"Yellow Gate"
Waves of pink, red and white blossoms shimmer through the trees. Branches heavy with blooms overhang the trails. In every direction, the eye encounters a riot of spring color. It can only mean one thing: our signature collection of thousands of rhododendrons is at its peak and Heritage’s Rhododendron Festival is in full swing.
Some years are better than others for blooms and this year is one of the best. The plants used last summer’s drought to produce a record bud count this spring. There are simply more blooms than ever!
Admiring all this dazzle got us thinking about some of the people who made it possible. If you’re a rhodie aficionado, you probably know about Charles O. Dexter, a retired textile manufacturer from New Bedford who hybridized a vast number of the rhodie varieties found on our grounds. Often overlooked in Dexter’s shadow is Jack Cowles, who worked as horticulturist on the Dexter Estate from 1957 to 1967 for owner Stanley Burns.
Cowles loved the Dexter hybrids and he made it his goal to improve them further. He bred for specific traits, such as clear and vivid color and compact plants with small, glossy leaves. Where Dexter is known for his pink and red shades, Cowles bred a number of yellow flower varieties, rarer among rhododendrons and highly sought after. Perhaps his best-known creation, "Yellow Gate" (shown above), begins with shell pink buds that unfurl into lemon yellow petals. It gets its name, not surprisingly, from its color and location — right next to our Main Gate.
The Jack Cowles Rhododendron Garden features forty different plants. These plants were donated to the museum by the Sandwich Chapter of the American Rhododendron Society. Neither Dexter nor Cowles registered many of their hybrid varieties with the American Rhododendron Society, but others have picked up where they left off. Recently, Sandwich Club Members of the ARS and John and Donna Delano registered three named Cowles varieties: "Heritage Snow Ruby," "Heritage Campfire Peach" and "Heritage Pastel Perfume."
"Heritage Campfire Peach"
The Rhododendron Festival runs from Saturday, May 21, 2011 to Monday, May 30, 2011 and features a fantastic line up of events. If you’d like a Jack Cowles rhodie for your own garden, "Yellow Gate" seedlings will be available at our Annual Plant Sale starting May 21st, along with lots of other beautiful specimens featured at Heritage. They’ll go quick, so come early!
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