchb. f. (M. E. S. 

Davidson 1271). 

Walter R. Lindsay collected in Panama between 

1934 and 1941. Lindsayella amabilis Ames & C. 

Schweinfurth (W. R. Lindsay & G. H. Bevins s.n., 

Chiriquí, 1937 = Sobralia callosa, L.O. Williams) was 

named in his honor. 

Gene and Peggy White resided in the country 

between 1935 and 1940 and collected Masdevallia 

ecaudata Schltr. (White & White 81), Pleurothallis 

homalantha Schltr. (White & White 80), Pleurothallis 

tuerckheimii Schltr. (White & White 18), Epidendrum 

prismatocarpum Rchb. f. (White & White 203) and 

Epidendrum pygmaeum Hook. (White & White 205). 

“Among the most interesting botanical collections 

made in Panama during the year 1937 is a series of 

seventy-five numbers sent to the Missouri Botanical 

Garden by Gene and Peggy White” (Woodson & 

Seibert, 1938: 823). 

Victor Wolfgang Friedrich Heinrich von Hagen 

(1908-?) and his wife Christine von Hagen collected 

in Honduras (1937-38) and in Chiriquí in 1940 

(Stenorrhynchos navarrensis Ames (v. Hagen 2111). 

Von Hagen is better known for his travels throughout 

the continent following the trails of the ancient 

civilizations and for his popular writings about Latin 

American traditions and cultures. 

H. von Wedel collected in 1940 and 1941. In Bocas 

del Toro he discovered two new species: Pleurothallis 

ellipsophylla L. O. Williams (H. von Wedel 560 – 

Bocas del Toro) and Epidendrum rigidum Jacquin var. 

angustisegmentum L. O. Williams (H. von Wedel 1708 

– Bocas del Toro). Other orchid specimens collected by 

von Wedel include: Sobralia rolfeana Schltr. (H. von 

Wedel 409), Pleurothallis brighamii S. Watson (H. von 

Wedel 185), Epidendrum boothi (Lindl.) L. O. Wms. 

(H. von Wedel 123), Epidendrum stenopetalum Hook. 

(H. von Wedel 765), and Epidendrum anceps Jacq. (H. 

von Wedel 2081). Many plant species were named in


his honor, among them Anthurium wedelianum Croat 

from the Araceae and Peperomia wedelii Yuncker 

from the Piperaceae.Von Wedel had also interests 

in ornithology and was an excellent photographer. 

According to Woodson, “there is probably no one in 

the vicinity of the Chiriquí Lagoon who is quite so 

familiar with the country and its inhabitants as Mr. 

Wedel” (Woodson & Seibert, 1942: 272). 

Ivan Murray Johnston (1898-1960) collected during 

World War II intensively in San José Island in the Bay 

of Panama, together with Carl Oskar Erlanson (1901—) 

and others, resulting in the publication of a flora 

(Johnston, 1949). In 1946 he found the type of Lycaste 

campbelli C. Schweinf. (Johnston 1371). Other of 

his orchid specimens are Aspasia principissa Rchb. 

f. (Johnston 1015), Xylobium foveatum (Lindl.) G. 

Nicholson (Johnston 1117), and Dichaea panamensis 

Lindl. (Johnston 1216). 

“Botanical activity leading to a Flora of Panama 

began in 1934 with the efforts of R. E. Woodson, 

Jr., and his associates from the Missouri Botanical 

Garden” (Croat, 1978: 50). Robert Everard Woodson 

(1904-1963) was in Panama between 1938 and 1940. 

He formed part of the team that would prepare, several 

years later, the monumental Flora of Panama of the 

Missouri Botanical Garden. Woodson (Fig. 54C) 

collected mostly in the company of Robert Walter 

Schery (1917-1987). Together, they initiated the Flora 

of Panama in 1943. “Subsequent collecting in Panama 

by staff and students of the Missouri Botanical Garden 

has yielded an estimated 73,000 collections” (Croat, 

1978: 50). Woodson taught in St. Louis, Missouri. 

Among his students was Dr. Jorge León Arguedas, 

who would become one of the most prominent 

botanists of Costa Rica in the second half of the XX 

century. Among Woodson’s collections were the types 

of: Malaxis woodsonii L.O. Williams (Woodson, 

Allen & Seibert 831 and 832, Chiriquí), Pleurothallis 

macrantha L. O. Williams (Woodson & Schery 66 , 

Chiriquí), Sarcoglottis woodsonii (L.O. Williams) 

Garay (Woodson & Schery 753, Chiriquí), and 

Zygopetalum parviflorum L. O. Williams (Woodson & 

Schery 605, Chiriquí). 

Paul Hamilton Allen (1911-1963) (Fig. 54D), a 

student at the Missouri Botanical Garden, was sent 

to Panama as an assistant to the botanical expedition 

of Carroll Dodge and Julian Steyermark and assumed 

187 

in 1936 the direction of the Tropical Station in Cerro 

Ancón. At the same time he acted as botanical consultant 

for the schools in the Canal Zone and was finally 

named superintendent of the Experimental Gardens of 

the Canal Zone, better known as the Summit Botanical 

Garden. “Between 1937 and 1947, under the auspices 

of the Missouri Botanical Garden, he was part of 17 

expeditions to the forests of Panama and collected 

over 7,000 species of plants. He was, after Pittier, the 

naturalist who explored the most remote regions of the 

geography of the isthmus” (Heckadon Moreno, 1998: 

182). Allen was “one of the most meticulous collectors 

ever to work in Central America” (Williams, 1972: 

207). His achievements were outstanding, especially 

if we take into account that Allen never received a 

formal biological education, nor earned any academic 

degree. It would be impossible to name all new species 

of Orchidaceae that were discovered by Allen and all 

of those that were named in his honor. Here are just 

a few of them: Oncidium parviflorum L. O. Williams 

(P.H. Allen 2937, Panama), Maxillaria repens L. O. 

Williams (P.H. Allen 2968, Panama), Epidendrum 

allenii L. O. Williams (P.H. Allen 2203, Panama), Ada 

allenii (L.O. Williams ex C. Schweinf.) N.H. Williams 

(P.H. Allen 5150, Panama), Macroclinium alleniorum 

R.L. Dressler & F. Pupulin (P.H. Allen 5244, Costa 

Rica), Masdevallia allenii L.O. Williams (P.H. Allen 

1230, Panama), Maxillaria allenii L.O. Williams (P.H. 

Allen 1650, Panama), Oncidium allenii Dressler (P.H. 

Allen, Panama), Pleurothallis allenii L.O. Williams 

(P.H. Allen 12400, Panama), Sobralia allenii L.O. 

Williams (P.H. Allen 2686, Panama), and Stelis allenii 

L.O. Williams (P.H. Allen 2952, Panama). After 

returning from a wartime study of rubber resources in 

Colombia, Allen went to Harvard in 1946 to study the 

orchid material there. 

The third and fourth parts of the Orchidaceae for the 

Flora of Panama, which were written by Allen, were 

published in 1949. (The first two parts had been written 

by L.O. Williams and published in 1946). For this work, 

he asked Charles Lankester for advice: “Through the 

grapevine, I have heard that you have done a manual 

on the Orchids of Costa Rica. It is most fortunate in 

my opinion that you have done so, since you have seen 

more species in the field than any living collector. It 

now seems probable that I may be saddled with the 

job of completing Dr. Louis Williams half finished 


188 

manuscript on the Orchids of Panama, and since many 

species are common to both countries I would like to 

see your manual, and have the benefit of your advice 

before making a spectacle of myself in print” (letter 

from Allen to Lankester, November 12, 1946). In a 

letter to Ames (1947) he wrote: “Work continues on 

the collection of the orchids of Panama, which seem to 

have no end; each field trip brings to light new species 

or geographical distributions…. Although I have not 

seen New Guinea or the mountains of Brazil, I would 

bet the area comprised by Costa Rica, Panama and 

Colombia against any other in the world” (Heckadon 

Moreno, 1998: 183). “It is regrettable that Allen was 

not invited to participate more fully in the preparation 

of the other parts of the Panama Flora, for he knew the 

plants of that country firsthand better than any other 

contemporary botanist” (Hodge, 1964: 74). 

He resided for several years at Palmar Sur, Costa 

Rica (1948-1953), and found a great many tree species 

not seen before. His The Rain Forests of Golfo Dulce 

(1956) is an outstanding contribution to our knowledge 

of the rain forests in Central America, even though the 

work describes a limited geographical area. In 1952, 

Allen published a fundamental work on Cycnoches. 

For a brief interval Allen returned to the United 

States as Director of the Fairchild Botanical Garden 

at Miami, but was soon back in Central America, 

where he worked with Williams and Standley at ‘El 

Zamorano’. During this period he was loaned to the 

Government of El Salvador to conduct a survey of 

that country’s forest resources and returned in 1959 

to Honduras, as Director of the Lancetilla Experiment 

Station. He had in preparation an account of the woody 

plants of El Salvador at the time of his death. Oskar 

Pank (1912- ), a German gardener who resided in El 

Salvador since 1952, was Allen’s frequent companion 

during his collecting excursions (Hamer, 1973 (I): 

13). Pank would be during more than two decades the 

resident botanist of La Laguna Botanical Garden, in 

San Salvador, after its foundation in 1978. Paul Allen 

was also a gifted photographer and his wife, Dorothy, 

a magnificent botanical illustrator. Beautiful examples 

of her skills were the illustrations to The Orchids of 

Panama (1953), a reprint of Allen’s work that was 

originally published in The Orchid Journal. Allen’s 

personal herbarium, more than 5,000 sheets, is now 

at the Escuela Agrícola Panamericana in Honduras 

LANKESTERIANA 


with the exception of a representative series of plants 

collected in the valleys of Río Tuyra and Río Yape, 

which was destroyed by a fire which badly damaged 

the administration building of the Tropical Station in 

Balboa, the night of September 1, 1937 (Woodson & 

Seibert, 1938: 823). 

Harry A. Dunn ( -1977) lived in Ancón, in the 

Panama Canal Zone, and devoted a lot of field work 

in the company of Paul Allen in search of Cycnoches. 

Epidendrum dunni A. D. Hawkes was named in his 

honor. A resident of over 30 years of the Canal Zone, 

Dunn spent days and months botanizing, collecting 

orchids and studying meso-american archeology 

throughout Central America, becoming known as 

“the orchid man” in Panama. In his collecting of 

plants he was highly conservation-minded long before 

many plant collectors had such concerns. The patio 

of the Dunn home, near the old Tivoli Hotel in the 

Canal Zone, was a veritable orchid botanical garden 

(Davidson, 1979: 150). 

Louis Otho Williams (1908-1991) (Fig. 55A), a 

native of Jackson, Wyoming, earned his bachelor’s 

and master’s degrees under botanist Aven Nelson of 

the University of Wyoming. His doctoral studies in 

plant systematics were at Washington University and 

the Missouri Botanical Garden, where he became a 

student of Jesse M. Greenman, his second prominent 

mentor (Burger, 1991: 355). He served as a research 

assistant at the Ames Orchid Herbarium of Harvard 

University for seven years, during which he edited 

the American Orchid Society Bulletin. His successful 

editorship was responsible for increasing the Society’s 

membership from two hundred to three thousand. 

Orchids, American floristics, and useful plants were his 

main interest, and he published nearly 300 scientific 

articles dealing with these areas. He spent a time in 

Mexico (1938), in an attempt to obtain for Harvard the 

magnificent collection of Mexican orchids built up by 

the recently deceased E. M. Oestlund. This collection 

was the primary source of data for the Orchidaceae 

of Mexico that was in very late draft in 1942, when 

Williams left to work on a rubber procurement project 

in Brazil, where he stayed until 1945. “On returning to 

Harvard, Louis found that while inflation had raised 

most prices, Harvard salaries hadn’t followed suit, and 

he checked out some other possibilities. On receiving 

a good and interesting offer, he went to see Oakes


Ames, to say that he would have to leave, with some 

regrets, because he and his wife Terua could not get 

by on his salary from the Herbarium. He was startled 

when Ames flew into a rage and accused Louis of 

treachery for even thinking of leaving, pushing the 

manuscript of the Orchidaceae of Mexico across the 

desk to Louis, saying that Louis was welcome to go, 

and to take his draft with him, because it would never 

be published by Harvard” (Greenwood, 1992: 128). 

During his brief stay at Harvard he finished the first 

two parts of the Orchidaceae for the Flora of Panama 

that were published in 1946. He collected a great 

number of species and many were dedicated to him, 

among others: Bulbophyllum williamsii A.D. Hawkes, 

Corallorhiza williamsii Correll, Cyclopogon williamsii 

C.H. Dodson & R. Vásquez Ch., Cyrtochilum 

williamsianum (Dodson) Dalström, Epidendrum 

williamsii C.H. Dodson, Lepanthes williamsi Salazar 

& Soto Arenas, Malaxis williamsii Ames, Maxillaria 

williamsii C.H. Dodson, Pleurothallis williamsii 

Ames, Scelochilus williamsii C.H. Dodson, and 

Stelis williamsii Ames. He was a leading pioneer in 

tropical plant taxonomy, and that interest led him to 

return to the tropics in the 1950s. In Honduras, he 

helped to establish and direct a large herbarium at 

the Escuela Agrícola Panamericana [‘El Zamorano’], 

and additionally developed a regional natural history 

library and launched the journal Ceiba. It was in 

Ceiba where he published his major contributions 

to the orchid flora of our region, after his Orchids of 

Panama: The Orchidaceae of Mexico (1951) and An 

Enumeration of the Orchidaceae of Central America, 

British Honduras and Panama (1956). 

During his previous travels to Central America and 

his ten-year stay in Honduras, Williams also collected 

in Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa 

Rica, where he became a good friend of Charles H. 

Lankester. “A number of times we had the pleasure of 

having don Carlos in our house in Honduras and here 

in the United States, and to visit him in his home in 

Costa Rica” (Williams, 1969: 860). After Ames’ death 

in 1950, Williams became the undisputed authority in 

Central American orchids. In 1960, he joined the staff 

of the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, 

and by 1964 had become head of the department 

of Botany. Known as a capable and approachable 

administrator, he rebuilt the department, revived its 

189 

floristic programs, and developed grant support. His 

botanical collections numbered more than 43,000. 

Following his retirement, Williams continued his 

research and supervised the completion of the Flora 

of Guatemala. Following his death in 1991, his widow, 

Terua, wrote the index and final volume of this work. 

Williams’ library and private herbarium are now part 

of the Marie Selby Botanical Garden. 

The ‘great depression’ of Costa Rican orchidology 

“During the 1930s, agricultural experiment 

stations, natural history museums, and 

botanical gardens were shut down or had their 

budgets curtailed even further. The National 

Museum of Costa Rica was incorporated 

into the University of Costa Rica, following 

a common pattern in Latin America during 

the 1930s and 1940s. Even so, the Museum 

remained almost moribund until the 1960s… 

(McCook, 1999: 120)” 

In the 1930s, Costa Rican orchidology began 

to languish. Only Lankester continued with the 

exploration of the country, although his legendary 

capacity for the discovery of new species seemed to 

be coming slowly to an end. Aside from the economic 

troubles brought by the Great Depression, it was 

simply too much for the small republic to overcome 

the departure of Pittier to the United States (1905) and 

A. C. Brade to Brazil (1910); the premature deaths of 

Biolley (1908), Tonduz (1921), Wercklé (1924), and 

Sancho (1929); the retirement of Alberto M. Brenes in 

1930, the reduced botanical activity of Otón Jiménez 

due to his multiple business affairs and the voluntary 

exile of Amparo de Zeledón to Honduras. Although 

several collectors visited Costa Rica during that 

period, it would take the country until the early 1970s 

to recover from such losses. 

The Austrian Biological Expedition to Costa 

Rica (1930) was perhaps the last attempt to restore 

European Botany to the leading role it had played 

during the preceding centuries. The expedition 

arrived in Costa Rica in March, 1930, after stopping 

in Trinidad and Venezuela, where several collections 

were made. The group of scientists, which stayed 

in Costa Rica until the month of August, was led by 

the ornithologist Moriz Sassi (Bauernfeind, 1966: 


190 

126). Part of the expedition were also the biologists 

E. Reimoser and C. Fr. Roewer. Dr. Otto Porsch 

(1875-1959) (Fig. 55B), who in 1921 had succeeded 

Karl Wilhelm as director of the botanical garden of 

the University of Natural Resources at Vienna, was 

responsible for the botanical collections and director 

of the expedition (Díaz Bolaños, 2007: 7). His main 

collaborator was the botanist Giorgio Cufodontis 

(1896-1974) (Fig. 55C) (Grayum et al., 2004: 20). An 

expert in flower pollination, Porsch had traveled to 

Brazil in the first years of the XX century and collected 

many new types of Orchidaceae, such as Meiracyllium 

wetsteinii Porsch, Physurus austrobrasiliensis Porsch, 

Masdevallia zebrina Porsch, Physurus kuczynskii 

Porsch, Campylocentrum chlororhizum Porsch, 

Catasetum fimbriatum Rchb.f. var. aurantiacum 

Porsch, Catasetum ornithorrhynchum Porsch, 

Cranichis microphylla Porsch, Habenaria paulensis 

Porsch, Habenaria wacketii Porsch, Pleurothallis 

bupleurifolia Porsch, Pleurothallis laxiflora Porsch, 

Stelis guttifera Porsch and Stenorhynchus loefgrenii 

Porsch, all published in 1905 in the Oesterreichische 

Botanische Zeitschrift (=Austrian Journal of Botany). 

Porsch wrote: “Because of the great number of types 

[of hummingbirds] in small areas, Costa Rica was the 

richest region for a possible and multiple answers to 

this question [the relation between flowers and their 

pollinators]” (Porsch, 1931: 11). If we follow Dressler, 

Porsch’s writings must be taken carefully: “I think 

that Porsch’s paper [...] is really a classic of how to 

get 40 pages of publication out of one short paragraph 

of data” (In a letter to R.L. Rodríguez, 2 November, 

1967). Porsch and Cufodontis could be proud to travel 

through Costa Rica in the company of the best guides 

they could think of: Ferdinand Nevermann was their 

host in his ‘Finca Hamburgo’ and their guide through 

the Atlantic region, Charles Lankester showed them 

the best of his orchid garden in Cóncavas, Alfred 

Brade hiked with them to the summit of the Turrialba 

volcano and Alberto M. Brenes traveled with them 

through Guanacaste and the southern Osa Peninsula. 

Brenes would write, two years later, an account of his 

journey to Guanacaste with the expedition (Brenes, 

1956). 

Among the orchid specimens collected by the 

expedition and reported by Cufodontis (1933) 

were: Vanilla fragans (Salisb.) Ames (Cufodontis 

LANKESTERIANA 


735, Hamburg Farm), Stelis thecoglossa Rchb. 

f. (Nevermann 496, Vulcanus Irazu), Maxillaria 

crassifolia (Lindl.) Rchb. f. (Brenes 162, Golfito). 

Lepanthes brenesii Schltr. (Lankester 802, Las 

Cóncavas), Brassavola nodosa Lindl. (A. Brade 799, 

Las Cóncavas), and Cattleya dowiana Batem. (A. 

Brade 818, Vulcanus Turrialba, floruit culta). Porsch 

and Cufodontis were also responsible for the discovery 

of two new species of Erythrina (Fabaceae): Erythrina 

globocalyx Porsch & Cufod. and Erythrina gibbosa 

Cufod. However, the expedition did not meet the 

expectations, at least from the botanical point of view. 

Less than 900 specimens were collected and almost 

nothing was published about the scientific results, in 

part because of the political disturbances brought by 

the rising Nazi movement, which led a few years later 

(1938) to Austria’s annexation by Germany. 

Expelled from the university in 1934 for his 

notorious right-wing inclinations, Porsch wrote in 

1932 a phytogeographical description of Costa Rica 

(Porsch, 1932), in which he followed closely the 

previous work by C. Wercklé (1909). Cufodontis 

wrote five articles about the results of the scientific 

expedition, which he published in German and Italian 

(Díaz Bolaños, 2008). 

U.S. botanist Austin Smith (1881-1948) was born 

in Ohio and came to Costa Rica in 1920. He lived in 

Guanacaste until 1937 and then settled in the small 

town of Zarcero de Alfaro Ruiz (Grayum et al., 2004: 

22). Smith made a living as a horticulturist, exporting 

plants and seeds to the United States, and collected, 

among others, Prosthechea brassavolae (Rchb. f.) 

W.E. Higgins (Smith 1048), Crossoglossa fratrum 

(Schltr.) Dressler (Smith 1055), Sobralia leucoxantha 

Rchb. f. (Smith 1173), Elleanthus wercklei Schltr. 

(Smith 1343) and Habenaria aviculoides Ames & 

C. Schweinf. (Smith 1376). Paullinia austin-smithii 

Standl. of the Sapindaceae carries his name. Smith 

was also interested in ornithology and wrote several 

articles about his observations of Costa Rican birds. 

The Swiss Walter Kupper (1874-1953) (Fig. 55D), 

was the first botanist to climb Cerro Chirripó, Costa 

Rica’s highest peak and collected in this country from 

November 1931 to July 1932, a journey sponsored by 

the Bavarian Academy of Science (Sussengut, 1954: 

170). Kupper was Curator of the Botanical Garden 

in Munich, Germany, a position he held until his


retirement in 1940. Maxillaria thienii Dodson (Kupper 

374) is one of his orchid specimens and Mansfeld 

described a new species, Kegeliella kupperi based on 

one of his collections near Tilarán, in Costa Rica. In 

a narrative about his collecting experiences in Costa 

Rica, Kupper compares the size of the country (“not 

even as large as Bavaria”) with the number of orchid 

species that can be found, “larger than in any other 

tropical country” (Kupper, 1938: 2). During the same 

journey Kupper visited Christian Halbinger, in Mexico. 

They became close friends and Kupper sent years later 

his collection of Vandas to Halbinger, fearing that they 

could be destroyed during World War II. 

Fernando Solís Rojas collected some orchids 

between 1935 and 1949: Pleurothallis amparoana 

Schltr. (Solís 345), Xylobium powellii (Solís 354), 

and Pleurothallis dolichopus Schltr. (Solís 473). 

“In 1943, a visiting American team, led by C. A. 

Merker and including fellow forester William R. Barbour 

and botanists Elbert Luther Little Jr. (1907— ) and 

Wiliam Adams Dayton (1885-1958), surveyed Costa 

Rican forest resources in connection with the U.S. war 

effort, producing, among other things, an annotated list 

of important forest trees and a crude vegetation map of 

the country” (Grayum et al., 2004: 23). Among their 

orchid collections were Nidema boothii (Lindl.) Schltr. 

(Barbour 1037), and Arpophyllum giganteum Hartw. ex 

Lindl. (Barbour 1035). 

Richard W. Holm (1895-1987) and Hugh H. Iltis 

(1925-), botanized in various neglected corners of 

Costa Rica in 1949, including the northern plains of 

the Guatusos. Their painstaking collections include 

Corymborkys forcipigera (Rchb. f. & Warsz.) L.O. 

Williams (Holm & Iltis 104), Govenia Lindl. sp. 

(Holm & Iltis 136), Pleurothallis phyllocardioides 

Schltr. (Holm & Iltis 195), Elleanthus cynarocephalus 

(Rchb. f.) Rchb. f. (Holm & Iltis 406), and Oncidium 

bryolophotum Rchb. f. (Holm & Iltis 631). 

Although the harvest of those years was meager, 

not everything was lost. Alexander F. Skutch 

(1904-2004) (Fig. 56A), who lived in Costa Rica 

from 1935 until his recent death, soon became 

one of the country’s most respected leaders in the 

study of natural sciences and in the development 

of a new relationship between mankind and its 

natural environment. At the age of 16, after reading 

Shelley’s poetry and essays, he decided to become a 

191 

vegetarian. Although love and affection for animals 

were his initial reasons, he later found scientific 

arguments and often stated that one of the main 

causes for the destruction of tropical forests was the 

need to clear great extensions of land for grazing. 

After graduating as a Bachelor of Botany at John 

Hopkins University, in Baltimore (1925), he traveled 

in 1926 to Jamaica, to study the leaf anatomy of 

bananas at a plantation of the United Fruit Company 

(UFC), which was the base for his doctoral theses 

Anatomy of the Leaf of Banana, Musa sapientum L. 

var. Hort. Gros Michel, in 1928. The same year he 

received a grant to continue his research on banana 

in another of the UFC experiment stations near 

Almirante, in Panama. These were his first contacts 

with tropical nature. In the early 1930s he traveled 

to Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador, Venezuela and 

Costa Rica. As a result, he published many papers 

on tropical flora and fauna and became soon one of 

the world’s leading ornithologists. 

“In 1933-34, Alexander F. Skutch obtained a 

small but excellently prepared collection from 

several departments [of Guatemala], mainly in 

Huehuetenango and Quiché” (Ames & Correll, 1985: 

viii). Among his orchid collections from Guatemala 

we find Habenaria entomantha (Llave & Lex.) Lindl. 

(Skutch 519), Habenaria monorrhiza (Sw.) Rchb. f. 

(Skutch 1377), Triphora trianthophora (Sw.) Rydb. 

(Skutch 494), Cranichis apiculata Lindl. (Skutch 

923) and a new species, Epidendrum skutchii Ames, 

Hubb. & C. Schweinf. (Skutch 1715). 

He came to Costa Rica in 1935, to the valley of El 

General, with contracts to collect plants for museums 

and botanical gardens in the United States and Europe. 

This income was sufficient for Skutch to continue 

with his scientific studies on birds. His collections of 

orchids from Costa Rica include Masdevallia nidifica 

Rchb. f. (Skutch 171), Xylobium foveatum (Lindl.) 

G. Nicholson (Skutch 2147), Ponthieva racemosa 

(Walter) C. Mohr (Skutch 2198), and again a new 

species, Stelis skutchii Ames (Skutch 3126). Several 

years later (1941) he bought a small farm on the Peñas 

Blancas river, that he called “Los Cusingos”, the local 

name for the orange beaked toucanet (Pteroglossus 

frantzii) where he lived for over 60 years until his 

death in 2004. In 1950 he married one of Charles H. 

Lankester’s daughters, Pamela, who died in 2001. 


192 

Henry Teuscher and the Montreal Botanical 

Garden. The Montreal Botanical Garden was born 

of the dream of the man with both a religious and 

scientific vocation, Brother Marie-Victorin, born 

Conrad Kirouack (1885-1944). Passionately inspired 

by nature, he had founded the Botanical Institute of 

the Université de Montréal in 1920 and dreamed of 

creating a great botanical garden for Montrealers, a 

plan he made public in 1925. Six years later, after much 

hard work to convince both politicians and members 

of the local scientific community, his plan finally took 

shape. When the Garden was founded in 1931, Québec 

was in the grips of one of the worst crises in its history. 

Thousands of Montrealers were out of work and, 

rather than simply paying these relief money, Mayor 

Camilien Houde came up with the idea of employing 

them to built the Garden 

With the assistance of Henry (Heinrich) Teuscher 

(1891-1984) (Fig. 56B), a landscape architect of German 

origin trained in Europe and the United States and a 

renowned horticulturalist and botanist, Brother Marie- 

Victorin’s dream finally became a reality. A man of many 

talents, Teuscher drew up the first plan of the Garden. 

In 1936, he was officially appointed Superintendent and 

Chief Horticulturalist, and later Curator of the Garden, a 

position he held until his retirement in 1962. He also laid 

out several of the exhibition greenhouses and assembled 

some of the Garden’s major plant collections. His ideas 

as a botanist and garden architect were best expressed 

in his “Programme d’un jardin botanique idéal” (1940). 

Always trying to expand the Garden’s collections, 

Teuscher traveled in search for orchids to Ecuador (1951 

and 1956) and to Panama in 1964. One of his collections 

in Ecuador gave birth to a new genus named in his honor: 

Teuscheria Garay, with the type species Teuscheria 

cornucopia Garay (Teuscher s.n., Ecuador). Teuscher 

corresponded frequently and received material from 

the best collectors in our region, such as Harry Dunn in 

Panama, and years later Clarence Horich in Costa Rica. 

In addition, he traveled to Venezuela, Ecuador, Trinidad 

& Tobago, Jamaica, and Hawaii. Several orchid species 

were dedicated to Teuscher, among them: Epidendrum 

teuscherianum A.D. Hawkes, Rodriguezia teuscheri 

Garay and Telipogon teuscheri Garay. Between 1952 

and 1977, Teuscher published 287 articles in the most 

important orchid journals of his time. The most beautiful 

plant in the annual orchid show of the Montreal Orchid 

LANKESTERIANA 


Society is awarded with the “Grand prix d’excellence 

Henry Teuscher”. Henry Teuscher will remain, for 

many orchidologists across the glove, as the symbol of 

Montreal’s orchidology (Boutot, 1984: 4). 

The Flora of Guatemala 

“The exceedingly varied types of soil and 

topography and diverse geological history of 

the country, ranging from ancient mountain 

masses connected with North America to 

relatively youthful volcanic areas, combined 

with marked altitudinal and climatic variations 

- hot desert to cold alpine regions - have given 

Guatemala the richest flora in all Central 

America with an estimated total of 8,000 

species of vascular plants”. 

(Standley & Steyermark, 1945: 275) 

The project of the Flora of Guatemala became 

one of the most ambitious enterprises of the Field 

Museum of Natural History in the 1930s. It was again 

the prolific Paul C. Standley who in 1938 undertook 

this enormous work. Standley was later joined in the 

project by Julian Steyermark, who joined the Museum 

staff in 1937 and not only made numerous valuable 

collections in Guatemala, but contributed also to the 

published flora. Finally, Louis O. Williams joined the 

staff in 1960 and supervised the completion of the 

Flora of Guatemala (thirteen parts, 6,528 pages). The 

treatise of the orchids for the Flora was written by 

Oakes Ames and Donovan Stewart Correll, a work that 

would not have been possible without the contribution 

of an important number of collectors who must be 

mentioned as precursors to what is still today the main 

published work on the Orchidaceae of Guatemala. 

Margaret Ward Lewis collected in Guatemala from 

1928 to 1942. “When I first came to the tropics some 

twelve years ago it was to live in a little Fruit Company 

headquarters town where the seven houses were 

arranged in a hollow square and every front porch was 

a potential observatory. Exploration of the surrounding 

‘bush’ was the only escape to a private life... I thought 

collecting in one family was all I could encompass as 

a beginner and I had unique opportunities to collect. 

My husband was at that time Chief Engineer for the 

[United] Fruit Company and I was in on all felling 

for a railroad across Montúfar Flats. In a little while


everybody knew I was interested in orchids and plants 

-hundreds of duplicates- came in from all sides... Since 

1931 except for several visits to the States I have lived 

here in the City and our collection was considerably 

amplified by Sunday expeditions and the notes made 

more useful by taking up photography. From time to 

time I have made the acquaintance of people in different 

parts of the Republic who send me anything new they 

find and even the section foremen on the railroad 

know enough about orchids to send me any they find 

in clearing the right-of-way. So no one has had a better 

chance than I to collect …” (In a letter from M. Lewis to 

L. O. Williams, January, 1940). Lewis’ collections and 

diagnostic photographs of Guatemalan orchids were 

of great importance to Ames’ and Correll’s work. In 

Guatemala she met Steyermark, mentioned in several of 

her letters, and collected with J. R. Johnston in 1940. 

Among her collections are Cypripedium irapeanum 

Llave & Lex. (Lewis 151), Phragmipedium caudatum 

(Lindl.) Rolfe (Lewis 127), Habenaria monorrhiza 

(Sw.) Rchb. f. (Lewis 211), Elleanthus capitatus (R. Br.) 

Rchb. f. (Lewis 168), Sobralia fragans Lindl. (Lewis 

320) and Spiranthes amabilis Ames (Lewis 164), as 

well as at least six new species: Pleurothallis lewisae 

Ames (Lewis 2), Spiranthes obtecta S. Schweinf. 

(Lewis 191), Stanhopea lewisae Ames & Correll (Lewis 

140), Cranichis hieroglyphica Ames & Correll (Lewis 

154), Scaphyglottis minutiflora Ames & Correll (Lewis 

105), and Lepanthes excedens Ames & Correll (Lewis 

105). Margaret Ward Lewis’ love for Guatemala and 

its orchids were best described by herself in her article 

Guatemalan Interlude (1954), that she finished with the 

sentence: “Orchids are where you find them and I hope, 

where you leave them” (Ward-Lewis, 1954: 184-190). 

Mercedes Aguilar Hidalgo (1905-), a specialist 

in Phanerogams, collected in 1935 in Guatemala 

and Belize. Some of her specimens are Habenaria 

pauciflora (Lindl.) Rchb. f. (M. Aguilar 208), 

Habenaria strictissima Rchb. f. (M. Aguilar 156), 

Epidendrum cochleatum L. (M. Aguilar 334), 

Epidendrum skinneri Batem. ex Lindl. (M. Aguilar 

143) and Epidendrum stamfordianum Batem. (M. 

Aguilar 462). 

Biologist, naturalist and pioneer of canopy biology, 

Marston Bates (1906-1974) made a few collections 

of orchids in Guatemala in 1935, including Stelis 

ovatilabia Schltr. (Bates 19), Stelis purpurascens A. 

193 

Rich. & Gal. (Bates 13), Epidendrum boothi (Lindl.) 

L.O. Williams (Bates 12) and Epidendrum lindleyanum 

(Batem.) Rchb. f. (Bates 11). Bates was better known 

as a philosopher of natural sciences and for his books: 

The Nature of Natural History (1951), Man in nature 

(1961), and The Forest and the Sea (1960). 

Walter Conrad Leopold Muenscher (1891- 

1963) collected in 1937 Sobralia macrantha Lindl. 

(Muenscher 12442), Epidendrum ochraceum Lindl. 

(Muenscher 12548), Dichaea intermedia Ames & 

Correll (Muenscher 12531), Dichaea muricata (Sw.) 

Lindl. (Muenscher 12543) and Epidendrum repens 

Cogn. (Muenscher 12542). Muenscher, New York 

State’s ‘Wizard of Weeds’, was Professor of Botany at 

Cornell University from 1923 to 1954. He had special 

interests in wetlands, poisonous plants, and trees, and 

was the author of more than 125 articles and several 

books in addition to Keys to Woody Plants (1950). 

One of Lundell’s main collaborators was Elías 

Contreras, with whom he collected in Petén. Some 

of his orchid specimens are Habenaria bractescens 

Lindl. (Contreras 1771), Habenaria distans Griseb. 

(Contreras 2976), Vanilla hartii Rolfe (Contreras 

3063), Elleanthus linifolius Presl. (Contreras 2753) 

and Sobralia fragans Lindl. (Contreras 2836). 

John Robert Johnston (1880-1953) collected in 

Guatemala from 1937 to 1941. Years before he had 

botanized in Venezuela (1901-1903) and had written 

several articles on the flora of the coastal areas and the 

main islands. He collected Cypripedium irapeanum 

Llave & Lex. (Johnston 1645), Habenaria crassicornis 

Lindl. (Johnston 155), Habenaria entomantha (Llave 

& Lex.) Lindl. (Johnston 920), Habenaria quinqueseta 

(Michx.) Sw. (Johnston 1564), Habenaria repens Nutt. 

(Johnston 1400), Crybe rosea Lindl. (Johnston 1983) 

and the type specimens of Leochilus johnstonii Ames & 

Correll (Johnston 1864, Guatemala), and Epidendrum 

altícola Ames & Correll (Johnston 1472, Guatemala). 

Francis Welles Hunnewell (1880-1964) was in Guatemala 

from1937 to1941. “In recent years, .... Hunnewell has 

made a small but discriminating collection, primarly in 

five of the Pacific coast departments” (Ames & Correll, 

1985: viii). Among his orchid collections we find 

Ponthieva triloba Schltr (Hunnewell 14668), Spiranthes 

parasitica A. Rich. & Gal. (Hunnewell 14675), 

Spiranthes pyramidalis Lindl. (Hunnewell 14672), 

Pleurothallis grobyi Batem. ex Lindl. (Hunnewell 


194 

14676), and Epidendrum ibaguense H.B.K. (Hunnewell 

14670). Hunnewell also collected in Belize. 

In 1938 José Ignacio Aguilar collected in Guatemala 

Habenaria entomantha (Llave & Lex.) Lindl. (J.I. 

Aguilar 1534), Habenaria repens Nutt (J.I. Aguilar 

311), Elleanthus capitatus (R. Br.) Rchb. f. (J.I. 

Aguilar 426), Ponthieva triloba Schltr. (J.I. Aguilar 

1512), Spiranthes orchioides (Sw.) A. Rich. (J.I. 

Aguilar 1167), and Epidendrum aricosum Batem. ex 

Lindl. (J.I. Aguilar 363). 

Julian Alfred Steyermark (1909-1988) (Fig. 56C), 

after being in Panama on a botanical expedition in 

1934 and 1935, joined the staff of the Field Museum 

of Natural History in 1937 and started working with 

Standley on the Flora of Guatemala, where he collected 

from 1939 to 1943. Steyermark was St. Louis born and 

bred, earning his Ph.D. through Washington University 

in 1933. Steyermark also produced numerous tropical 

American floras and returned to the Missouri Botanical 

Garden in 1984 to work on the flora of the Venezuelan 

Guyana. He was credited in the Guinness Book of World 

Records for collecting 138,000 plant specimens during 

his lifetime. While in Guatemala, he collected a great 

number of orchid specimens, such as Habenaria alata 

Hook (Steyermark 29538), Habenaria clypeata Lindl. 

(Steyermark 51804), Triphora cubensis (Rchb. f.) 

Ames (Steyermark 69559), Cranichis apiculata Lindl. 

(Steyermark 31701), and Spiranthes aurantiaca (Llave 

& Lex.) Hemsl. (Steyermark 50628). He discovered 

the following new species: Campylocentrum 

microphyllum Ames & Correll (Steyermark 37376, 

Guatemala), Kreodanthus ovatilabius (Ames & 

Correll ) Garay (Steyermark 32471, Guatemala), 

Epidendrum schweinfurthianum Correll (Steyermark 

42521, Guatemala), Epidendrum sobralioides Ames & 

Correll (Steyermark 42764, Guatemala), and Malaxis 

steyermarkii Correll (Steyermark 51762, Guatemala). 

As part of the Flora of Guatemala of Paul Standley 

and Julian Steyermark, Oakes Ames and Donovan 

Stewart Correll (1908-1983) wrote the first systematic 

treatment of the orchids of the country (Ames & Correll, 

1985). A total of 567 species were enumerated. Correll 

published later a supplement to this work, in which he 

included the orchids of Belize (Correll, 1985). 

Correll, who had spent two years taking voice 

lessons and singing solos at church and on the radio 

before going to college, became a research associate 

LANKESTERIANA 


at the Botanical Museum of Harvard University 

(1939-1943). Ames introduced him to orchids and 

to Economic Botany. In a letter from L. O. Williams 

to Margaret Ward Lewis (December 7, 1939), he 

informed her that “A young man, Dr. D. S. Correll, 

has been added to our staff. The first problem to 

which he has been assigned is writing up the orchids 

for Standley’s proposed flora of Guatemala. I think 

that he will undoubtedly do a very good job of it.” 

During World War II he served in the US Navy and 

was in Panama for a few days in 1945, although we 

have no records of orchid collections by Correll from 

that country. At the end of 1947 he was in Mexico 

(Michoacán and Oaxaca) and from 1947 to 1956 he 

served in various capacities in the Specialty Crop 

Introductions Group of the United States Department 

of Agriculture (Schubert, 1984: 134). In 1956 he 

became head of the Botany Department of the Texas 

Research Foundation, Renner, Texas and traveled 

often to Latin America: Mexico (1958), Ecuador and 

Bolivia (1958-1960) and again Mexico (1959 and 

1965). During the years of 1971-1973, Correll served 

as Program Director for Systematic Biology at the 

National Science Foundation, and at the conclusion 

of his appointment he was invited to join the staff of 

the Fairchild Tropical Garden, Miami, as taxonomist, 

to produce a flora of the Bahama Islands, that was 

published just a few months before his death. Correll 

published major botanical works. Worthy of mention 

are his Native Orchids of North America North of 

Mexico (1950), Manual of the Vascular Plants of Texas 

(1970), and Flora of the Bahama Archipelago (1982). 

The land of Percival Hildebart Gentle 

“We must allow our children the right to 

experience the beauty of Belize that we 

have had the fortune to share. We must, in 

addition, teach the next generation the idea of 

conservation for, if we fail, we had better teach 

them survival”. 

(Manuel Esquivel, Prime Minister of Belize, 

in the foreword to McLeish et al., 1994). 

Harley Harris Bartlett (1886-1960) (Fig. 56D), 

was born in Anaconda, Montana. He went to Harvard 

in 1904, working as an assistant to B. L. Robinson 

and M. L. Fernald, for an A.B. cum laude (1908) in

A 


C D 

Figure 56. A — Alexander F. Skutch (1904-2004). Courtesy of the Tropical Science Center, Costa Rica. B — Henry 

(Heinrich) Teuscher (1891-1984). In Boutot, 1984: 3. C — Julian Alfred Steyermark (1909-1988). Courtesy of Barry 

Hamel, Missouri Botanical Garden. D — Harley Harris Bartlett (1886-1960). Courtesy of the Archives of the Gray 

Herbarium, Harvard University. 

B 

195 


196 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 57. A — Percival Hildebart Gentle (1890- 1958). Portrait by Ellen Atha, with her permission. B — Karl Erik 

Magnus Östlund (1875-1938). Courtesy of Luis Sánchez, AMO Herbarium, Mexico. C — Richard Evans Schultes (1915- 

2001). Courtesy of the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. D — Thomas Baillie MacDougall (1895-1973). 

Courtesy of Luis Sánchez, AMO Herbarium, Mexico. 


B


chemistry. In 1909, he came to Washington with the 

Bureau of Plant Industry as a chemical biologist. 

During this time he worked on the genetics of 

Oenothera. In 1915 he became assistant professor of 

botany at the University of Michigan, full professor in 

1921, head of the Botany Department from 1922-47, 

and Director of the Botanical Garden from 1919-55. 

In 1918, he explored and botanized in Sumatra with 

the U.S. Rubber Company. Bartlett, sponsored by the 

Carnegie Institution and the University of Michigan, 

had been in Mexico (1930) and collected in 1931 in 

Guatemala and Belize, where he returned in 1936 and 

obtained an extensive series of plants in the Belize and 

El Cayo districts. In Belize he collected Habenaria 

wercklei Schltr. (H.H. Bartlett 11598), Sobralia 

bradeorum Schltr. (H.H. Bartlett 11771), Elleanthus 

graminifolius (Barb. Rodr.) Løjtnant (H.H. Bartlett 

11733), Lophiaris lurida (Lindl.) Braem (H.H. Bartlett 

12077), Oncidium sphacelatum Lindl. (H.H. Bartlett 

12946), and Encyclia belizensis (Rchb. f.) Schltr. 

(H.H. Bartlett 14068). From Guatemala we have his 

specimen of Brassia maculata R. Br. (H.H. Bartlett 

12699). In 1940, Bartlett was in Panama together with 

Tobias Lasser (1911-) 39 . They collected among others 

Campylocentrum micranthum (Lindl.) Maury (H.H. 

Bartlett & T. Lasser 16823). 

It was undoubtedly a fortunate circumstance that 

Bartlett, in 1931, could convince Percival Hildebart 

Gentle (1890- 1958) (Fig. 57A) to collect for him. 

Gentle, a Belizean-born botanist, devoted the latter 

half of his professional life to collecting herbarium 

specimens throughout the country. His collections, 

among which over 150 new species were found, were 

sent to the United States and from there distributed to 

herbaria throughout the world. His collections were a 

great contribution to Lundell’s studies on the flora of 

Belize. “From 1931 until shortly before his death in 

1958, Gentle collected 9756 numbers, easily making 

him the most prolific collector of the Belize flora.... 

Percival Gentle had a keen eye for plants he had not 

previously collected. Based on collection data in our 

databases, we estimate that he collected approximately 

65% of the flora. His numerous and well-executed 

collections are a testament to his dedication and skill 

as a botanist and a legacy enriching our understanding 

197 

of the Belize flora.” Gentle’s “botanical efforts 

during 1931-1958 made possible most subsequent 

studies involving the Belizean flora” (Balick et al., 

2000: 18).Among his orchid collections we can find 

Ponera striata Lindl. (Gentle 1097), Trigonidium 

egertonianum Bateman ex Lindl. (Gentle 1122), 

Maxillaria crassifolia (Lindl.) Rchb. f. (Gentle 

1123), Oncidium sphacelatum Lindl. (Gentle 1154), 

Encyclia bractescens (Lindl.) Hoehne (Gentle 1195), 

Stelis ciliaris Lindl. (Gentle 1196), Ornithocephalus 

inflexus Lindl. (Gentle 1312), Brassavola nodosa 

var. grandiflora (Lindl.) H.G. Jones (Gentle 1313), 

Scaphyglottis behrii (Rchb. f.) Benth. & Hook. f. 

ex Hemsl. (Gentle 1576), Ionopsis utricularioides 

(Sw.) Lindl. (Gentle 1700), Scaphyglottis leucantha 

Rchb. f. (Gentle 1781), Maxillaria tenuifolia Lindl. 

(Gentle 2189), Bletia purpurea (Lam.) DC. (Gentle 

2537), Dimerandra emarginata (G. Mey.) Hoehne 

(Gentle 2541), Brassia maculata R. Br. (Gentle 3023), 

Sobralia decora Bateman (Gentle 3036), Elleanthus 

graminifolius (Barb. Rodr.) Løjtnant (Gentle 3065), 

Prescottia stachyodes (Sw.) Lindl. (Gentle 3492), 

Habenaria mesodactyla Griseb. (Gentle 3636), 

Polystachya clavata Lindl. (Gentle 3640), Prosthechea 

cochleata (L.) W.E. Higgins (Gentle 3974), Habenaria 

trifida Kunth (Gentle 4036), Scaphyglottis prolifera 

Cogn. (Gentle 4077), Scaphyglottis minutiflora Ames 

& Correll (Gentle 4265), Cryptarrhena lunata R. Br. 

(Gentle 4266), Ornithocephalus bicornis Lindl. ex 

Benth. (Gentle 4267), Cryptarrhena guatemalensis 

Schltr. (Gentle 4309), Sobralia mucronata Ames & 

C. Schweinf. (Gentle 4314), Lophiaris lurida (Lindl.) 

Braem (Gentle 4396), Campylocentrum hondurense 

Ames (Gentle 4472), Sobralia fragrans Lindl. 

(Gentle 4925), Campylocentrum micranthum (Lindl.) 

Maury (Gentle 5049), Campylocentrum tyrridion 

Garay & Dunst. (Gentle 5077), Oncidium ensatum 

Lindl. (Gentle 5147), Lycaste aromatica (Graham ex 

Hook.) Lindl. (Gentle 5418), Dichaea panamensis 

Lindl. (Gentle 6032) and Prosthechea pygmaea 

(Hook.) W.E. Higgins (Gentle 6368). A few months 

before his death he made his last orchid collection, the 

beautiful Encyclia belizensis (Rchb. f.) Schltr. (Gentle 

9740). Lundell honored him in the genus Gentlea 

(Myrsinaceae). 

39 Lasser, Director of the ‘Instituto Botánico’ of Venezuela, was the editor of the Flora de Venezuela (1964), for which Ernesto 

Foldats wrote the treatment of the Orchidaceae. 


198 

The Mexican Renaissance (I). With the Mexican 

Revolution that began after the political events of 1910 

the country entered a period of political commotion and 

fratricidal struggles. The result were almost three decades 

of economic and cultural penury (Rzedowski, 1981: 7), 

of which Mexico would only begin to recover during the 

government of Lázaro Cárdenas (1934-1940). Only Carl 

A. Purpus, in his beloved Zacuapam, dared to continue 

his botanical activity during those troubled years. 

A new era of Mexican orchidology began with Karl 

Erik Magnus Östlund (1875-1938) (Fig. 57B). Östlund 

had been born in Stockholm, where he received the 

degree of Chemical Engineer in 1897. In 1909 he came 

to Mexico, as manager of the ‘Empresa de Teléfonos 

Ericsson S.A.’ Soon he became interested in the Mexican 

Orchidaceae and in 1928 he retired and dedicated himself 

entirely to orchid studies. He prepared detailed drawings 

from living material, with microscopic sections, exact 

measurements and color indications. “The Östlund 

Orchid Herbarium ... was without doubt the finest 

collection of orchids ever to come out of Mexico. Now 

I might justifiably go further and say that it was most 

probably the finest collection of orchids to come out of 

any country” (Williams, 1951: 5). “The quality of the 

data of origin, the care with which the specimens were 

prepared, the abundance of the material, the rigor of the 

numeration, the extensive additional information and 

the drawings in the field books, all this in a period of 

just ten years, is exceptional” (Hágsater et al., 2005: 69). 

The Östlund heirs donated this collection to the Oakes 

Ames Herbarium at Harvard University. Duplicate sets 

of specimens were distributed to many institutions, 

including the Smithsonian Institute and the Missouri 

Botanical Garden. Östlund collected the types of two 

new species: Spiranthes densiflora C. Schweinfurth 

(Östlund 1513) and Epidendrum cyanocolumna Ames, 

Hubb. and Schweinf. (Östlund 2413). Two orchid 

genera: Oestlundia W.E. Higgins and Oestlundorchis 

Szlach., as well as many species, were dedicated to him: 

Brassia oestlundiana L.O. Williams, Encyclia oestlundii 

(Ames, Hubbard & Schweinfurth) Hágsater & F.R. 

Stermitz, Lepanthes oestlundiana R.E. Schult. & Dillon, 

Maxillaria oestlundiana L.O. Williams, Mormodes 

oestlundiana G.A. Salazar Chávez & Hágsater, and 

Pleurothallis oestlundiana L.O. Williams. 

Otto Nagel (1894-1972) finished his apprenticeship 

in botany and gardening in Saxony, and came to 

LANKESTERIANA 


Mexico in 1925. He dedicated himself to grafting and 

the improvement of the orange groves in the state of 

Veracruz. During this time, he lived in the home of C. 

A. Purpus, who introduced him to the Mexican flora 

(Hartmann, 1968: 191). A few years later he was called 

by Karl E. Östlund: he needed an able assistant and 

collaborator to increase and take care of his collection 

and prepare an orchid herbarium. Nagel was the ideal 

man for this task, and so began a fruitful relationship that 

would go on for nearly a decade (Halbinger, 1972: 257). 

Searching for and collecting orchids, Nagel traveled 

through the whole country. He collected the greater 

part of the Mexican species and discovered a number 

of new ones. Many others, including a new genus, 

were named in his honor: Nageliella L.O. Williams, 

Bletia nagelii L.O. Williams (Conzatti & Nagel 7113), 

Bulbophyllum nagelii L.O. Williams (Williams & Nagel 

3864), Epidendrum nagelii L.O. Williams (Nagel 2063), 

Lepanthes nagelii Salazar & Soto Arenas, Maxillaria 

nagelii L.O. Williams ex Correll, Mormodes nagelii 

L.O. Williams, Stelis nagelii Solano, and Trichosalpinx 

nageliana Soto Arenas. Nagel was made head of the 

Orchidarium of the Biology Institute of the National 

University in 1959 by its director, the renowned 

professor Faustino Miranda González (1905-1964). 

Miranda, born in northern Spain, had come to Mexico in 

1939 as a political refugee after the Spanish Civil War, 

and would play an important role in the development 

of natural sciences in the country. He spent five years 

in Chiapas, were he wrote an important work about 

the vegetation of the region (Miranda, 1952) and 

founded the Botanical Garden of Tuxtla Gutiérrez. In 

1960 he organized the botanical garden of the National 

University. Both gardens carry today his name. 

Miranda plays an important role in our history 

because he identified over 2,700 plants collected by 

Francisco Hernández in the XVI century and by his 

translation of the Badianus Manuscript. 

Eizi Matuda (1894-1978) was the only botanist of 

Asian origin who ever worked in our region. Born in 

Nagasaki, Japan, he received his degree in Biological 

Sciences at the Imperial University of Taihoku (Taiwan), 

in 1914. As a professor and researcher for different 

universities in Japan, Matuda studied the flora of Korea, 

Manchuria, Hong Kong, Singapore and Java. In 1922 he 

came to Mexico and became a Mexican citizen in 1928. 

Matuda was a field man and traveled into remote areas


by mule, thus acquiring an excellent knowledge of much 

of tropical Mexico. Although he specialized in Aroids, he 

collected and studied Mexican Orchidaceae, and in 1969 

published an important book about the orchids of the 

state of Mexico (Matuda, 1969). An important number of 

Mexican species was named in his honor: Epidendrum 

matudae L.O. Williams, Govenia matudae E.W. Greenw. 

& Soto Arenas, Habenaria matudae Salazar, Lepanthes 

matudana G.A. Salazar Chávez & Soto Arenas, and 

Pleurothallis matudiana C. Schweinfurth. 

Christian Halbinger (1884-1976) was born in Munich 

and came to Mexico in 1906. He was from the beginning 

fascinated by the Mexican flora, with an initial interest 

in Cacti that resulted in the naming of two species: 

Mammilaria halbingeri und Echeverria halbingeri in his 

honor. In the 1930’s his interest shifted to orchids and he 

became a founding member of the Mexican Society of 

Orchid Friends in 1939, together with Carlos Lascuarain, 

Maximino Martínez and Juan Balme. Halbinger’s work 

with Mexican orchids has been continued by his son 

Federico (born 1925). Halbinger collected the type 

specimen of Pleurothallis longispicata L.O. Williams (C. 

Halbinger 1752). Another Mexican species, Platystele 

halbingerana (R.E. Schult.) Garay carries his name, and 

was collected by a good friend of Halbinger, the great 

ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes (1915-2001) (Fig. 

57C) during a collecting excursion to Oaxaca in 1939, 

while searching for plants with hallucinogenic properties. 

Schultes would become some years later Curator of 

the Orchid Herbarium of Oakes Ames and later of the 

Botanical Museum of Harvard University. He is famous 

in the orchid world for his book Native Orchids of 

Trinidad and Tobago (1960). 

Thomas Baillie MacDougall (1895-1973) (Fig. 57D) 

was a British subject who came to the United States 

shortly after World War I. As an amateur biologist, he 

became related to diverse Natural History institutions, 

among them the New York Botanical Garden, and 

was named by several of them collector in southern 

Mexico. He made the isthmus of Tehuantepec his 

residence and lived there for over 40 years. In Francisco 

Ortega, a Zapotec guide and itinerant trader, he found a 

special friend and companion on most of his collecting 

excursions, traveling on foot over the greater part of the 

states of Oaxaca and Chiapas. He discovered innumerable 

new species, many of which carry his name: Begonia 

macdougallii, Tillandsia macdougallii, Anthurium 

199 

macdougallii, etc. (Bravo, 1973: 171-172). MacDougall 

collected the type specimen of Epidendrum rowleyi 

Withner & G.E. Pollard (T.B. MacDougall s.n.) and 

two orchid species were named after him: Oerstedella 

macdougallii Hágsater and Sobralia macdougallii Soto 

Arenas, Pérez-García & Salazar. MacDougall visited 

often the Botanical Garden of the National University 

in Mexico City, where he would discuss his orchid 

specimens with Otto Nagel and his cacti with Helia 

Bravo. “Among the species of cacti he discovered is 

the small and singular Ortegocactus macdougallii, a 

name that links those two most affectionate friends: Don 

Francisco Ortega and Don Thomas MacDougall” (Bravo, 

1973: 172). All important names in the orchidology 

of Mexico during MacDougall’s life were his friends: 

Oberg, Pollard, Greenwood, Nagel, Halbinger, Miranda 

and Matuda, among others. 

Franz Mayer (1882-1975) came to Mexico in 1905, 

under a one year contract with a British bank. He saw the 

opportunity to make his own career and stayed in Mexico 

for the rest of his life, being one of the founders of the 

Mexican Stock Exchange. One of his good friends, Ema 

Hurtado (the widow of the famous painter Diego Rivera) 

introduced him to the orchids of Mexico that became his 

passion. Mayer was a founding member of the ‘Sociedad 

Mexicana Amigos de las Orquídeas’ (= ‘Mexican Society 

of Friends of the Orchids’ ) in the early 1940’s and later 

a founding and honorary member of the ‘Asociación 

Mexicana de Orquideología.’ Mayer built up one of the 

largest orchid collections in Mexico. A large part of it 

was left to the Asociación Mexicana de Orquideología 

that has kept an important part of it incorporated into 

the collection it maintains in the Botanical Garden of 

Chapultepec. “[Mayer] knew how to choose his friends, 

and there is no doubt that the orchids were the ones he 

preferred” (Ewald, 1977: 146). 

A passionate hunter, Salvador Rosillo de Velasco 

(1910-1987), began to turn his attention to orchids 

during his hunting excursions, around the year of 1945. 

However, he limited his area of study to the state of 

Jalisco that lies outside the area of interest of this story. 

Aaron John Sharp (1904-1997) collected in Guatemala 

and Mexico between 1944 and 1946. A native of Ohio, 

Sharp came to our area to study the floristic relationships 

with eastern North America. In those years he published 

an important work about the flora of Chiapas (Sharp, 

1945). Sharp was a noteworthy conservationist, who 


200 

spent most of his life trying to create a conscience about 

the sustainable use of natural resources. In Chiapas he 

discovered a new species of orchid: Cranichis ciliilabia 

C. Schweinfurth (Sharp 45977). 

Honduras and the Pan-American Agricultural 

School of ‘El Zamorano’. Many years after most 

Central American countries had already been thoroughly 

explored, Honduras was still the noteworthy exception. 

“The vegetation of Honduras as a whole is very imperfectly 

known. With the exception of a few collections which 

have been made in the Atlantic coastal plain region and 

at scattered inland points, most of the country remains 

wholly unexplored in the botanical sense” (Yuncker, 

1945: 55). Most of those few collections mentioned 

by Williams were made by Truman George Yuncker 

(1891-1964) (Fig. 58A), who organized expeditions into 

Honduras in 1934 and 1936 and then in 1938 and 1940. 

After obtaining his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois, 

Yuncker joined the faculty of DePauw University in 

1919 and served as head of the botany and bacteriology 

department from its establishment in the 1920s until his 

retirement in 1956. On his second journey to Honduras, 

Yuncker traveled with Ray Fields Dawson (1911- ) 

and Howard R. Youse. Yuncker wrote some of the few 

contributions to the flora of Honduras known from the 

first half of the century: A Contribution to the Flora of 

Honduras (1938) and Flora of the Aguan Valley and the 

Coastal Regions near La Ceiba, Honduras (1940). In the 

former, 63 species of orchids in 28 genera were described, 

as usual with the contribution of Oakes Ames. During 

the expedition of Yuncker, Dawson and Youse, two new 

orchid species were discovered, that were described 

by Ames as Lepanthes yunckeri Ames (T.G. Yuncker, 

R.F. Dawson & H.R. Youse 6152) and Lepanthes 

dawsonii Ames (T.G. Yuncker, R.F. Dawson & H.R. 

Youse 6152A). Another orchid, Phreatia yunckeri, was 

described by L.O. Williams from a collection by Yuncker 

in the South Pacific. 

Finally, after many years of neglect, Honduras started 

to play an important role in the history of our orchids 

when, after Lancetilla, Wilson Popenoe was called 

upon by the United Fruit Company President Samuel 

Zemurray in 1941 to help initiate and develop another 

U.F.C project. This project was the Pan American 

Agricultural School, popularly known today as “El 

Zamorano”. The idea was to create a center of learning 

LANKESTERIANA 


where Central Americans and other Latin Americans 

could receive up to date agricultural training to help them 

develop their countries. Popenoe was chosen to find the 

site for the new school and become its first director. 

For weeks Popenoe traveled throughout Honduras and 

Central America and, in the end, he selected a 3,500 acre 

property in the Valley of El Zamorano near the Yeguare 

River and 25 miles away from Tegucigalpa, the capital. 

The Pan American School of Agriculture was opened 

in September 1943 on an experimental basis, and the 

first student body was composed of 73 Mexicans and 

Central Americans. Williams, who had joined the staff 

of El Zamorano in the early 1950’s, wrote a quarter 

of a century later: “In Honduras the Escuela Agrícola 

Panamericana, under the direction of Wilson Popenoe, 

began systematic botanical explorations in all Central 

American countries in 1946. This work continues, 

now in conjunction with [the] Field Museum and 

with important assistance from the National Science 

Foundation ... Paul C. Standley joined us occasionally 

in the late 1940s and permanently in 1950 … This 

exploration is being continued by Prof. Molina and 

by myself and other associates as time permits. A very 

fine herbarium of Central American materials is to be 

found at the Escuela Agrícola Panamericana, as well 

as a very usable library” (Williams, 1972: 202-205). In 

a similar way to Lancetilla, El Zamorano has only an 

indirect relation to our story. But the fact that Williams 

and Standley spent so many years there, for a short 

time in the company of Paul H. Allen, made it the most 

important orchid research center in Central America for 

the first decades of the second half of the XX century. 

The great Paul C. Standley, to whom we owe most of 

the Central American floras of the first half of the XX. 

century, chose Honduras as the place where he wanted to 

spend his last years. In a letter to C.V. Morton he wrote: 

“I am back in Honduras to stay, I hope, and it is doubtful 

if I shall ever see the States again. There certainly are 

plenty of things here to keep me busy, and as long as I 

am able to crawl around I can find plenty of field work in 

Central America that is worth while” (In a letter to C.W. 

Morton, April 12, 1950). During his stay at El Zamorano, 

Standley planned a flora of Central America. “This plan, 

for a Middle American flora, was not to materialize, for 

reasons beyond Standley’s control, but the groundwork, 

in the form of the best herbarium and library in Central 

America, was completed…” (Williams, 1963: 76-77).


The second half of The xx cenTury 40 

He may be a son of a bitch, but he is our son 

of a bitch! 

Franklin D. Roosevelt, about Anastasio 

Somoza, President of Nicaragua 

The years following World War II show a convulse 

Central America, struggling with political and social 

unrests. In Guatemala, the progressive governments 

of Arévalo and Arbenz (1944-1954) were followed 

by more than three decades of military rulers and 

guerilla movements fighting for a fairer social order. 

All attempts to establish democratic governments in 

Honduras were aborted by successive military coups. 

Anastasio Somoza, in Nicaragua, was the only one of 

the dictators of the 1930s that survived the post-war 

era, until his regime was overthrown by the sandinista 

movement in 1979. El Salvador lived through a 

political evolution very similar to that of Guatemala, 

with military governments focusing on agricultural 

diversification and the creation of new industries, 

politics that were of little benefit to the poorer classes 

(Pérez Brignoli, 2000: 153-160). Mexico, where 

since 1940 the social objectives of the revolution 

had been sacrificed to the acceleration of economic 

growth, entered finally in a post-revolutionary phase 

under the presidency of Miguel Alemán (1946-1952) 

and began an era of ambiguous social and economic 

politics (Halperin Donghui, 2002: 500-506). In 1968, 

the country was shaken by strong social protests that 

ended in the infamous killings in Tlatelolco Square, on 

October 2 of that same year, one of the most tragic 

events of modern Mexican history. In Panama, the 

movement that demanded sovereignty over the canal 

gained more and more strength and ended with the 

Torrijos-Carter treaties, signed on September 7, 1977, 

establishing the transfer of the canal to Panama on 

December 31, 1999. Only Costa Rica, under the shelter 

of the social reforms of the early 1940s and the political 

constitution proclaimed in 1949 which -among other 

important changes- had abolished the army, seemed 

to be able to escape the social and political chaos 

in which the rest of the region was submerged. This 

allows us to understand why, in the world of orchid 

research, Costa Rica was the only country in which, 

201 

slowly, an institutional impulse developed, starting 

with the legacy of Charles H. Lankester and continuing 

in the Lankester Botanical Garden of the University 

of Costa Rica, founded in 1973. In the other countries 

of the region we find important advances which 

depended always, however, on individual vocations 

and on the high human and professional level of 

their protagonists. Panama represents a special case, 

where the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute 

has made an outstanding contribution to the botanical 

exploration of the isthmus, together with Mexico, with 

the outstanding results of the research and studies by 

the collaborators of the AMO Herbarium. 

The Mexican Renaissance (II). The work started by 

Thomas MacDougall in Oaxaca was continued by a 

small group of amateurs who gave an enormous impulse 

to Mexican orchidology. “It was the Christmas season 

many years ago in Oaxaca, and the tall ‘gringa’ who 

had recently come to live in the city stood in the flower 

market admiring the colorful plants that the Indians of 

the Sierra had brought in to sell as holiday decorations. 

She was particularly entranced by the delicate small 

blossoms on some of the plants, and on noting her 

interest, a gentleman standing nearby said, ‘that is a 

plant of Odontoglossum cervantesii - an orchid.’ Then 

and there was born in the mind of Ruth Oberg ( - 1970) 

the desire to learn more about these fascinating plants, 

and the man speaking to her was none other than Don 

Tomás MacDougall. What a fortunate meeting!, and 

the beginning of a friendship that lasted to the end of 

Ruth’s life” (Pollard, 1974: 173). “The enthusiasm and 

dedication of Ruth to the study of orchids made her 

an important figure in the renaissance of orchidology” 

(Soto Arenas, 1992:196). Ruth Oberg became known 

as the ‘Orchid Lady of Oaxaca’ and visitors from many 

areas, among them Glenn Pollard, George Kennedy, 

Eric Hágsater, Carl Withner, Alphonse Heller, Paul 

Allen and Edward Greenwood, called to consult her 

and admire the contributions that she was making 

toward orchid research. She was especially close to 

Pollard. Together with Robert Dressler, she joined a 

group from Harvard University for a collecting trip 

to a remote part of the State of Chiapas - The Laguna 

Ocotal Grande, where she collected a new species of 

40 The author’s decision to exclude from this history all persons living at the time this work was written has the inevitable result that 

this chapter shows large and unavoidable gaps. 


202 

Ornithocephalus, that was later dedicated to her. The 

expedition was led by Dr. Raymond A. Paynter Jr., 

Assistant Curator for Birds at the Harvard Museum of 

Zoology and Paynter suggested Dressler as the botanist 

who should accompany the group. However, strongminded 

Ruth Oberg had to give her consent: “I have 

just spoken to the botanist and it is fairly certain that 

he will be going along, provided, of course, he meets 

with your approval. I asked him about the orchid 

situation and he said that he is perfectly willing to give 

you first choice on all orchids collected and you may 

have the disposition of them” (R. Paynter in a letter 

to R. Oberg, March 25, 1954). In April of that same 

year, Oberg writes to Dressler and emphasizes her 

point: “If you collect a single plant which is known to 

me, so that I can make a record about it, you certainly 

are welcome to keep it. But if it is something which 

I will want to study, then I must reserve the right to 

keep it. Otherwise my making this trip would lose its 

point” (Letter to R. Dressler, April 19, 1954). When 

they met, they became immediately good friends, and 

for the rest of Oberg’s life, Dressler would call her 

“Tía” (‘aunt’, in Spanish). Oberg described years later 

the excursion to Laguna Ocotal, in an article published 

in the journal of the Mexican Society of Orchidology 

(Oberg, 1974). In the years to come, Oberg send large 

amounts of plants to Dressler for identification, always 

complaining that the answers came to slow because of 

too much work on the side of ‘don Roberto’. During the 

last years of her life, Oberg worked on a book on Mexican 

orchids, which unfortunately was never published. She 

wrote to Dressler: “You know how I’m going to start my 

preface? ‘This book has been compiled with the hope it 

will so irritate someone that he will write a better one!’ ” 

(Letter to R. Dressler, June 10, 1966). One of Oberg’s 

constant complaints was the quality of the then existing 

books on Mexican orchids, especially the one published 

by Norman P. Wright in 1958. “I certainly don’t want 

to see an Icon. of Mex. Orch. if it is not better than 

Norman Wright did his book. And he certainly did a 

job of messing up the text for that folio of Orch. and 

Humming birds” (Letter to R. Dressler, February 16, 

1965). Among the collections made by Oberg we find 

Maxillaria nagelii L.O. Williams ex Correll (Oberg 

95) and Encyclia baculus (Rchb. f.) Dressler & G.E. 

Pollard (Oberg 60). Epidendrum obergii A.D. Hawkes 

had been dedicated to her in 1957. 

LANKESTERIANA 


Federico (Fritz) Halbinger (1925-2007) (Fig. 58B), 

was the son of Christian Halbinger and, like his father, 

an expert on Mexican orchids. In 1969 he was cofounder 

of the Mexican Orchid Society “Amigos de las 

Orquídeas” and in 1970 and 1971 he made extensive 

collecting trips to the mountains of the Sierra Madre 

in the company of Eric Hágsater, Robert Dressler, and 

Glenn Pollard. These excursions were very successful, 

also in terms of the discovery of new species. Shortly 

after that, the journal “Orquídea (Mex.)” was founded, 

and Halbinger began with the publication of a series 

of articles, mainly on the genus Barkeria, that had 

become his specialty. For this reason Miguel Angel 

Soto Arenas honored him in 1993 with the new 

species: Barkeria fritz-halbingeriana Soto Arenas. In 

the following years Halbinger expanded his interest 

to the genera Odontoglossum and Laelia, publishing 

important monographic papers, again mostly in the 

journal “Orquídea (Mex.)”. From 1973 to 1974, 

Halbinger presided over the Mexican Society of 

Orchidology. 

Glenn E. Pollard (1900-1976) (Fig. 58C) was 

born in the town of Kelso, Missouri, as the son of a 

railroad man who moved frequently, so that Glenn’s 

schooling was in varied backgrounds. He graduated 

in mining and metallurgy at Stanford University in 

1923. In 1950 Glenn and his wife Barbara made their 

first visit to Mexico and the country made such a 

favorable impression on them that when Glenn retired 

in 1955, they decided to spend the winter there and 

eventually made Oaxaca their home. “In Oaxaca the 

Pollards made friends with Ruth Oberg, who for many 

years had lived in the suburb of San Felipe del Agua 

studying orchids, and with Tom MacDougall, who also 

was widely known in biological circles as a veteran 

collector of plants and small animals, and was perhaps 

then the most knowledgeable person concerning the 

topography and biota of Oaxaca and Chiapas. Ruth 

introduced Glenn to the fascinating world of orchids 

and Tom reinforced his budding interest with advice 

and guidance. Soon Glenn began collecting a few 

plants, and when the Pollards built their own house 

in 1959, it included a small orchid house; Ruth Oberg 

contributed some plants to get the collection well started 

”(Greenwood, 1978: 9). The new road program which 

started in the early 1960s in southern Mexico brought 

wonderful opportunities for Pollard to collect orchids.

A 


C D 

Figure 58. A — Truman George Yuncker (1891-1964). Courtesy of the Archives of the Gray Herbarium, Harvard University. 

B — Federico (Fritz) Halbinger (1925-2007). In Röth, 2007: 72. C — Glenn E. Pollard (1900-1976). Courtesy of Eric 

Hágsater. D — Edward Warren Greenwood (1918-2002) and his wife Mary Scobbie. Courtesy of Eric Hágsater. 

B 

203 


204 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 59. A — Clarence Klaus Horich (1930-1994). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. B — Jack A. Fowlie (1929-1993) during 

a visit to Costa Rica (Fowlie on the right. On the left Clarence Horich). Courtesy of Rudolf Jenny. C — Rafael Lucas 

Rodríguez Caballero (1915-1981). Courtesy of his daughter, Leonora Rodríguez. D — Pescatoria cerina (Lindl. & 

Paxton) Rchb. f. Illustration by R.L.Rodríguez in Rodríguez et al., 1986: 203. 


B


He followed the bulldozers through country hardly 

explored botanically and still unlumbered and the 

trees being knocked down by the road gangs made for 

extremely rich collecting. Pollard’s collection became 

very important, with many rare plants, and turned 

soon into a focus of interest for orchid enthusiasts 

and specialists, who came often to visit, among them 

Louis O. Williams, Calaway H. Dodson and Robert L. 

Dressler. All became friends and Dressler’s interest 

in Mexican plants led to collaboration and to the joint 

authorship of The Genus Encyclia in Mexico (Dressler 

& Pollard, 1974), Pollards most important contribution 

to Mexican orchidology. Although he published some 

eighteen papers on Mexican orchids, Glenn Pollard 

regarded The Genus Encyclia as his outstanding effort, 

and the vindication of his hard work and long studies. 

A loner by nature, his poor health in later years 

reinforced his dislike for people in groups. Despite this, 

he was friendly and warm with people he liked, though 

not everyone met with his approval (Greenwood, 1978: 

4). His friends named in his honor Encyclia pollardiana 

(Withner) Dressler & Pollard, Malaxis pollardii L.O. 

Williams, Lepanthes pollardii H.A. Hespenheide and 

Oncidium pollardi, Dodson & Hágsater. Withner and 

Harding honored him with the new genus Pollardia. 

As a founding member of the Mexican Association of 

Orchidology, Pollard took an active role in attempts to 

widen Mexican interest in the orchids of the country. 

Pollard died in Oaxaca, on March 27, 1976. 

“The Greenwoods of the Canadian Embassy in 

Washington have just left. You may have heard of them, 

their main interest is in the cacti and in photography, 

but they also have an interest in orchids and quite a 

bit of knowledge of them” (R. Oberg in a letter to R. 

Dressler, August 11, 1960) (Fig. 58D). Edward Warren 

Greenwood (1918-2002) first came to Mexico with his 

wife Mary in 1958-1959, when they spent two weeks 

in Mexico City. There they met plant explorer Tom 

MacDougall, and Drs. Helia Bravo and Eizi Matuda. 

During this same vacation, Ed met Glenn Pollard and 

Ruth Oberg when he went to Oaxaca. At that time, the 

Greenwoods decided to eventually retire to Mexico. 

Ed Greenwood worked with the Canadian Embassy, in 

Washington D.C., from 1959 to 1962. He kept in touch 

with the Mexican botanists of the National University, 

and a close relationship was established with Helia 

Bravo. Helia had been invited by the Greenwoods to 

205 

stay at their apartment in Washington, during her stay 

studying the cactus collections at the United States 

National Herbarium. Helia always remembered him as 

a good friend and a very good cook. “He had a keen 

sense of humor and was a superb raconteur” (Dressler, 

2002). Many of Ed’s pictures of cacti illustrate Helia 

and Hernando Sánchez-Mejorada’s work on Mexican 

cactii (1991). It is to be remembered that Greenwood, 

at that time, followed mainly his interests in the 

Cactaceae (Reddoch, 2002: 251). After completing 

the Washington assignment, Ed returned to Ottawa 

where he started the Native Orchid Location Survey of 

the Ottawa District, which he later extended to all of 

Canada. The Greenwoods continued to spend annual 

leave in Mexico, except during the couple of years when 

Ed was working in Great Britain. “While on vacation in 

Oaxaca, in the summer of 1963, Eric Hágsater came 

through on his way to Chiapas, meeting Ed and Mary 

at Pollard’s place, starting an enduring friendship and 

collaboration. In July 1964, Ed and Mary traveled with 

Ruth Oberg, the orchid and cacti lover living in Oaxaca, 

to Jalisco and Colima, where they met Eric Hágsater 

and collected together for a couple of weeks”. “In 1969, 

Ed Greenwood moved to London, England, where he 

was attached to the Canadian High Commission. On his 

weekends he spent time in the Kew Herbarium and in 

the libraries at Kew and the British Museum. During 

his stay in London he amassed an incredible amount of 

literature about Mexican orchids, mostly photocopies of 

original descriptions, books on the subject, pictures of 

type and critical specimens, and became very familiar 

with the historical collections housed in European 

herbaria” (Light et al., 2002: v). He also took the 

opportunity to travel to Vienna: “In early May I shall be 

in Vienna for a few days working in the Reichenbach 

Herbarium. Perhaps there may be some items there 

which I might look up for you…” (In a letter to R. 

Dressler, March 23, 1973). Ed Greenwood returned 

to Canada and retired in 1973. At the end of that year 

he departed with Mary to Mexico, where he stayed 

for the next 20 years. When the Greenwoods decided 

to set up their home in Oaxaca, the most productive 

period in Mexican orchidology began. Shortly after 

the Greenwoods moved to Mexico permanently, Eric 

Hágsater revived the old orchid society “Amigos de las 

Orquídeas”. They began publishing Orquídea (Mex.), 

where Ed became one of the editors. 


206 

The first years in Mexico were spent in close 

collaboration with Glenn Pollard and the other orchid 

enthusiasts living in Oaxaca. Greenwood explored the 

Oaxacan roads together with Octavio Suárez, a young 

boy who had been introduced to him by Pollard. In the 

field, Ed was a terrific observer, always looking for the 

rarest, smallest, and most inconspicuous terrestrials, 

in which he became a specialist. “Ed´s knowledge 

of Mexican Spiranthinae eventually became very 

authoritative [...] However, Ed Greenwood’s most 

important contribution was the formation of a new 

generation of Mexican orchidists in systematics. His 

endless enthusiasm was contagious and joining him on 

field trips was very enlightening (Light et al., 2002: v).” 

In 1987 he had to travel to Canada and from there he 

wrote to Dressler: “I was disappointed at missing you in 

Guadalajara and also at not observing the presentations 

there by our AMO juniors. You had met only Nacho 

Aguirre, I believe; how did you like Miguel Ángel Soto 

and Gerardo Salazar?” (Letter to Dressler, October 31, 

1987). “Among his output of about 20 papers were 

the descriptions of 10 new orchid species” (Reddoch, 

2002: 251). Many others were dedicated to him, 

among them: Acianthera greenwoodii Soto Arenas, 

Anathallis greenwoodii Soto Arenas & Salazar, Bletia 

greenwoodiana Sosa, Dryadella greenwoodiana Soto 

Arenas, Salazar & Solano, Encyclia greenwoodiana 

I. Aguirre-Olavarrieta, Epidendrum greenwoodii 

Hágsater, Galeandra greenwoodiana N. Warford, 

Govenia greenwoodii Dressler & Soto Arenas, 

Habenaria greenwoodiana R. González, Lepanthes 

greenwoodii G.A. Salazar & Soto Arenas, Liparis 

greenwodiana Espejo, Malaxis greenwoodiana 

Salazar & Soto Arenas, Stelis greenwoodii Soto 

Arenas & Solano, and Trichosalpinx greenwoodiana 

Soto Arenas. Greenwood had been involved since 

1978 in the fascicles about Orchidaceae of the Flora 

de Veracruz, and worked later on the project of the 

Flora Mesoamericana, as a specialist in the genus 

Govenia. Greenwood had concerns with regard to his 

appointment as a specialist for the Flora: “because I 

personally am located in the fringe zone, with mixing 

of northern and tropical floral elements, there may be 

some highly specific targets to investigate. On the other 

hand, my total lack of funds for travel to herbaria and 

the very limited access to have to the literature are very 

real limitations on my capability. There is one bright 

LANKESTERIANA 


spot, though; my two-year bout with heart trouble is 

past, after a coronary by-pass job in Houston less than 

three weeks ago. My work capacity won’t be limited by 

feebleness, I am assured” (letter to Dressler, November 

19, 1986). In 1986 Greenwood traveled to Costa Rica, 

where he came together with Dressler and met Dora 

Emilia Mora de Retana. In a letter to Dressler, written 

in March of that year, he expressed his wish to meet 

in Costa Rica Norris Williams, Calaway Dodson and 

Carlyle Luer. We don’t know if his wish was fulfilled. 

“Failing health and the advantages of the Canadian 

public health service finally lured Ed and Mary back to 

Canada, where Ed continued to correspond with many 

other orchid enthusiasts in Mexico and elsewhere as 

long as his health permitted” (Dressler, 2002: 1119). 

Edward W. Greenwood died in Ottawa on February 

24, 2002, at the age of 84. “His energy, enthusiasm, 

encouragement and expertise, as well as his passion for 

orchids, will be remembered by many who new him” 

(Reddoch, 2002: 252). 

The role of George C. Kennedy (1919-1980) in the 

orchidology of Mexico is difficult to judge. On one 

side, his most important collections were made in South 

America, or in the northwestern states of Mexico, which 

lie outside of our area of study. On the other, we know 

(from her correspondence with Robert L. Dressler) that 

he was a frequent visitor of Ruth Oberg in Oaxaca and 

he wrote several important articles on different genera 

which are widely distributed throughout Mexico, 

sometimes together with Halbinger, with whom he 

went on several collecting trips. A graduate of Harvard, 

Kennedy moved in 1952 to Los Angeles and became 

a research professor at the Institute of Geo-physics 

and Planetary Physics at UCLA, where he worked 

and studied until his death. “As a research professor, 

he taught no classes but experimented in his lab with 

two or three post doctoral students each year. Together 

they made the Kennedy Lab famous throughout the 

world” (Fowlie, 1990: 8). Kennedy visited Mexico on 

geological excursions and was immediately fascinated 

by orchids and Pre-Columbian art. It was said about 

him that he was ‘persona non grata’ in Mexico, 

because he took numerous archeological pieces of 

the Colima culture out of the country. Hunting after 

orchids he traveled extensively, and –besides Mexico- 

collected in Madagascar, Burma, India, Colombia, 

Ecuador and Peru. He often gave many of his living


collections from Ecuador to Dr. Calaway Dodson at 

Selby, but without any collection data, which made 

Dodson furious, since this made them worthless. In a 

letter to Hágsater from December 1975 he complains 

that he was not allowed to take 5,000 plants out of 

Colombia. Three of Kennedy’s collections became the 

types for new orchids species: Pleurothallis kennedy 

Luer and Oncidium kennedy Stacy, both collected in 

Ecuador, and Epidendrum kennedy Fowlie & Withner, 

frequent in the Mexican states of Sinaloa and Nayarit, 

somewhat to the North of our are of study. He had 

large greenhouses in Los Angeles, and normally did 

not number his plants until they flowered and he had 

been able to photograph them. Therefore, Kennedy’s 

numbers correspond to his slides. 

Heller and Hawkes: a Nicaraguan interlude. “In 

May 1973, while watering the garden of his large estate 

high up the hills overlooking Managua, Alphonse 

Henry Heller (1894-1973) died of a coronary. He was 

nearly 79 years old. Born an American, he studied 

mining engineering, worked for the Atlantic-Richfield 

Company, lived in San Marino near Los Angeles, 

founded his own company and became very wealthy. 

In 1956, at the age of 62, he retired from business, left 

the United States and took up residence in Nicaragua, 

where, as a hobby, he first worked on butterflies and 

then started collecting orchids as a very enthusiastic 

amateur” (Hamer, 1982-85: 1). Heller had already a 

large orchid collection in California. In a letter to 

Dressler, Ruth Oberg writes: “Did I tell you that the 

Hellers of San Marino and Managua, Nic. came to 

visit me on their way south? He moved all his orchid 

plants from Calif. (what a job that must have been!), 

and now has them planted on trees on the coffee finca 

he bought about 8 miles from Managua” (Letter to 

Dressler, November 5, 1957). Heller became a good 

friend of Oberg and visited her frequently, on his trips 

from California to Nicaragua. 

Dr. Calaway Dodson first met him in 1955 in San 

Marino, and he later visited him several times in 

Managua. This is how Dodson characterizes him: 

“Al Heller was an extreme intense individual. His 

interests were varied and when he became interested 

in a particular subject such as orchids, he did so in 

a profound manner. He consulted all experts in the 

field, he prepared bibliographies, lists and compiled 

207 

libraries covering the total range of the subject. He was 

untiring and worked 16 to 20 hours per day. [...] The 

results of his efforts are immense. He filled more than 

150 notebooks, each two to three inches thick, with 

notes on orchids alone. He made more than 12,000 

collections of Nicaraguan orchids and illustrated 

most of them in color along with extensive notes on 

each collection, concerning size, shape, habitat, etc. 

[...] Unfortunately, his zeal, enthusiasm, and lack of 

patience allowed little room for constructive criticism 

from scientific collaborators with the result that in most 

cases, communication was lost. He was particularly 

lax in making herbarium specimens to document his 

citations of species. [...] His illustrations were certainly 

adequate, though even he did not consider them works 

of art. Al Heller’s contribution to the knowledge of the 

orchids of Nicaragua was major even though flawed 

by the lack of corroborating specimens in some cases”. 

(Hamer, 1982-85: 1) “The enormous increase in known 

orchids in Nicaragua from 1956 to 1973 indicates 

clearly what may happen in a tropical region when an 

astute and dedicated person takes up the study of a major 

component of that flora” (Williams, 1973: 987). When 

A. Heller died, he left a truckload full of information 

on local orchids with drawings, descriptions, color 

slides and specimens of dried plants of Orchidaceae, 

as well as a large and valuable library, which were 

donated by his widow Christiane Heller to the Marie 

Selby Botanical Gardens, then under the directorship 

of Dr. Calaway H. Dodson. It was this material 

which formed the nucleus of the rapidly growing 

research department of that institution. The donation 

was made with the understanding that arrangements 

would be made to use Heller’s work for a publication 

and Dodson invited Hamer, who still resided in El 

Salvador, to have a look at Heller’s material, which was 

the base for the fascicles on Nicaragua of the Icones 

Plantarum Tropicarum series, written by Hamer and 

edited by Dodson, and later for the Orchidaceae of 

the Flora of Nicaragua, published by the Missouri 

Botanical Garden (Hamer, 2001). The opinions about 

Heller’s work were contradictory. As Hamer writes, 

“unfortunately the Heller material turned out not to be 

too useful; I had been warned that “... it would be a 

mistake to get mixed up with that project, as I feel sure 

the sketches must be inaccurate (Dr. Fowlie) or “Yes, 

it is true, Heller sent us a lot of scraps, much of which 


208 

was not even worth putting on a herbarium sheet (Dr. 

Garay), and “Mr. Heller made very good sketches of 

the orchids he collected, but usually lousy specimens 

or none, and these were usually with inadequate 

data” (Dr. Williams) (Hamer, 1985: 3). “[Heller] 

had prepared a manuscript or a check list totaling 57 

pages, all classified phylogenetically, as proposed by 

Dr. Dressler. His work was however never published, 

since his interests had changed” (Hamer, 1985: 1). 

Alfonso Heller (as he was called in Nicaragua) had 

amassed information about 650 species, with drawings 

and descriptions and sometimes photos. About 1968 he 

suddenly lost interest in orchids and dedicated himself 

to Nicaraguan archaeology. 

Born in Houlton, Maine, Alex Drum Hawkes 

(1927-1977) commenced working with orchids at the 

age of eleven. Such famous botanists as Oakes Ames, 

Liberty Hyde Bailey and David Fairchild were among 

his early influential mentors. At the age of twelve 

his first article on the subject was published, the 

forerunner of many thousands of papers on orchids 

and other largely tropical plants (Blowers, 1965: 15- 

16). He soon became interested in the orchids of 

Tropics and at the early age of 23 he published his The 

Genus Habenaria in Florida (Hawkes, 1950) and one 

year later his checklist of Cuban orchids (Hawkes, 

1951). From 1952 to 1959 he edited the short-lived 

Orchid Journal, where important articles about the 

orchids of our region were published. Somewhat later 

he edited The Orchid Weekly (originally named the 

South Florida Orchid Weekly) in the years 1958-1967. 

Then came his first book, Cultural Directions for 

Orchids (1960), in 1961 Orchids, Their Botany and 

Culture and in 1965 his Encyclopaedia of Cultivated 

Orchids, which received very poor reviews from 

many knowledgeable orchidologists. Probably the 

harshest critic was that of Leslie A. Garay. “If the 

author means that Ames through his writings taught 

him and inspired the writing of this monumental work, 

then Professor Ames for the first time, although post 

mortem, became a failure. Professor Ames was known 

to be a very exact and meticulous researcher and a 

most careful investigator; yet none of these aspects of 

Ames’ teaching is apparent anywhere in Mr. Hawkes’ 

book”. And finally, “I have read this book with the 

same critical eye as Professor Ames, to whom it is 

dedicated, would have, and am sure, if he were alive 

LANKESTERIANA 


today, he would agree with me that 12 guineas or 

$36.00 is too high a price to pay even for such a large 

amount of misinformation” (Garay, 1966: 197-199). 

A highly qualified ‘chef’, Hawkes wrote also on 

cooking, and published several popular books on this 

subject. Hawke’s first experience in Central America 

was in Belize, where he collected orchids in 1958. In 

1959 he came to Nicaragua and established a longlasting 

friendship with Heller, who very soon hired 

him to help him in his studies of Nicaraguan orchids. 

“My purpose was, of course, to see and collect orchids, 

and in this matter I was the guest of Mr. and Mrs. 

Alfonso H. Heller ...” (Hawkes, 1959). He continued 

traveling to this country and throughout Central 

and South America, and discovered, together with 

Heller, many new species, which were often named 

in their honor: Epidendrum goodspeedianum A.D. 

Hawkes, Epidendrum restrepoanum A.D. Hawkes, 

Epidendrum curtisii A.D. Hawkes, Epidendrum 

neocauliflorum A.D. Hawkes, Epidendrum 

vulcanicola A.H. Heller, Eurystyles borealis A.H. 

Heller, Kegeliella atropilosa L.O. Williams & A.H. 

Heller, Odontoglossum subcruciforme A.H. Heller. 

Pleurothallis lappiformis A. Heller & L.O. Williams, 

Pleurothallis exesilabia A.H. Heller & A.D. Hawkes, 

Pleurothallis carnosilabia A.H. Heller & A.D. 

Hawkes, Pleurothallis chontalensis A.H. Heller 

& A.D. Hawkes, Sobralia chatoensis A.H. Heller 

& A.D. Hawkes, Sobralia triandra A.H. Heller & 

A.D. Hawkes, Epidendrum hawkesii A.H. Heller, 

Eria hawkesii A.H. Heller, Oncidium hawkesianum 

Moir, Pleurothallis alexii A.H. Heller, Pleurothallis 

hawkesii Flickinger, Sobralia hawkesii A.H. 

Heller, Chondrorhyncha helleri Fowlie, Dressleria 

helleri Dodson, Lepanthes helleri A.D. Hawkes, 

Pleurothallis helleri A.D. Hawkes, Pleurothallis 

helleriana L.O. Williams, Sobralia helleri A.D. 

Hawkes, Stellilabium helleri L.O. Williams, and 

Vanilla helleri A.D. Hawkes. Hawkes described the 

new genera Helleriella and Hellerorchis, named in 

honor of his friend and patron. He died in Norbrook, 

Jamaica, where he had spent the last ten years of his 

life. During his years in Jamaica he wrote for the 

Jamaica Weekly Gleaner, conducted a radio program 

on gourmet coking, taught Portuguese at Priory 

School (he spoke six languages) and had become a 

reputable artist.


Clarence Klaus Horich: the last of the adventurers. 

Clarence Klaus Horich (1930-1994) (Fig. 59A) was 

born probably 100 years too late. His character, 

romantic and adventurous, bohemian and dreaming, 

belonged more to the XIX century than to the hard 

years of the European post-war. If we want to find a 

twin soul to Horich’s, we have to go back in time to 

re-discover his alter ego, George Ure Skinner [...], 

who explored Central America in the first half of the 

XIX century. [...] Horich dreamed sometimes with 

living from the orchids. More probably, the orchids 

ended living from him (Ossenbach, 2003: 47-48). 

After learning gardening in Lüdenscheid (Germany), 

Horich emigrated in 1951 to Canada (like so many 

other Germans who tried to escape the miseries of 

the destroyed Germany) and soon found employ in 

the orchid nursery of Albert Withers. It was Withers 

(who already had collected orchids in South America) 

who encouraged Horich to follow his steps (Bock, 

1994: 121). In 1953 he started on his first collecting 

expeditions, which led him to Mexico, Central America, 

Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia. He not only hunted 

for plants, but was also interested in living animals. 

He went after reptiles and snakes for the Canadian 

Stanley Park in Oaxaca and Chiapas and traveled 

during 11 months collecting orchids for the English 

firm of Sanders (Jenny, 2000: 21). In Central America, 

he collected intensively in El Salvador, Guatemala 

and Honduras, until he finally settled in Costa Rica in 

1957. In 1979 he became a Costa Rican citizen. He 

became a purveyor of living plants for many botanical 

gardens, among which we find those of the University 

of Heidelberg, Montreal, Vancouver, Missouri, Vienna, 

Berlin, Bonn, Hannover, Frankfurt and the Lankester 

Botanical Garden of the University of Costa Rica. 

According to Jenny (2007, pers. comm.), he charged 

between 5 and 10 Dollars for a good plant, and up to 

60 Dollars for rarities such as Coryanthes. In words of 

Dr. Hans-Georg Preissel, at that time director of the 

Botanical Garden in Hannover: “A botanical garden 

needs original material. Horich is for us one of these 

pioneers who has supplied the collections that make 

us attractive on an international level” (KRW, 1990). 

Nothing could stop him: he wasn’t afraid to cross 

the Reventazón River on precarious ferry cables, nor to 

cross the Gulf of Nicoya in a small boat with a crew 

of Coryanthes and ants (Horich, 1984). He didn’t have 

209 

to deal with phytosanitary certificates nor with CITES’ 

rules which would have been intolerable obstacles for 

somebody like Clarence Horich. Soon he started writing 

about the plants, the habitat and especially about his 

adventures on collecting trips. “Between 1953 and 1994 

he published more than 230 articles about orchids, and 

in spite of the fact that the reader had to sift carefully 

between facts and adventure, those articles contained the 

best descriptions of localities and habitats we have from 

Central America. I always found it was a real adventure 

to travel and collect with him; he was one of the best 

plant experts in Costa Rica and a day with him in the 

forest was something like a short and intensive course 

in botany and ecology. His private plant collection in 

his backyard in San José was better than most of the 

collections of Costa Rican plants in botanical gardens. 

He had an extremely good eye for small plants and he 

had a sixth sense where and how to find new things” 

(Jenny, 2000: 21). Horich was proud to have been 

the guide through Costa Rica’s forests of the world’s 

leading orchidologists of his time. Between 1960 and 

1965 he traveled through the most remote regions with 

Jack Fowlie and Cal Dodson. In later years he was the 

guide of Rebecca Northen, Rudolf Jenny, Eric Hágsater 

and Robert Dressler, among others. 

Rudolf Jenny honored Horich (with whom he had 

collected orchids in Costa Rica in 1976, 1980, 1984 and 

1986) with the dedication of a new genus: Horichia, 

with the type species Horichia dressleri. Many other 

species were dedicated to him: Cischweinfia horichii 

Senghas & T. Neudecker, Coryanthes horichiana Jenny, 

Epidendrum horichii Hágsater, Gongora horichiana 

Fowlie, Lepanthes horichii Luer, Maxillaria horichii 

Senghas, Mesospinidium horichii I. Bock, Mormodes 

horichii Fowlie, Pleurothallis horichii Luer, Stanhopea 

x horichiana Jenny, Telipogon horichianus Braas, and 

Teuscheria horichiana Jenny & Braem. Horich’s lifelong 

companion, Elcimey Baldizón, was honored by 

Hágsater with Epidendrum elcimeyae and by Braas & 

Horich with Telipogon elcimeyae. 

“It appears Jack Fowlie was a character and 

is sorely missed. The world is sorely lacking 

characters these days”. 

Anonymous 

“I practice medicine so I can afford to study orchids 

in their native habitats” (Hetherington, 1994: 5). Jack 


210 

A. Fowlie (1929-1993) (Fig. 59B), a family physician, 

was one of Horich’s best friends and visited him in 

Costa Rica on several occasions. His first expedition 

with Horich was in November of 1960, together with 

Noel Gauntlett, Jürgen Hansen and Glenn Hiatt, from 

the Los Angeles State & County Arboretum. Then they 

traveled again, this time to the region of Sarapiquí, 

together with Ralph Spencer. In one of his articles, 

Horich muses about Fowlie getting lost in the forest, 

loosing a valuable camera, climbing down a 50 meter 

vertical rock and finally coming out with a thick 

bundle of Pescatoria cerina (Horich, 1978). “Jack 

[...] had a busy practice when he was not traveling. 

He loved to talk about orchids and his travels, and he 

was never reluctant to give medical advice when on a 

trip or with orchid friends” (Hetherington, 2004: 288). 

His most valuable contribution to the orchid world was 

his excellent photography and his ability to write of 

his travels and of the species he observed. Clarence 

Horich collaborated with Fowlie collecting a great 

number of Lycaste species for the research that led to 

the publication of the latter’s most important work: 

The Genus Lycaste, its specification, distribution, 

literature and cultivation – a monographic revision 

(1970). In 1993, Oakeley actualized Fowlie’s work, 

bringing the genus to 45 species and changing some 

names (Oakeley, 1993). The following orchid species 

were dedicated to Fowlie: Cyrtopodium fowliei L.C. 

Menezes, Encyclia fowliei Duveen, Lycaste fowliei 

Oakeley, Paphiopedilum fowliei L.A. Birk, and 

Stanhopea × fowlieana Jenny. 

Most of these species were published in The Orchid 

Digest, the specialized journal of which Fowlie was 

the editor during many years. In the words of Eric 

Muehlbauer, “[..] the late Jack Fowlie had been its 

editor during the 80’s, maybe late 70’s... an incredible 

character. Had no grasp of written grammar and his 

own, very unique, ideas on Paphiopedilum taxonomy. 

That said, he was an incredibly productive writer who 

traveled to see slippers in situ, and got to know the 

people in the areas where they grew, and the people 

who collected them and grew them. His influence 

helped the Orchid Digest become and remain the great 

magazine that it still is” (Muehlbauer, 2006). “Typical 

of his extraordinary interest and drive, prior to his 

interest in orchid species he wrote a hardbound book, 

The Snakes of Arizona, in 1965. It is a fascinating 

LANKESTERIANA 


study, though I doubt that many orchid fanciers would 

say that they must see or have it” (Hetherington, 2004: 

289). 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez and the Lankester 

Botanical Garden 

“Those who dedicate too much time to 

orchids begin as orchidophiles, become soon 

orchidologists, and end as orchidiots...” 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez, during a lecture (1974) 

Schlechter had good reasons to dedicate Ramonia 

pulchella to the small village of San Ramón, which with 

a population of bearly 15,000, has produced more than 

its share of great biologists. Not satisfied with having 

Alberto M. Brenes and Guillermo Acosta among its 

prominent citizens, San Ramón gave birth in the early 

XX century to one of the most respected figures of 

Costa Rica’s scientific world: Rafael Lucas Rodríguez 

Caballero (1915-1981) (Fig. 59C). During one of 

his first visits to Costa Rica, Robert Dressler visited 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez in his office at the University 

of Costa Rica. As Dressler remembers: “After that, 

a visit to Costa Rica was incomplete without seeing 

‘don Rafa’, as friends and students called him. Quite 

aside from our mutual interest in orchids, I was at once 

impressed by his charm, his intellect and his linguistic 

skill” (Rodríguez et al, 1986: 10). 

Rafael Lucas received his first lessons from his 

mother, Emilia Caballero, who was a teacher in his 

home town. After finishing elementary school, he 

moved with his mother to the United States, where he 

began his high school studies, which he later finished 

at the ‘Liceo de Costa Rica’, one of the best schools of 

the capital. His friends at school called him “El Sabio” 

(= the wise man) because of his dedication to his 

studies. He stayed at the same ‘Liceo’ as an assistant for 

Natural History, Zoology and Botany. Blessed by the 

Muse of arts, he was also employed during those years 

in the workshop of the famous French sculptor Louis 

Ferón, where he developed his talents as a jeweller and 

illustrator. Years later he would design the great mural 

which Ferón crafted for the ‘Golden Room’, in San 

José’s old airport building. In 1942, shortly after the 

University of Costa Rica opened its doors, Rodríguez 

started his studies in biology at its School of Sciences, 

and in 1945 received a scholarship which allowed him


to continue his specialization in plant systematics at 

the University of California at Berkeley. His teacher 

was the famous Lincoln Constance, whose illustrious 

career at Berkeley spanned more than six decades 

and who wrote several years later: “Rafael was torn 

between a career as a professional biologist with strong 

interest in natural history or as an artist with a flair 

for graphic illustration. He was happiest when these 

interests coincided in the study of recurring patterns 

in living organisms” (Rodríguez et al., 1986: 14). 

Rodriguez’ doctoral dissertation was a comparative 

investigation of the Costa Rican tree Myrrhidendron, 

in relation to other woody Umbellales, profusely and 

beautifully illustrated by the author. This publication is 

still quoted widely years after his death. 

After returning to Costa Rica in 1953, Rodríguez was 

incorporated as a professor at the University of Costa 

Rica, where he was instrumental in the creation of a 

Department of Biology, and was appointed as its first 

director. Under his direction, the Department assumed 

custody of the University Herbarium (USJ), which 

had been founded in 1943. Today, the department has 

become the School of Biology and carries his name. 

Rodríguez contributed enormously to the development 

of the studies of biology in Costa Rica and was one 

of the first editors of the prestigious Revista de 

Biología Tropical. Again through his efforts, the first 

contacts between the University of Costa Rica and the 

Organization for Tropical Studies were established, 

a milestone in the history of nature conservation in 

the country. A many-faceted man, Rodríguez was a 

leader of the Boy Scout movement in Costa Rica, a 

passionate stamp collector, and combined his teaching 

in biology with singing in the University Choir. 

As his friend and fellow artist Francisco Amighetti 

wrote: “Like many scientists and artists, Rafael Lucas 

Rodríguez had the privilege of maturing intelectually 

while still preserving his childhood spirit intact”. 

Strongly interested in Orientalistim, he believed in a 

theosophical interpretation of nature and intended to 

form his students not only as biologists but as true 

humanists. His passion for botanical illustration led 

him to organize a special course for the School of Arts, 

which he called ‘watercolor painting for biologists’. 

It was because of his reputation as a botanical 

illustrator that Rodríguez first became interested 

in orchids. One day in the early 1960’s he was 

211 

approached by the well-known orchidologist Charles 

Lankester, who asked him to produce an illustration 

from a live orchid: it was a specimen of Pescatorea 

cerina (Lindl. & Paxton) Rchb. f. (Fig. 59D) which 

became the first of a large number of beautiful orchid 

watercolors. As Lincoln Constance said, his paintings 

were ‘artistically gorgeous but scientifically accurate’ 

(Rodríguez et al., 1986: 14). Rafael Lucas began in 

1966 his most ambitious project, a treatise with the title 

Orquídeas del Istmo Centroamericano, a manuscript 

that unfortunately was never published, of which large 

parts are still preserved in the archives of the Lankester 

Botanical Garden, and that began with the words, in 

Rafael Lucas’ characteristic calligraphy: “Central 

America is famous for the abundance and above all, 

the variety of its orchids” (Fig. 60A). 

It was for this project that Rafael Lucas began his 

series of illustrations, which reached the impressive 

number of 1,092. As Robert Dressler recalls, as time 

went on, his skill increased and it was easy to see 

which were the older paintings and which newer. Then 

he changed to a larger format, with the intention of 

redoing all of the earlier paintings, as flowers became 

available. However, many of the illustrations remained 

unfinished at the time of his death. What Rafael Lucas 

did not have was a good hand at cultivating orchids. 

As Dressler puts it: “He didn’t have a green thumb” 

(Rodríguez et al., 1986: 11). His office was usually 

decorated with the dying remains of many plants that 

his friends had brought in for him to paint. He was 

neither a field man. Luis D. Gómez, one of his pupils, 

tells us that he once had to drag his professor into the 

field, to admire a tree which was ladden with masses 

of flowering Trisetella triaristella (pers. comm, 2004). 

It is not clear why Rafael Lucas did not publish his 

work. He might have been a perfectionist, waiting 

to finish his series of paintings before comitting 

anything to press; he might also, being a specialist 

in other plant families, have felt somewhat insecure 

about Orchidaceae. According to L.D. Gómez, don 

Rafa always complained about the lack of literature, 

reference collections and time to travel and study type 

specimens. He never stopped studying: his notebooks 

are full of annotations and sketches, and he often 

pasted a photocopy of the original description of a 

species next to one of his detailed pencil sketches. 

In 1969, members of the Latin-American Committee 


212 

of Orchidology proposed to Miguel A. Ramírez the 

idea of founding a Costa Rican organization which 

should unite all those interested in the cultivation 

and conservation of orchids. Ramírez responded with 

enthusiasm and found immediate support from Rafael 

Lucas Rodríguez, Dorothy Lankester, daughter of 

Charles Lankester, who had recently passed away, and 

Roy Lent. The first meeting of the group was held in a 

classroom at the School of Biology of the University 

of Costa Rica on May 16, 1970, and in July of that 

same year the Costa Rican Orchid Society (Asociación 

Costarricense de Orquideología, or A.C.O.) was 

officially constituted, with Miguel A. Ramírez as 

its first president. And here the links of history can 

be easily understood: it was Lankester who seduced 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez into the world of orchids when 

he first asked him to paint Pescatoria cerina. And it 

was one of the main purposes of A.C.O. to save ‘El 

Silvestre’, the orchid garden of Charles Lankester and 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez who made the international 

contacts and organized a network of institutions that 

eventually provided the funds to buy the property and 

donate it to the University of Costa Rica. On March 2, 

1973, Rafael Lucas had the satisfaction of giving the 

opening address during the official inauguration of the 

Lankester Botanical Garden (Fig. 60B). 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez was not only a great biologist 

and a convinced humanist, he was also a man of charm 

and humor. Robert Dressler, his friend and admirer, 

remembers an episode which describes vividly Rafael 

Lucas’ character: “In one major botanical congress, 

we learned that Dr. Rodríguez was to present an afterdinner 

speech on Recent advances in Algology. None 

of us knew him to be interested in algae, and there was 

much speculation on the subject of the speech, but Don 

Rafa smilingly evaded all leading questions. When 

the time came, the speech had little to do with algae. 

Rather, he went back to the Greek, algos = ‘pain’, and 

laid the foundations for a new science, the study of 

pain and more specifically, the pain caused by sitting 

on hard chairs in classrooms and auditoria, listening to 

poorly prepared, or overly long lectures illustrated by 

blurry or upside-down slides. The talk was charming, 

erudite and very funny. No one suffered the slightest 

pain on that occasion” (Rodríguez et al., 1986: 10). 

Rafael Lucas was instrumental in Dressler’s early 

interest in Costa Rican orchids, as it becomes clear 

LANKESTERIANA 


when one reads through their mutual correspondence. 

In 1977 Rafael Lucas was awarded the highest 

academic honor of the country: the ‘Magón’, National 

Award for Cultural Achievement, as a recognition of 

his extraordinary contributions to botanical science. 

In the same year, the lagoons of Palo Verde, in the 

province of Guanacaste, were declared as a Wildlife 

Refuge under the name Refugio Nacional de Fauna 

Silvestre Rafael Lucas Rodríguez Caballero (today 

part of the Palo Verde National Park). In 1979, an 

exhibit of his botanical illustrations was staged at the 

Museum of Botany and the Arts at the Marie Selby 

Botanical Garden in Sarasota, Florida. 

On some occasions, Rafael Lucas painted orchids 

without realizing that they were species new to science, 

and which were later, in many cases, dedicated to him. 

This was the case with Epidendrum rafael-lucasii 

Hágsater, Lepanthes rafaeliana Pupulin, Masdevallia 

rafaeliana Luer, Encyclia ossenbachiana Pupulin, and 

Maxillaria rodrigueziana J.T. Atwood & Mora-Ret. 

Shortly before his death, in 1980, his paintings were 

exhibited at the National Museum in San José. In 1986, 

the University of Costa Rica published a beautiful 

volume, authored by Dora E. Mora, María E. Barahona 

and Norris H. Williams, with some texts from Dr. 

Rodríguez, featuring 143 of the most beautiful orchid 

paintings by Rafael Lucas, under the name of Géneros 

de Orquídeas de Costa Rica (Rodríguez et al., 1986). 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez passed away on January 

29, 1981, after a long disease. We leave the final 

words to Francisco Amighetti, Robert Dressler and 

Rudolf Jenny: “A good man in the broadest sense of 

the word … [his paintings] are a wonderful tool for 

anyone studying the orchids of Costa Rica, and their 

value will only increase as the availability of orchids 

in their natural habitat diminishes everywhere.… 

Dr. Rodríguez death was a tragedy, and we can only 

imagine what he might have done with another ten or 

twenty years of life… that charm and intellect that was 

Don Rafa can never be replaced…An extraordinarely 

friendly person, a true gentleman and artist ” 

(Rodríguez et al., 1986: 11). 

Unfortunately, only about 150 of Rafael Lucas’ 

1,092 illustrations were recovered by the University 

of Costa Rica, mainly those that were used for the 

publication of his book. The rest remained in the hands 

of his family. The largest part of the legacy of Costa

A 

B 

C 


Figure 60. A — First paragraph of Rodriguez’s Orchids of the Central American Isthmus. Courtesy of Lankester Botanical 

Garden, University of Costa Rica. B — Rafael Lucas Rodríguez inaugurating the Lankester Botanical Garden on March 

2, 1973. Courtesy of Ricardo Lankester. C — Rebecca Northen (third from left) with her husband, Charles Lankester, and 

one of Lankester daughters, during a visit to Costa Rica. Courtesy of James Watson, American Orchid Society. 

213 


214 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

C D 

Figure 61. A — Dora Emilia Mora de Retana (1940-2001). In Dressler, 2001: 1076. B — Joaquín Bernardo García Castro 

(1944-2001). Courtesy of Eduado Bitter. C — Marie Selby (1885-1971). Courtesy of Wesley Higgins, Marie Selby 

Botanical Gardens. D — The Marie Selby Botanical Gardens. In Luer, 1983: 13. 


B


Rica’s most important orchid illustrator is therefore 

still unknown to the scientific community. Rafael 

Lucas named Odontoglossum hortensiae in 1979 in 

honor of his wife Hortensia Sevilla. 

Rebecca Tyson Northen (1911-2004) (Fig. 60C) 

played a vital role in the future preservation of 

Lankester Garden in Costa Rica, an institution that has 

become the leading research station for Orchidaceae 

in our region. She had made the acquaintance of 

Charles Lankester in the 1950s and was the leader of 

the campaign that led to the purchase of the garden 

by the Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust and the 

American Orchid Society, to be later donated to the 

University of Costa Rica. Unquestionable one of the 

most recognizable and popular personalities in the 

orchid community, Rebecca was friend and educator 

to countless individuals throughout our fraternity. A 

trained biologist, Rebecca traveled extensively with her 

husband Henry in Central and South America, studying 

and collecting orchids in the wild (Anonymous, 2004: 

410). During the 1st World Orchid Conference, held in 

St. Louis, Missouri, in 1951, Gordon Dillon introduced 

her as “the mother and father of beginning orchid 

growers” (Watson, 2002: 12). 

Myth and reality: Costa Rica during the years of 

Dora E. Mora and Joaquín García. Dora Emilia 

Mora de Retana (1940-2001) (Fig. 61A) was for 

many years, after Rafael Lucas Rodríguez, the only 

Costa Rican orchidologist with a scientific training in 

Botany. She went her first steps in the field of Botany 

at the side of don Rafael Lucas. Soon however she 

began to shine with her own light until she became this 

almost mythical figure (although often controversial, 

especially because of her almost dictatorial way to 

conduct the affairs at Lankester Garden) that we will 

always remember. With the blessing of Rafael Lucas 

Rodríguez, she took over as Director of the Lankester 

Garden in the year of 1979, and kept that post until she 

retired in the year 2000. During the 22 years in which 

she was the Director, Dora Emilia had the merit of 

converting Lankester Garden in an obligatory meeting 

point for orchidologists from all over the world who 

visited Costa Rica. Slowly but surely, the Lankester 

Botanical Garden was transformed from a small farm 

of 10,7 hectares to a botanical garden of world fame. 

To the old farm of Charles Lankester came important 

215 

scientists such as Calaway Dodson, Robert Dressler, 

Carlyle Luer, Eric Hágsater, John Atwood, Rudolf 

Jenny, Henry Oakeley and many others. Knowledge 

about Costa Rican orchids increased enormously: 

Ames, in 1937, had registered for Costa Rica 133 

genera and 959 species (Standley, 1937). In the Lista 

actualizada de las orquídeas de Costa Rica (1992), 

published by Dora Emilia Mora and Joaquín García, 

these numbers increased to 179 genera and 1,416 

species. 

From 1984 on, Dora Emilia organized courses in 

orchidology at the University of Costa Rica. The first of 

these courses was given by Dr. Robert L. Dressler, who 

at the request of Dora Emilia spent several months in 

Costa Rica as an invited professor. The projects which 

resulted from the collaboration between Dora Emilia 

and Dr. John T. Atwood where the most important 

contributions to the international projection of the name 

of the Lankester Botanical Garden. Together with him 

she published fascicles 15 and 16 of Icones Plantarum 

Tropicarum, on the orchids of Costa Rica (1992-93), 

and the treatise about Maxillariinae y Oncidiinae in the 

Flora Costaricensis of the Field Museum of Chicago 

(1999). Her friends were always loyal and dedicated 

five new species to Dora Emilia Mora de Retana. 

Eric Hágsater named in her honor Epidendrum moraretanae, 

Günter Gerlach Kefersteinia retanae, Robert 

Dressler Sobralia doremiliae, Carlyle Luer Stelis 

morae and Calaway Dodson and Rodrigo Escobar 

Telipogon retanarum.Dora Emilia Mora de Retana’s 

scientific contributions remained on a domestic level. 

Her greatest achievement was to maintain during long 

years a botanical garden amidst enormous financial 

difficulties and to convert it into a research center 

to which she was able to attract the world’s leading 

orchidologists. 

The year 2001 was not a good one: barely six weeks 

after the death of Dora Emilia, Dr. Joaquín Bernardo 

García Castro (1944-2001) (Fig. 61B) passed away 

in San José. A good friend and collaborator of Dora 

Emilia Mora, we read about him in the words of 

Jorge Warner: “Dr. García had a great influence on 

the development of orchid cultivation as a hobby. He 

was always willing to share his knowledge with the 

beginners. He was a master among the orchid growers, 

who listened carefully as he explained, with in-depth 

experience and in a very simple form, such complicated 


216 

items as the biochemistry of the color of the flowers 

or the genetic basics for the production of orchid 

hybrids. As a member of the Asociación Costarricense 

de Orquideología (A.C.O.) and especially during his 

two terms as its President (August 1986 - July 1988 

and August 1991 - July 1992), Dr. García was known 

for his ability to promote, during a period when orchid 

hybrids were very popular, the cultivation and study 

of the native species” (Warner, 2002: 1). Joaquín 

García had a prodigious memory. From John Atwood 

we have these words: “I do not have the brains of 

Joaquín; therefore I need a well-organized library” 

(Warner, 2002: 1). Eduardo Bitter, his life-long friend, 

remembers Joaquín García’s many-sided culture: 

“Though his insatiable thirst for knowledge and his 

immense intellectual capacity, he was an expert in 

many fields: plastic arts, music, theatre, literature, 

and many others” (Bitter, 2002: 3). And again Jorge 

Warner: “Joaquín was always a great friend of the 

Lankester Botanical Garden. In fulfillment of his last 

wish, his ashes are buried, since September 22 [2001] 

besides a tree that was planted in his honor in the 

Garden. With his and Dora Emilia’s death, six weeks 

earlier, we closed a chapter in the recent history of 

Costa Rica’s orchidology” (Warner, 2002: 2). Together 

with Dora Emilia Mora he published a half dozen of 

new species and combinations. Franco Pupulin named 

in his honor Prosthechea joaquingarciana. 

The Marie Selby Botanical Gardens. When Marie 

Selby (1885-1971) (Fig. 61C) was still young, her 

family moved to Marietta, Ohio where her father 

studied geology and developed oil-drilling equipment. 

The family frequently went on camping and hiking 

trips, creating in Marie a strong love of nature at a 

young age. Marie met and married William Selby 

(1884-1956), a partner with his father in the Selby Oil 

and Gas Company (later to become Texaco Oil). They 

were wed on January 31, 1908 in Marietta, Ohio. One 

of their first shared interests was automobile racing, and 

subsequently Marie became the first American woman 

to cross the USA by car. William Selby enjoyed fishing 

and had visited Sarasota before his marriage. When 

he brought his wife to the west coast of Florida, they 

purchased seven acres of land bordering on Sarasota 

Bay and Hudson Bayou. They built a Spanish-style 

house and lived a quiet life enjoying nature, gardening 

LANKESTERIANA 


and boating. Marie was a charter member of Sarasota’s 

first garden club, the Founders’ Circle (Marie Selby 

Botanical Gardens, 2006). 

William Selby died on 4 December 1956, after setting 

up the William B. and Marie Selby Foundation for the 

community of Sarasota. This Foundation continues 

to fund many important education and community 

projects, although it is in no way connected to Selby 

Gardens except by name alone. After William’s death, 

Marie lived quietly in their home until her death on 9 

June 1971. In her will, she left their remaining major 

asset, the bayside property, “for the enjoyment of the 

general public” as a botanical garden. The first trustees 

of the Gardens decided to create a tropically oriented 

botanical garden with a strong research department. 

Research was prioritized because it was considered 

a means of bringing attention very quickly to a new 

botanical garden. Further, taxonomy was selected as 

the initial focus because it was thought that this work 

was relatively inexpensive (ironically, in today’s world 

of DNA and gene mapping, taxonomy has become 

one of the most expensive scientific pursuits). Selby 

Foundation funded the purchase of the botanical 

library, an essential gift that enabled the research 

program to flourish. 

Dr. Cal Dodson, orchid biologist from University of 

Miami, was the first director of Selby Gardens. Mrs. 

Selby’s physician, Dr. Carlyle Luer, also a renowned 

orchid specialist, went to Ecuador to interview and 

persuade Dr. Dodson to take on the leadership of Selby 

Gardens. Despite the fact that Mrs. Selby was a lover of 

roses, a mission specializing on epiphytes was chosen 

because the group represented approximately 20% 

of all flowering plants, and many (like orchids) were 

spectacular to display. Development of the Gardens 

began in March 1972 with landscaping based on a 

plan from the Department of Landscape Architecture 

at the University of Florida, and with construction of 

greenhouses. Selby Gardens was officially opened to 

the public on 7 July, 1975. In a very short span of time, 

Selby Gardens came a long way (Anonymous, 1977: 1) 

(Fig. 61D). In its first 30 years, the research program has 

grown, evolved, and diversified. There are three major 

components to the research program: orchid research, 

bromeliad research, and canopy ecology (the latter 

representing the habitat where these epiphytes live). 

Other tropical botanical topics of study are still part


of Selby’s research component, but these three are the 

most internationally recognized. The orchid program 

has featured many world renowned orchidologists 

over Selby’s 30 years, and will hope to expand in the 

next 25 years to reflect the new directions of genetic 

research and conservation biology. The bromeliad 

identification center has grown to become the world’s 

foremost site for taxonomic work on this small albeit 

unique epiphytic plant family. Only in the past 20 

years has Selby become renown for canopy ecology. 

In addition to housing epiphytes, the forest canopy 

is reputed to house over half of the species on Earth. 

This importance of canopy science has expanded as 

a consequence of the critical global needs to survey 

this habitat before deforestation practices result in its 

disappearance. 

The research department boasts several valuable 

collections. Since many orchids, bromeliads and 

other epiphytes are no longer common in the wild, 

the collections de Selby have become a valuable 

global resource. These collections include a herbarium 

(dried “library” of pressed plants) numbering over 

80,000; a spirit collection of orchids (flowers of the 

orchid family preserved in jars of alcohol so as to 

retain their three-dimensional qualities); a specialized 

library of botanical volumes; slides and video 

collections of tropical plant-related visuals; botanical 

files in the Orchid Identification and Bromeliad 

Identification Centers; and live collections of tropical 

plants in the greenhouses. Of special importance, 

the herbarium boasts approximately 1,200 type 

specimens, which represent the first collection of a 

new species. In 2000, the research department was 

restructured to better serve the needs of an expanding 

and dynamic program over the next 25 years. The 

research department is expanding. Over 30 years, a 

proportionally high number of distinguished botanists 

have worked for and contributed to Selby’s research 

program. Tropical research has been conducted in 

Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Costa Rica, Panama, Belize, 

Samoa, Australia, Malaysia, and Cameroon as well as 

Florida. Important events, such as the first and second 

International Canopy Conferences (1994 and 1998), 

the First International Epiphyte Conference (1991), 

and the Orchid Conservation Workshop (1997), have 

been hosted here. Important publications such as 

the Icones Plantarum Tropicarum (a field guide to 

217 

orchids); Selbyana (the Gardens’ journal that features 

articles on epiphytes and other tropical plants, and 

canopy biology); and most recently a new local series 

of Florida floral field guides have been produced by 

Selby scientists. The official Selby Botanical Gardens 

Press, which oversees all publications of the Gardens, 

was launched in 2000. 

Three new species of orchids, Erythrodes selbyana 

Dodson, Telipogon selbyanus N.H. Williams & 

Dressler, and Coryanthes selbyana Archila were 

named in honor of the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens. 

The Marie Selby Botanical Gardens have collaborated 

closely, since the early 1990’s, with the Lankester 

Botanical Garden of the University of Costa Rica, and 

have made the Central American region one of their 

main research areas. 

The Flora Mesoamericana 

That you are ‘jefe’ of this part of the 

program [the orchids] is welcome news. 

Ed Greenwood in a letter 

to R. Dressler, May 18, 1983 

The first major regional flora ever written in Spanish, 

Flora Mesoamericana is a collaborative effort of the 

Missouri Botanical Garden, the Instituto de Biología 

of the National Autonomous University of Mexico 

(UNAM), the Natural History Museum, London, and 

numerous specialists world-wide. In Spanish, the 

Flora pretends to describe, for the first time, all the 

vascular plants growing in the southeasternmost (sic) 

states of Mexico (including the Yucatán Peninsula) and 

all the Central American republics. 

The idea of the Flora Mesoamericana was promoted 

by Peter H. Raven, Director of the Missouri Botanical 

Garden, who since 1972 has actively promoted the 

concept of a Central American Flora. In that year, 

Raven organized a meeting, in conjunction with the 

XIX Annual Symposium of Systematics, to discuss the 

feasibility of the project. Although a general agreement 

was reached regarding the necessity and usefulness 

of the project, most among those attending though 

that the time was not ripe to begin with it. One of the 

main reasons to doubt that it was the right moment to 

start with this project was that the Flora of Guatemala 

and the Flora of Panama had not yet been finished. In 

1979, after the conclusion of the Flora of Guatemala 


218 

(1977) and the imminent publication of the last parts 

of the Flora of Panama, a much broader infrastructure 

was created, enough to begin with a more extense 

treatment of the flora of the region. On these bases, 

Raven, together with José Sarukhán K., then Director 

of the Instituto de Biología of the National Autonomous 

University of Mexico, and John F.M. Cannon, Curator 

of Botany of the British Museum (Natural History), as 

it was called at that time, proposed a floristic project, 

even more ambitious, that should cover not only Central 

America, but also the tropical regions of Mexico, this is, 

the most important part of the tropical areas of the North 

American continent. These three institutions became the 

organizers of the Flora Mesoamericana project. 

However, there were still doubts and criticisms, at 

least amongst the orchidologists. It is interesting to 

follow an exchange of letters between Ed Greenwood 

and Robert Dressler regarding the subject of the Flora 

Mesoamericana. “Missouri Botanical Garden is trying 

to organize a new “Flora Mesoamericana” and have 

asked me for an outline of the orchids, with possible 

contributors. I will give them your name, as well as 

Eric [Hágsater] and several others from Mexico. 

I don’t know how much we can do, but it could be 

an interesting project” (Dressler to Greenwood, 

December 2, 1980). “The “Flora Mesoamericana” 

project seems dubious to me. Louis Williams reported 

that the plan is to cover the area from about the Isthmus 

of Tehuantepec through Panama, using descriptions of 

not over 100 words and minimum references. Only 5 

years are to be allowed for completion and a rather 

small amount of money, which I have forgotten for 

the moment. The descriptions appear too brief to 

serve for more than aids to determination, and in view 

of almost everyone’s findings on the richness of the 

flora and the poor state of knowledge, the result will 

be vulnerable to criticism such as yours of Williams 

and Allen “Orchids of Panama”, which covered only 

about half of the species present. Of course we will 

help in any way we can if Pete Raven asks us. I fear 

that there will be gaps in Nicaragua and El Salvador” 

(Greenwood to Dressler, December 11, 1980). “I agree 

with all your criticisms of the Flora Mesoamericana 

project. [...] There was a meeting just a couple of years 

ago in which everyone said “we’re not ready”, but 

Missouri has decided to go ahead, anyway. The project 

is not without some botanical imperialism, and has left 

LANKESTERIANA 


some ill feelings locally” (Dressler [from Panama] to 

Greenwood, January 9, 1981). “Eric [Hágsater] has put 

my name, and those of several other amateurs on the 

list of contributors. I don’t really object to this, though 

I have some misgivings about doing a full flora of an 

area so little explored ...” (Greenwood to Dressler, May 

18, 1983). And finally: “I don’ really know what to say 

about the Flora Mesoamericana. Like yourself, I feel 

very far from the herbaria here, and field work is both 

more fun and, I think, more urgent right now. [...] I 

really don’t want to get bogged down in floristic work. 

This is a poor place to do it, and the institute [Dressler 

was at the time working at the Smithsonian Tropical 

Research Institute ] has very little interest in this kind 

of work. I really don’t see much hope of doing a decent 

treatment of the Central American orchids in the near 

future. I realize that I haven’t answered your questions. 

The thing is that I don’t have any answers” (Dressler to 

Greenwood, July 20, 1983). 

Notwithstanding, the project went ahead, and 

Dressler kept his position of editor for Orchidaceae. 

The initial time frame was never maintained. 25 years 

after the meeting in Missouri, several volumes have 

been published, but the Orchidaceae are still waiting. 

Fritz Hamer and the orchids of El Salvador and 

Nicaragua. Fritz Hamer (1912-2004) (Fig. 62A), who 

passed away recently, the most prominent and maybe 

the only real expert on the orchids of El Salvador and 

Nicaragua during the second half of the XX century, 

was the last of a long list of German collectors and 

scientists who played a relevant role in the history of 

Central American orchidology. Fritz Hamer was born 

in Hamburg, Germany, on November 22, 1912, where 

he grew up and received his education in business in a 

Dutch-owned export company. In 1936 his company 

sent him to Venezuela and a year later to Guatemala, 

where the onset of World War II found him. In 1942 

he was repatriated to Germany, where he served in the 

Army during the campaign against Russia. At the end 

of the war he went back to Guatemala for a short period 

of time and established himself later in El Salvador, 

where he formed a successful company which imported 

and distributed machinery and equipment, and which 

still exists (Douglass, 1980: 19). 

Rebecca T. Northen, in a letter to F. Hamer, 

congratulated him to his work: “This is a most


remarkable achievement, a real work of love. To search 

out the orchids remaining in a country so denuded of 

forest – to find what is left, and put them on record 

– must have been a tremendous task. And to make 

anatomical drawings of all, and photographs of most 

[species], was, I know, a painstaking task. I admire 

you for doing it, and appreciate the results” (Kennedy, 

1977: 212). 

His interest in orchids started relatively late in life. 

Around 1960, someone gave him a Miltonia which 

caught his artistic eye and led to his first orchid drawing. 

He began exploring the country in search of orchids, 

which he cultivated patiently, preparing photographs, 

illustrations and descriptions. Hamer soon discovered 

the lack of adequate bibliography about the orchids of 

his adoptive country. After Standley’s and Calderón’s 

Preliminary list of the plants of El Salvador (1925), 

in which 63 species of orchids in 28 genera were 

described, nothing else had been published about the 

orchid flora of the country. Motivated by this, Hamer, 

who had already published a few articles on the 

orchids of the country, began in 1971 the preparation 

of his fundamental work The Orchids of El Salvador, 

whose first two volumes were published in 1974 by the 

Ministry of Education of El Salvador. 279 species in 67 

genera were described. Hamer, who had no scientific 

background in the natural sciences, received valuable 

help in this and all future works from Leslie A. Garay, 

who became a mentor and friend for the rest of Hamer’s 

life. Social and political unrest, which led later to civil 

war, made Hamer abandon El Salvador and move to 

Florida, where he became part of the scientific staff of 

the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens. It was there where 

he published, in 1981, the third volume of his work, 

bringing the number of Salvadorian orchids to 362 

species in 93 genera. 

When Alphonse Heller died in Nicaragua, all of his 

drawings, descriptions, color slides and specimens of 

dried plants of Orchidaceae, as well as a large and valuable 

library, were donated by Christiane Heller to the Marie 

Selby Botanical Gardens, then under the directorship of 

Dr. Calaway H. Dodson. The donation was made with 

the understanding that arrangements would be made to 

use Heller’s work for a publication and Dodson invited 

Hamer, who still resided in El Salvador, to have a look at 

Heller’s material. Then there was another development. 

The Missouri Botanical Garden had committed itself to 

219 

preparing a Flora de Nicaragua, in cooperation with 

the University of Managua, and Hamer was asked to 

take over the family of orchids within that Flora. With 

Heller’s material as a base, Hamer visited the herbaria 

at Kew, the Field Museum in Chicago, the Escuela 

Agrícola Panamericana at “El Zamorano” in Honduras, 

at Managua and at the University of Michigan, finding 

that there was more material available from former 

expeditions to Nicaragua. Fascicle seven of the first 

series of Icones Plantarum Tropicarum, edited by 

Dodson, which contained the first 100 descriptions and 

illustrations by Hamer on the orchids of Nicaragua, 

was published in 1982. During the next years, Hamer 

published 500 additional plates for the Icones (Hamer, 

1982-1985). 

Thus it was again Hamer who filled a void in 

the bibliography of the orchids of Central America. 

Since the doubtful ‘Flora nicaragüense’ of Miguel 

Ramírez Goyena (1909), in which 94 species were 

listed, nothing else had ever been published about 

the orchidaceous flora of that country. Between 1988 

and 1990 Hamer published in the scientific journal 

Selbyana (Vol. 10 and 11) his Orchids of Central 

America – an Illustrated Field Guide, in which he 

reproduced all his illustrations of the orchids of the 

region, although without descriptions. The project 

of the Flora de Nicaragua of the Missouri Botanical 

Garden became finally a reality in 2001, and again it 

was Hamer, already 89 years of age, who authored 

the chapter on Orchidaceae, describing 587 species in 

144 genera. A fundamental author for the knowledge 

of the orchids of our region, Hamer collaborated also 

with Dr. Carlyle A. Luer translating into German the 

seven volumes of Thesaurus Dracularum (1988-1994) 

and the first six volumes of A Treasure of Masdevallia 

(1996-2001). During his life, Hamer published 14 

new species and 9 new combinations of Orchidaceae: 

Bulbophyllum bandischii Garay, Hamer & Siegerist, 

Bulbophyllum burfordiense Garay, Hamer & Siegerist, 

Bulbophyllum fraudulentum Garay, Hamer & Siegerist, 

Bulbophyllum kegelii Hamer & Garay, Cyrtopodium 

punctatum Lindl. var. salvadorense Hamer & Garay, 

Dichaea muricatoides Hamer & Garay, Epidendrum 

glumarum Hamer & Garay, Isochilus aurantiacus 

Hamer & Garay, Isochilus pitalensis Hamer & 

Garay, Neo-urbania nicaraguensis Hamer & 

Garay, Mormodes × salvadorensis Hamer & Garay, 


220 

Oncidium cheirophorum Rchb.f. var. exauriculatum 

Hamer & Garay, Synarmosepalum kettridgei Garay, 

Hamer & Siegerist, Beloglottis ecallosa (Ames & C. 

Schweinf.) Hamer & Garay, Calanthe calanthoides 

(Rich. & Galeotti) Hamer & Garay, Cirrhopetalum 

gusdorfii (J. J. Sm.) Garay, F. Hamer & E. S. Siegerist, 

Eltroplectris roseoalba (Rchb.f.) Hamer & Garay, 

Encyclia dickinsoniana (Withner) Hamer, Epidendrum 

pseudopygmaea (Finet) Hamer & Garay, Miltonioides 

pauciflora (L. O. Williams) Hamer & Garay, 

Neolehmannia curvicolumna (Ames, F. T. Hubb. & 

C. Schweinf.) Hamer, and Scaphyglottis minuta (A. 

Rich. & Galeotti) Hamer & Garay. Other species 

were described based on collections by Hamer and 

dedicated to him: Beloglottis hameri Garay, Pelexia 

hameri Garay, and Ponthieva hameri Dressler. 

Hamer was married for 42 years to Hedwig Pfister, 

a neurologist, to whom he dedicated one of the new 

species he had discovered: Maxillaria hedwigiae 

Hamer & Dodson. He had three sons, one of which 

was murdered in 2003 by kidnappers in El Salvador. 

Overwhelmed by this tragedy, which cast a shadow 

over the last months of his life, Fritz Hamer passed 

away in Sarasota, Florida, on January 13, 2004. His 

extensive library was donated by his wife Hedwig to 

the Botanical Garden of La Laguna, in San Salvador. 

The orchid collection of the Garden was named, in 

2005, “Fritz Hamer Orchid Collection”. 

Guatemala: the heirs of Baron von Tuerckheim . 

Otto Tinschert (1915-2006) (Fig. 62B), a giant in the 

history of the orchidology of Guatemala, passed away 

on May 16, 2006, at the age of 91. ‘Don Otto’ had been 

born in Ottendorf, near the German Atlantic Coast, on 

March 2, 1915. In love with the sea since his youth, he 

studied at the Navy Academy at Stralsund and in 1936 

sailed around the world on board of school ship ‘Gorch 

Fock’ and visited Guatemala, falling immediately in 

love with the country, as he liked to tell. As an officer, 

he served in the German Navy during World War II, 

commanding a submarine during the last years of the 

conflict. During the difficult post-war years, he found 

work with a relative, who imported cotton, and became 

soon an expert in the determination of the quality of the 

fiber. After being sent to Nicaragua to select cotton that 

was to be exported to Germany, he received an offer 

to work in that country and accepted, “thinking that I 

LANKESTERIANA 


would be near Guatemala”. While attending a meeting 

of Central American cotton producers, he met Mr. José 

Quezada, from Guatemala, who convinced him to work 

in his plantations. Thus he came to Guatemala in 1957, 

with his wife and two young children, to live in a small 

house amidst the cotton plantations of Retalhuleu. The 

third of his sons was born this same year in Guatemala 

City. While working in Guatemala’s southern coast, he 

began to admire the native orchids and started a small 

collection in his garden. He always told that “after 

killing enough of them” he finally understood that 

he had to learn how to grow them, and wrote to his 

relatives in Germany to send him a book on orchids. 

This was the beginning of his life-long romance with 

these plants.He established himself permanently in 

Guatemala, traveling after that only to Germany for his 

yearly visits to his relatives and the reunions with his 

old submarine crew. In a small VW beetle he traveled 

throughout Guatemala on difficult dirt roads, eager to 

learn about the culture of the many Mayan tribes and 

to admire the ruins of their magnificent architecture. 

Interested in the enormous genetic potential that 

he saw in the native orchids of his collection, he 

soon learned to grow them from seed, improvising a 

small laboratory and constructing his own equipment, 

which later included a home-made laminar flow 

hood. Thus he began the first important line of 

work for which he became well-known, producing 

a great number of hybrids, many of which received 

important AOS awards and became commercially 

important in the United States. When his laboratory 

facilities improved, he began what would become 

his main interest in life: the reproduction from 

seed of especially interesting native species, which 

were threatened by extinction. His first big success 

was Lycaste skinneri var. alba (‘The White Nun’), 

Guatemala’s National Flower, which today is 

almost impossible to find in nature. Most plants of 

this species which are currently cultivated came 

from Otto’s laboratory. Disappointed by the tragic 

situation of the deforestation in Guatemala, and with 

little hope of detaining it, he began, with a small 

group of interested friends, to promote the creation 

of a National Botanical Garden, which could fill in 

the voids in the areas of research, study, sustainable 

use and conservation of the country’s flora. He 

worked arduously towards this ideal, convincing


and motivating universities, foundations and other 

organizations. This idea, which was first born in 

Otto’s mind, is still being discussed, with some hope 

of it becoming reality. In the same field, he worked in 

Petén, a region whose forests were heavily exploited 

for wood, trying to rescue the enormous numbers 

of plants of orchids and other interesting epiphytes, 

which are left to rot after the large felled trees are 

cleaned off their branches, before transporting them 

to the sawmills. For this project he obtained the 

support of the Armed Forces, who allowed him to 

plant the rescued plants on the trees of a forest at an 

Air Force base. The Air Force would also contribute 

with labor and the logging companies were expected 

to bring from the mountains everything that grew 

on the trunks of the trees and was usually left over. 

Although the loggers initially accepted, they never 

kept their part of the deal. 

In recognition for his conservation efforts, Otto 

Tinschert was in 1999 presented by the President of 

Guatemala, Álvaro Arzú Irigoyen, with the Presidential 

Medal of the Environment. Franco Pupulin named a 

new Guatemalan species in his honor: Kefersteinia 

tinschertiana (2004), now also found in Mexico. He was 

a mentor to many students interested in the cultivation 

of orchids and the methods of reproduction of these 

plants. He was always willing to share his knowledge 

and to collaborate with persons or institutions who 

asked him for help, Tinschert co-authored with Moisés 

Béhar the book Guatemala y sus Orquídeas (1999), 

destined to bring to the wide public the beauty of the 

local native species. In the international field, Otto 

was a member of the Conservation Committee of the 

American Orchid Society and of the Mesoamerican 

Orchid Specialist Group of the International Union for 

the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). He participated in 

several World Orchid Conferences. 

He was a hard worker, an honest man and an 

enthusiastic and joyful person, beloved by all who 

knew him. He loved living in Guatemala and had 

bought, long years ago, an old abandoned corn field, 

without trees except for one old avocado. Otto planted 

over 3,000 trees and built his home. In the meantime the 

property lies in Guatemala’s most exclusive residential 

area and the house, in the midst of forests and gardens, 

is truly what Otto called “my home-made paradise”. 

There he spent his last years, in the company of friends 

221 

and relatives who loved him, growing his orchids and 

helping the young beginners as much as he could. This 

was undoubtedly his best legacy (Béhar & Ossenbach, 

2006: 490). 

Otto Mittelstaedt (1919-2000) (Fig. 62C), was “an 

extraordinary man and a beautiful person, who helped 

more than anyone to the knowledge of the orchids 

of Guatemala” (In the words of Moisés Behar, his 

close friend). He was the son of the German Paul 

von Mittelstaedt and Emilia Villegas, a Spaniard. His 

father came to Guatemala in 1896, from the port of 

Kiel, and began to work, together with countrymen 

who had established themselves earlier, in the growing 

of coffee. Mittelstaedt was born in Cobán, Guatemala, 

on April 19, 1919. He went to Grammar and High 

School at the German High School of the capital. 

Shortly after finishing High School he married Maria 

Concepción Sobalvarro, and moved with his wife to 

live and work in a coffee plantation that had been 

bought by his mother in the coffee region of southern 

Guatemala. Working with the energy and enthusiasm 

that were his traits, together with his wife and hand in 

hand with the workers, he transformed the property in 

a short period of time in one of the most productive 

and best organized coffee plantations of the country. 

In the 1980’s, with the coffee plantation that he had 

inherited from his mother in full production and in a 

good financial situation, but yet still in the prime of 

his life, he returned to his native and beloved Cobán 

to dedicate himself to his passion for orchids, leaving 

the coffee plantation to his sons. Cobán, capital city of 

the department of Alta Verapaz, lies in a region with a 

high level of humidity and altitudes which range from 

3,000 meters to sea level. “In Cobán it rains during 13 

months of the year”, say its inhabitants. Mountainous 

and with such a variety of climates, it is the region 

with the largest density and diversity of orchids in 

Guatemala. Through the good efforts of his son-inlaw, 

Don Otto acquired a rural property, close to the 

city, which had already a small nursery with some 

orchids, mainly Lycaste. When Mittelstaedt acquired 

the property, the terraces where full of metal bird 

cages, since the previous owner had dedicated himself 

to illegal cock-fights. 

Mittelstaedt became part of the small group 

of amateurs of the ‘Asociación Verapacence de 

Orquideología’ (= Orchid Society of Alta Verapaz), 


222 

and dedicated himself to strengthen the organization 

of the group, planning collecting excursions to the 

mountains, an annual exhibition and contributing 

to increase the number and the knowledge of its 

members. He was elected Secretary of the Society 

and in this position, which he held until his death, 

he acted really as an Executive Director. With the 

Society, he explored the mountains of the area and of 

other regions of Guatemala to appreciate its orchids 

and to collect specimens, always insisting in avoiding 

depredation. During these excursions several new 

species were found and many others, which although 

already described, had not been seen in their natural 

habitats for many years. He worked without tiring 

during the whole day, with the help of Juanito, his 

right hand, caring for and improving his collection, 

which came to be the largest and most complete 

collection of national orchids, specializing in Lycaste 

(which he reproduced from the back bulbs), until he 

had over 1,000 plants, maintained in conditions very 

similar to their natural habitat, under a plantation 

of giant ferns. His nursery ‘Vivero Alta Verapaz’ 

was for many years of great interest for tourists 

and orchid lovers who visited Cobán. Every night 

he worked in his small studio, quiet and separate 

from the main house, typing with two fingers on 

an old typewriter. He received the main orchid 

journals, and formed an important collection of 

books. He wrote Las Orquídeas, Guía Práctica para 

su Cultivo (= The Orchids, practical guide to their 

cultivation) and Orquídeas terrestres de Guatemala 

(= Terrestrial Orchids of Guatemala), which he 

printed privately. The latter are not well known and 

have not been studied in the country. He also wrote 

various articles about little known genera and several 

amusing and didactic stories. All these publications 

were typed by him, reproduced on a mimeograph, 

and primitively bound in a very limited edition of no 

more than 100 copies, without a commercial interest 

and with a purely didactic finality and only for the 

use of friends and members of the Society. He took 

it upon himself to organize the annual exhibitions, 

held at the beautiful Convent of Santo Domingo in 

Cobán, specialized in native species of Guatemala. 

The judges were members of the American Orchid 

Society, always very interested to come to Guatemala, 

which sometimes made it difficult to limit the number 

LANKESTERIANA 


of invited judges. Both the exhibitions and his private 

collection attracted numerous foreign visitors. Otto, 

besides being a hard worker, was a very kind person, 

a good entertainer and a man who offered with 

pleasure, and no second interest, all of his knowledge. 

Although he loved traveling within the country, he 

did not like to leave Guatemala and, notwithstanding 

his interest for orchids, he did not accept invitations 

to attend exhibitions in order to give lectures in other 

countries. He died in Cobán. Two new species were 

dedicated to him: Lepanthes mittelstaedtii Luer & M. 

Behar and Epidendrum mittelstaedtii Hágsater. 

Oscar Archila (1939-2007) (Fig. 62D) was the son 

of a Spaniard and a German-Indian (Quetchí) mother, 

from whom he inherited the empiric knowledge and 

the passion for orchids. Together with his sons, he 

founded more than 35 years ago an Orchid Experiment 

Station, with the “most complete” (In the words of his 

son Fredy ) collection of Guatemalan Encyclias, with 

over 35,000 plants in cultivation. The Station functions 

as a rescue center for flora and is certified under the 

regulations of CITES and CONAP (National Council 

for Protected Areas). Archila made his first contacts 

with nature as a hunter, and later as an orchid collector 

and grower. He spent days without end collecting 

in the mountains, even during the civil war years in 

the 1970s and 1980s, risking going into war areas 

and mined fields, in his efforts of reaching remote 

collecting grounds in the search for rare species. Oscar 

Archila passed away in Cobán, on December 12, 2007. 

The Experiment Station continues in the hands of his 

sons. 

The Flora of Panama (II). The Flora of Panama of 

the Missouri Botanical Garden had been initiated by 

Robert E. Woodson, who edited the first parts with the 

assistance, until 1952, of Robert W. Shery. From about 

the time of Shery’s departure until the late 1950’s there 

was a hiatus on the activity of the Flora. 

In the 1960’s a series of expeditions was sent to 

Panama from St. Louis. John Duncan Dwyer (1915- 

2005) (Fig. 63A) was one of the most noteworthy 

collectors of that period. Dr. Dwyer had joined the Saint 

Louis University in 1953 and immediately became the 

chairman of the biology department, a position he 

held until 1963. He taught at the University for more 

than 30 years and was well known for his excellence

A 


C D 

Figure 62. A — Fritz Hamer (1912-2004). Courtesy of his widow, Hedwig Hamer. B — Otto Tinschert (1915-2006). 

Courtesy of Moisés Béhar. C — Otto Mittelstaedt (1919-2000). Courtesy of Moisés Béhar. D — Oscar Archila (1939- 

2007). Courtesy of his son, Fredy Archila. 

B 

223 


224 

C 

A 

LANKESTERIANA 

Figure 63. A — John Duncan Dwyer (1915-2005). B — Reprint of the Flora of Panama, Orchidaceae, by Williams and 

Allen. Missouri Botanical Garden, 1980. C — Frontispiece of the first fascicle of Icones Plantarum Tropicarum. Marie 

Selby Botanical Gardens, 1980. D — Frontispiece of the first fascicle of Icones Orchidacearum. AMO Herbarium, 1990. 


B 

D


in teaching, research and service. He retired in 1985, 

becoming professor emeritus in biology. Although Dr. 

Dwyer’s specialty was the classification and evolution 

of tropical, Latin American plants, his primary work 

concentrated on plant groups that made useful drugs 

and resins. He became a pioneer in the young field of 

bio-prospecting when he devised simple ways for plant 

collectors to discriminate between species that could 

prove beneficial to human health and those that could 

not. A world traveler, Dr. Dwyer completed field work 

in the Republic of Panama, Belize and Guatemala. He 

also collected and preserved plant specimens in other 

Central American countries as well as in Colombia, 

Peru, Ecuador and Saudi Arabia. Many of these 

specimens are housed at the Missouri Botanical Garden. 

Dr. Dwyer was a research associate of the Missouri 

Botanical Garden since 1954, and in 1984 was elected 

Fellow of the Linnean Society of London, which was 

founded in 1788 and is the oldest existing society in 

the world devoted to the life sciences. Interestingly, 

Dr. Dwyer also served as a consultant for the St. Louis 

Coroner’s Office, examining victims of poisoning for 

plant toxins. During his field trips in Central America, 

Dwyer collected, among others, Encyclia belizensis 

(Rchb. f.) Schltr. and Ornithocephalus inflexus Lindl, 

both in Belize. In Guatemala he found Maxillaria 

friedrichsthalli Rchb. f. and Pleurothallis brighamii 

S. Watson, and in Panama the type specimen of 

Epidendrum dwyeri (Dwyer & Hayden 7733), which 

was dedicated to him by Eric Hágsater. 

Thomas B. Croat, who directed the project in the 

1970’s, relinquished management of the Flora of 

Panama in 1977 to William Gerald D’Arcy (1931- 

1999), who saw the work to completion (D’Arcy, 1980: 

vi). Dr. D’Arcy was born in 1931 in Calgary, Canada, 

and graduated with honors in political economy from 

the University of Alberta in 1954. Between 1960 and 

1966, he owned and managed a softdrink bottling 

factory in Tortola in the British Virgin Islands, where 

he kindled an interest in the local flora. Encouraged 

by several botanists, he decided to change careers. 

Dr. D’Arcy enrolled in the botany master’s program 

at the University of Florida. In 1968, he was recruited 

for the Ph.D. program at Washington University and 

the Missouri Botanical Garden, where he worked 

under Walter Lewis. He became involved in the 

Flora of Panama program and wrote his thesis on the 

225 

Solanaceae of Panama. He received his degree in 1972 

and, at age 41, began his career as a research botanist at 

the Missouri Botanical Garden. There he compiled the 

first computerized database for the Flora of Panama 

(or any other large flora) using software he wrote 

himself, since it was before the era of readily available 

technology. While in Panama, D’Arcy collected, among 

others, Epidendrum bisulcatum Ames (D’Arcy 10944), 

Pleurothallis cf. dentipetala Rolfe ex Ames (D’Arcy 

10927), Pleurothallis crocodiliceps Rchb. f. (D’Arcy 

10897b), and Sigmatostalix picturatissima Kraenzl. 

(D’Arcy 10600A). In April 1980, with all treatments 

ready in at least a manuscript form, a symposium 

was held in Panama City to celebrate completion of 

the Flora. In this same year, the Missouri Botanical 

Garden published a reprint of the Orchidaceae by 

Williams and Allen, which included “A checklist of 

the orchids of Panama as known today”, by Dr. Robert 

L. Dressler (Williams & Allen, 1980) (Fig. 63B). Many 

new species of plants were dedicated to him, among 

them Rondeletia darcy Dwyer from the Rubiaceae and 

Anturium darcy Croat, from the Araceae. 

Icones Plantarum Tropicarum & Icones 

Orchidacearum. In 1980 the Marie Selby Botanical 

Gardens began a project which was enormously useful 

for researchers and amateur-lovers of our orchids: the 

first of the two series of Icones Plantarum Tropicarum 

(IPT) (Fig. 63C). Although both series also treated South 

American orchids, the Icones of Nicaragua and Costa 

Rica were of great importance. As doctor Calaway H. 

Dodson wrote: “the Icones Plantarum Tropicarum 

concept is not new in publishing. Similar projects 

date back to the beginning of plant classification. The 

idea that ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’ is well 

applied here. Most treatments of floras of tropical 

countries published during the last 50 years have been 

long on text and short on illustrations. The expense 

of preparation and publication of illustrations was 

commonly cited as the reason. [...] The publication 

of a series of illustrations by Dunsterville & Garay 

in Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated prompted the 

development of the IPT project. In that case, 6 

volumes containing 1,000 superb illustrations with 

accompanying text were published over a 17 year 

period (1959-1976). “...A large number of species are 

known only by published descriptions and herbarium 


226 

specimens. For the orchid taxonomist this is rather like 

a chocolate cake with the sugar left out – pretty difficult 

to utilize. The situation was made more palatable when 

Stalky Dunsterville and Leslie Garay published their 

splendid series on the orchids of Venezuela. One 

corner of the cake was now sweet” (Dodson, 1981). 

“Cal Dodson and I talked a lot about the Icones during 

our long field trips in Ecuador. His intention, when 

he was director at Selby, was to put at the disposal of 

orchidologists and amateurs all drawings which were 

in the archives. Since he only wanted to publish the 

illustrations, he did not intent a very scientific text 

which would imply the revision of a lot of material, 

but would only include the basic information related 

to the specimen used for the illustration. Hence the 

simple description, which should be a complement 

to the illustrations, adding short notes from his 

experience, of that of the collectors and illustrators. 

It was important to cite the specimen on which the 

illustration was based. Due to this intention, he did 

not intent a taxonomic revision, although eventually 

several new species were published. After the change 

of direction at Selby, Cal decided to continue with 

IPT II in San Louis, Missouri. I know that he tried to 

obtain permission from the widow of Rafael Lucas 

Rodríguez to publish his drawings in the series, but she 

thought that a fortune should be paid to her, so that an 

agreement was not possible. Fortunately, Rafael Lucas 

allowed me to photograph (slides) and photocopy all 

his illustrations of Epidendrum, which has been very 

useful for my work” (Hágsater, 2007, pers. comm.). 

In 1990, Eric Hágsater and his collaborators at the 

AMO Herbarium of the Mexican capital began with 

the publication of a similar series to IPT, which was 

called Icones Orchidacearum (Fig. 63D). “Icones 

Orchidacearum, as a difference to IPT, has intended 

from the beginning to be a very rigorous taxonomic 

work, in two directions. On one side, it wants to be 

the work of reference for the orchids of Mexico, with 

the collaboration of multiple authors in the genera of 

their expertise, and with the illustrations of many other 

collaborators, trying to promote botanical illustration 

among young biologists, following a certain pattern 

regarding the details to be illustrated. The ‘executive’ 

editor was initially Gerardo Salazar, now substituted 

by Miguel Ángel Soto, who has already in preparation 

the next volume, which will be number 10. The dream 

LANKESTERIANA 


would be to complete all Mexican species. On the 

other side, there is the series on the genus Epidendrum, 

where I have had the collaboration of several executive 

editors, today Luis Sánchez. This series intends to be 

the publication of the revision of the genus, giving 

place in the beginning to new species, and now also 

to those previously described, for which we have been 

preparing illustrations based on the type specimens or, 

if not possible, from material that has been collected 

or grown, or other herbarium specimens when nothing 

else is available” (Hágsater, 2007, pers. commm.). 

The National Orchid Societies. We have read about 

the interest in orchids shown by the prehispanic 

cultures in Central America. Orchids were grown 

and collected by the first inhabitants of our region 

not only for medicinal and economical purposes, but 

also for their ornamental value. From Friar Francisco 

Jiménez we learned how, during colonial times, the 

Indians in Guatemala collected orchids and put their 

flowers on the altars, while Francisco Antonio de 

Fuentes y Guzmán describes the practical uses given 

to orchids by musicians and candy-makers. Bateman, 

in one of his vivid descriptions, gives us the following 

account on the popularity of orchids in XIX century 

Mexico: “In Mexico, where the ‘language of flowers’ 

is understood by all, the Orchidaceae seem to compose 

nearly the entire alphabet. Not an infant is baptised, 

not a marriage is celebrated, not a funeral obsequy 

performed, at which the aid of these flowers is not called 

in by the sentimental natives, to assist the expression 

of their feelings; -they are offered by the devotee at the 

shrine of his favorite saint, by the lover at the feet of 

his mistress, and by the sorrowing survivor at the grave 

of his friend... (Bateman, 1837-1843: 8).” Seemann, 

in his Botany of the H.M.S. Herald, tells us how in 

Panama “[The] Espiritu Santo or Holy Ghost plant 

(Peristeria elata, Hook.) bears a flower resembling a 

dove, and is, like the Flor de semana santa (= Holy 

Week Flower), another Orchidea, almost held in 

religious veneration, and eagerly sought for when in 

blossom” (Seemann, 1852-1857: 71). Boyle, in 1893, 

writes about the craziness for the alba varieties of 

certain species: “Even the half-castes of Mexico, who 

have no soul, apparently, for things above horseflesh 

and cockfights, and love-making, reverence this 

saintly bloom [Laelia anceps var. alba]. The Indians


adore it. Like their brethren to the south, who have 

removed every plant from Cattleya Skinneri alba 

for generations unknown, to set upon their churches, 

they collect this supreme effort of Nature and replant 

it round their huts. So thoroughly has the work been 

done in either case that no single specimen was ever 

seen in the forest. Every one has been bought from the 

Indians, and the supply is exhausted; that is to say, a 

good many more are known to exist, but very rarely 

now can the owner be persuaded to part with one. [...] 

Roezl and the early collectors had a ‘good time’ buying 

these semi-sacred flowers from the priests, bribing the 

parishioners to steal them, or, when occasion served, 

playing the thief themselves” (Boyle, 1983: 120-121). 

As we have seen, literature is full of examples of 

the interest in orchids in our region during the XIX 

century. But it was not until the 1940’s that the first 

efforts were made to create organizations with the 

purpose of uniting all those interested in the growing, 

study and conservation of orchids. 

In Mexico, in 1942, a group was formed with 

the name “Amigos de las Orquídeas” (= Friends of 

the Orchids) which organized in Chiapas the First 

International Congress of Orchidology, sponsored by 

Rafael Pascasio Gamboa, then governor of the state. 

The “Amigos de las Orquídeas” functioned during 

15 years but then lost most of his members and ceased to 

exist. In 1966, Joaquín Ibarrola had the idea of reviving 

the “Amigos de las Orquídeas” and in 1971 the new 

association was legally registered by Eric Hágsater as 

“Asociación Mexicana de Orquideología, A. C.” (= 

Mexican Society of Orchidology). It keeps meeting since 

then in Mexico City, as well as in the regional offices 

of Cuernavaca, Morelos; Jalapa, Veracruz; Morelia, 

Michoacán; Huixquilucán and Atizapán, Mexico; as 

well as with associated members throughout the country. 

The journal Orquídea is a scientific publication of the 

Mexican Society of Orchidology, focused mainly on 

the orchid flora of Mexico and Tropical America. This 

journal, which was first published in 1971, includes 

papers on systematics, ecology, conservation, anatomy, 

physiology and other aspects of the biology of the 

orchids. 

In 1968, Helena de Ospina, president of the 

Orchid Society of Colombia and wife of Mariano 

Ospina, president of the Latin American Committee 

of Orchidology, traveled through Central America 

227 

promoting the creation of national orchid societies. 

In El Salvador the ambassador of Colombia invited a 

group of interested friends and on October 21, 1968, 

the Salvadorian Society for Orchidology (ASO) was 

founded with an initial 30 members. The Society has 

as its objectives the study, cultivation, conservation 

and propagation of orchids, with special interest in the 

native species of El Salvador. During the first years, the 

members of ASO, guided by German botanist Oskar 

Pank and by Cleon Clason, an excellent photographer, 

dedicated themselves to explore the country, collecting 

species which were classified and described by Fritz 

Hamer and became the base for his future publications. 

Then came the war years, which forced the collectors to 

remain in the cities, and more and more foreign plants 

began to be imported. 

In Costa Rica, the same Helena de Ospina proposed 

to Miguel Ángel Ramírez the idea of creating an 

organization with all those interested in the cultivation 

and conservation of orchids. On April 4, 1970, Ramírez 

sent out a letter to several well-known orchid-lovers, 

inviting them to found the Costa Rican Society of 

Orchidology. With the help of Dorothy Lankester and 

Rafael Lucas Rodríguez Caballero, the first meeting was 

held on May 16, 1970, in the School of Biology of the 

University of Costa Rica. On July 31, 1970, in a meeting 

held at the residence of María Eugenia de Roy and 

with the collaboration of Fritz Trinler and Dirk t’Höen, 

the bylaws of the new association were presented and 

approved. The Society was legally registered this same 

year. Under the presidency of Miguel Ángel Ramírez the 

first National Orchid Show was held in San José, during 

May 8 and 9 of 1971, with a total of 147 plants being 

exhibited. 

In 1973, a group of conscious persons, knowing of 

the dangers to which many native species of Guatemalan 

orchids were exposed, founded the “Asociación 

Guatemalteca de Orquideología (AGO)” (= Guatemalan 

Socierty of Orchidology) to conserve and protect their 

orchids. Among the founding members rose the great 

figure of Dr. Moisés Behar, today retired in Curitiba, 

Brazil. Today AGO has more than 100 members, all 

enthusiasts of the orchids, their cultivation, identification, 

propagation and conservation. The efforts of AGO’s 

members have been internationally recognized. The 

annual orchid shows are held in February in Guatemala 

City, with a great variety of genera and species, both 


228 

native and exotic. The Society supports the maintenance 

and preservation, as well as the proper handling of the 

natural habitats of the orchids. Several years later, in 1979, 

the “Asociación Altaverapacense de Orquideología” (= 

Orchid Society of Alta Verapaz) was founded in Cobán, 

Guatemala, after a visit by Dr. Karlheinz Senghas of the 

University of Heidelberg. 

In the year of 1977, a large number of orchid 

enthusiasts came together in Panama to listen to the 

experiences in orchid growing of Robert Dressler, 

renowned scientist of the Smithsonian Institute. 

LANKESTERIANA 


During this meeting Walter Maduro was elected as 

the first president of a new association, called the 

Panamanian Society of Orchidology. One year later 

the first national orchid show was held at the Museum 

of the Panamanian Man, an exhibition that brought 

together the native and exotic species and hybrids of 

orchids owned by the members of the new society. 

In the month of October of 1992 the association was 

finally registered in the Public Registry. Its logo shows 

Panama’s National Flower, Peristeria elata, popularly 

known as the Holy Ghost Orchid. 

aCknowleDgeMenTs. Many friends have helped to make this book a reality. To try and comment on each one’s specific 

contribution could lead to unjust appreciations and unforgivable oversights. Therefore, I will limit myself to mentioning them 

in alphabetical order, begging for excuses if I forgot anybody: Fredy Archila, Joseph Arditti, Michael J. Balick, Moisés Behar, 

Eduardo Bitter, Mario Blanco, Paloma Blanco, Pilar Casasa, Pilar de San Pío, Susan Donogue, Kerry Dressler, Robert Dressler, 

Jaime García, Günter Gerlach, Luis Diego Gómez, Eric Hágsater, Hedwig Hamer, Barry Hammel, Stanley Heckadon-Moreno, 

Leonardo Hernández, Wesley Higgins, Luko Hilje, Pierre Jacquet, Rudolf Jenny, Pavel Kindlmann, Stephen Kirby, Isobyl 

la Croix, Ricardo Lankester, Hilda León-Paéz, Jorge León, Leoncio López Ocón, Steve Manning, Stuart McCook, Helga 

Nevermann, Marc Nir, Mary Noble McQuerry, Henry Oakeley, Gabriela Ossenbach, Enid Picado, Franco Pupulin, Leonora 

Rodríguez, Gustavo Romero, Willy Salazar, Luis Sánchez Saldaña, Esthela Sandoval, Walter Schug, Philip Seaton, Michael 

Seaward, Miguel Ángel Soto Arenas, Angela Todd, Silvia Troyo, Erich Vogt Sartorius, James Watson, and Mayela Zamora. 

To all, once again, a thousand thanks!

orchids and orchidology in central america. 500 ... - lankesteriana.org

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?