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December 20, 2008

Discovery in 1964 to be recognized by Holly Society of America as ‘Indiana State’ variation of the plant tied to Christmas

By Mark Bennett

It wasn’t quite like a Hollywood reporter discovering Lana Turner in a Tinseltown soda shop.

Still, Bob Artis spotted a special sight amid a neglected New Jersey hedge row in 1964.

The line of trees stood 15 feet tall and stretched 200 feet long. But leaf disease and insects had devastated nearly all the plants, known scientifically as ilex opacas or more commonly American hollies — a symbol of Christmas. All but one.

Its leaves glowed with a deeper green. It showed no signs of disease. “So it really stood out,” Artis recalled.

Artis found the tree and hedge row close to a farmhouse near his home in Magnolia, N.J. The Terre Haute native was living there then and working in Philadelphia as a chemist. After his discovery in ’64, Artis clipped three cuttings from that holly. Only one took root, and that took two years. When he moved back to his hometown in Indiana in 1967, he brought the survivor along and transplanted it in his cousin’s Terre Haute yard the following year.

Four decades later, second-generation cuttings from the original tree are growing in Terre Haute and beyond, thanks to Artis. And in 2009, the Holly Society of America will officially recognize Artis’ find as a registered “cultivar,” or plant variation. The society bestows that distinction upon just a few cultivars each year. Artis’ holly will be named “Indiana State,” in honor of his college alma mater.

Until Artis noticed the sturdy tree in that withered hedge, he knew little about hollies.

“He found this holly and fell in love with it,” said friend Marilyn Clark.

Today, fellow holly enthusiasts, such as Clark, know Artis as a bit of an expert on the plant. He’s active in the Friends of the Arboretum, a group that supports and cares for the nationally renowned holly tree haven in Terre Haute — the Clark-Landsbaum Deming Park Holly Arboretum, which Marilyn Clark helped found with her late husband Bill. That sector of the park features more than 300 holly plants, including 11 species and 175 cultivars. Some are young Indiana States.

“We have a lot of Indiana State plants,” said Clark, “but they all came from that one holly.”

Artis’ eyes didn’t fool him 44 years ago. That tree was indeed strong. Though it is now gone, the New Jersey holly’s son — Artis’ sole survivor cutting proved to be a male holly — now stands more than 21 feet tall in the yard of his cousin’s former home. It weathered a 31-degrees-below-zero temperature in 1994.

“That would be an extremely hardy plant,” Bill Cannon, past president of the Holly Society of America, said by phone from his home in Cape Cod, Mass.

Holly trees, most commonly found along the East Coast, sometimes struggle in widely varying climates, such as Indiana. But American hollies, such as Artis’ Indiana States, are the hardiest of the evergreen hollies, Cannon said.

Since 2002, several cuttings from the 21-foot Indiana State holly have taken root. Artis sent a half-dozen to holly enthusiasts in Indiana, New Jersey, Maryland and Massachusetts to grow them in various climates and evaluate their hardiness. The tallest of those second-generation cuttings is a 6-footer in the yard of Artis’ home on Terre Haute’s east side. Some smaller Indiana States are also growing there, along with nearly 80 other hollies.

The evaluation of cultivars’ durability in different climates is part of the Holly Society’s recognition process. The Indiana States should pass that test with high marks, Clark predicted.

“We feel pretty certain this one will be hardy just about everywhere,” she said.

Someday, Artis hopes the Indiana States become plentiful enough that his fellow Sycamore alums can get their own. “I’d just like to see it widely accepted and widely planted,” he said.

A half-century after he graduated from Indiana State, the university remains important to Artis, now 77, and his family. His wife, Carla, is an ISU alum, and so are their four children. “It seems somewhat of a no-brainer that Indiana State would be the name” of the holly, Carla said.

Artis also chose the name as a tribute to recent efforts by the university to help the Friends of the Arboretum turn Terre Haute into a holly tree mecca. Artis particularly praised Kevin Runion, the school’s associate vice president of facilities management, for committing one of four on-campus tree farms to growing nearly 200 holly trees for the arboretum and other Terre Haute sites, such as parks and schools.

The arboretum at Deming Park gives Terre Haute a rare niche. It is one of just 21 holly arboretums in the world, and the only one located in a public park. Its presence has led to hollies being planted around the town. “We had a chance to create a ‘city of hollies’ in Terre Haute,” Runion said of that effort.

Just as hollies are associated with Terre Haute, the evergreen varieties are also synonymous with Christmas worldwide. The male American holly carries brilliant, shiny green leaves. The female, the ilex opaca farage, bears bright red berries. Ancient Romans, Greeks and Druids were the first to deck their halls with boughs of holly. Druids believed the sun never deserted the holly, because of its perpetual colors, and considered it sacred, according to the University of Vermont. Romans used holly as a symbol of goodwill, as well as a staple of their Festival of Saturn, in honor of their mythical god of sowing and husbandry.

In America, especially Terre Haute, hollies hold a special attachment to the holidays.

“It’s hard to imagine a Christmas card or Christmas decoration that doesn’t have a holly on it,” Runion said.

The green of their leaves and the red of their berries are, not coincidentally, colors commonly associated with the season. They also contrast with the natural scenery in December.

“They’re noticeable this time of year because they’re the only thing that stays green,” Artis said.

“When it gets cold and snowing and windy, that plant just stands out in the landscape,” Cannon said, “and that’s probably why people are drawn to the holly.”

Just like the forefather tree of the Indiana State hollies that Bob Artis discovered in a New Jersey hedge row, long ago.

Mark Bennett can be reached at mark.bennett@tribstar.com or (812) 231-4377.









Raising ‘Indiana State’

What: A species, or “cultivar,” of the American holly tree nurtured by Terre Hautean Bob Artis will be officially recognized by the Holly Society of America in 2009.

Background: American hollies’ leaves stay green year-round. The females bear red berries that ripen September through December and remain on the trees throughout winter, until they’re eaten by birds and animals.

Myth: A bough of holly hung above a doorway will keep evil spirits out of a home.

Dispelled myth: Holly berries are not poisonous, said past Holly Society of America president Bill Cannon.

Terre Haute’s niche: The Clark-Landsbaum Deming Park Holly Arboretum is one of just 18 in the United States. There are only 21 holly arboretums worldwide. The Friends of the Arboretum group, with help from the ISU campus nursery, have spread hollies around Terre Haute in an effort to create “a city of hollies.”

--Sources: Holly Society of America, Friends of the Arboretum, Western North Carolina Nature Center

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