Photos? Bloom? Foliage? Canes?

I have no photo of Fannie's rose, just information from articles published about her garden that say that it's a damask and had been in her family since the 1700s. That really narrows it down, right? Another clue would be northern hardiness. It gets cold up here, you know.

What is the earliest date in which the rose was mentioned? I can do an advanced search on HelpMeFind for Damasks before that date. I did one using 1800, and it yielded six pages of results -- but as with many of the oldies, many of the results were synonyms. Also be aware that some roses were called Damasks then, but today we call them something else -- some Albas blur the lines, for example. Do you have any details about how she grew it? Or perhaps comments about how thorny it was, or if it bloomed again in Autumn?

:-)

~Christopher

Well, in the meantime, here are the results of a search for Damasks from before 1800, using the names I think are most common now, but do check them on HelpMeFind for their synonyms. You may just find one of them among her notes, perhaps something like "(rose name) was exceptionally beautiful this year..."

"Banshee" (or the "High Country Banshee" version)
'Bifera Alba'
'Blush Damask'
'Celsiana'
'Kazanlik'
'Perle de Weissenstein'
'Quatre Saisons'
'Rose de Puteaux'
'Summer Damask'
'York and Lancaster'

:-)

~Christopher

I agree with Christopher that it isn't a Damask. At least not what we currently would call a damask. Banshee is a possibility. The hardiness criteria is going to weed out a lot.

Shailor's Provence is still widely found in this part of the world and it might have been called a Damask in its day.
I don't know why it has the SP identity, as there's precious little in the literature that I've been able to find through Google search (and others) that defines SP.

In The Old Rose Adventurer, by an author I hold in high regard (me), there's nearly a half (big) page on 'Shailer's Provence' under its earlier name 'Gracilis'. See page 273.

Here is a quote from an article published in North Dakota Quarterly in 1932:

"... in 1744 the family moved back to western Virginia which was then on the outskirts of settled territory. On this trip, Nancy Clarke Bouldin took with her a slip of her favorite damask rose. After nearly two hundred years this rose is still growing on the Virginia homestead which remains in the hands of the family and Mrs. Heath was the proud possessor of a slip from this rose which is now a fair sized bush."

Fannie was very conscious of naming plants correctly. She learned botanical latin so that she could be sure that she and her correspondents were discussing the same plants. She exchanged letters regularly with T. Hay who was the Superintendent of the Royal Gardens in London and had many connections in the U.S. I even came across a letter from Vita Sackville-West - totally cool.

mad_gallica makes the essential point. North Dakota is zone 4a-3b where it's unlikely that a true damask would be cane-hardy or able to bloom, but 'Banshee' would, and it is rather damask-like.

But to answer part of the question, the most common true damask growing in western Virginia in 1744 might be 'Kazanlik', which is thought to be the (or similar to the) basic type of damask rose that arrived in Europe during the late Renaissance.

The first time I saw Banshee I thought it was a damask. I'm not a rose identification expert, but I'm not the only one to make that mistake. Anyway, it grew on our family's farm in northern interior Maine since the 1800's, so I'm sure it would survive in North Dakota. And it has been found in Virginia as well. I think it is a decent candidate to be your "damask".

Since you may never know for sure, you would probably be just as happy with Blush Damask or Celsiana, or another likely possibility. After all, you will at least be growing a rose she probably would have known, even if it was not her rose. Banshee has a serious suckering habit, probably part of its reason for surviving. And Banshee often fails to open properly. I have grown both Celsiana and Banshee, and Celsiana is by far the nicer rose.

Rosefolly

I've had Autumn Damask for about ten years here, and I had Leda for a few years - but she died through my own neglect. I have to get another one and be more careful, she's just beautiful. For Fannie's garden, I'm leaning toward Blush Damask. It's available and I can get on with it.

I am a descendent of Fannie Heath. I know a bit about this famous rose. I visited her farm in 1992 and while in Grand Forks took home a slip of a rose thought to be the famous rose.

I contacted the horticulturalists at Colonial Williamsburg and they suggested Celsiana and Blush Damask. I found Celsiana available online and ordered one. It is growing nicely. Sharon - The people who live there now only have an old peony that is believed to be Fannie's. They are going to share a piece of it with me for Fannie's garden.

Banshee was my first thought also. Here is a link to a very interesting (to me, anyway) article about Banshee's history:

http://www.paulbardenroses.com/main_dec.html

Hope it's of interest,

Virginia

Leah, have you been in touch with Dr. Kathleen Brokke from the U of Grand Forks? She did her thesis on Fannie and has a wealth of information.

i would love a slip of the peony from Fannie's farm. Do the Bratager''s still own the farm?

Where is your garden in Fannie's memory located?

i have a lavender bed in Fannie's memory in my garden. I have old china dishes scattered throughout it. Apparently she put anything she could in the soil to change the composition of the soil and break down the barriers that were in the land. We found pieces of China, china doll parts, old spoons in the soil when we took a shovel to it. It is fascinating to know what she did to make an oasis on that prairie.