Roses are very big in Australia which might be surprising when you consider that roses are not native to that land and have only been grown there since the late 1700s. The climate is warm and dry and it is a challenge for Australian hybridizers to come up with plants that will do well under those conditions.
Alister Clark was one such hybridizer. He bred roses at his home in Glenara, near Bulla, north of Melbourne, for the hot dry conditions found in Australia. Alister is one of the few breeders to have used Rosa gigantea as the foundation of his breeding program. R. gigantea is a warm climate plant. As a result, most of Alister's varieties are not winter hardy either. But they do (or at least some of them do) bloom year-round.
Rose-breeding is a slow business. Alister had to seek out and import roses from Europe before he could even begin his work! He crossed R. gigantea with 'Madame Abel Chatenay,' 'Betty Berkeley' (according to Susan Irvine, Alister's favorite color in roses was red and it was from 'Betty Berkeley' that Alister's favorite rose, 'Sunny South,' was born), 'Jersey Beauty,' and 'Jessie Clark'. While the first generation were once-blooming, the second generation repeated! Some of them, like 'Borderer', were continuously in bloom.
Alister Clark bred roses for the garden and not so much for the show table. Between 1912 and his death in 1949, he released 122 varieties purely for philanthropic purposes - he didn't seek commercial gain with his introductions.
Some of the roses he presented to the people for whom they were named. Most of his roses were named for women, some for racehorses. In addition to roses, Alister was interested in quite a variety of things - he bred daffodils and maintained a stable of racehorses and played golf. The first rose Alister released was named for a racehorse - 'Lady Medallist'. His association with horseracing continues to the present day -- the Alister Clark Stakes are run in the autumn race meet at Moonee Valley. The winning horse is draped in a garland of his 'Lorraine Lee' roses.
Two of his roses were named for the wives of gentlemen who "tested" his roses for him in their own gardens - 'Mrs. Hugh Dettman' and 'Mrs. W.R. Graves'. Hugh Dettman and Dr. Groves were hybridizers in their own rights - though not of roses. Dettman's plant of choice was daffodils - an interest he and Alister shared. Groves' plant was sweet peas.
'Edith Clark' was named for Alister's wife. 'Jessie Clark' was named for his niece and for a number of years after its release proceeds from the sale of this rose benefitted the National Rose Society of Victoria. 'Amy Johnson' commemorated the first woman to fly solo to Australia. 'Countess of Stradbroke' was named for the wife of the third Earl of Stradbroke and Governor of Victoria in 1920 and was considered to be the best climbing rose of its time.
The rose color palette has widened over the course of the years, but back in 1937 when 'Mab Grimwade' was introduced, there weren't a whole lot of truly apricot roses to choose from. The color and the robust blooming quality of this rose made it very popular. 'Sunlit,' another popular apricot-colored rose was not only popular in Alister's homeland but it was also acclaimed when it was first released in America.
Out of all the roses he raised, Alister's personal favorite was a very early one called 'Sunny South'. The public agreed. He wrote that 'Gwen Nash' was "the most beautiful thing in decorative pinks" he produced and apparently others shared that opinion. In the American Rose Annual of 1931, 'Gwen Nash' was described as "the most beautiful rose I ever saw; the sheer beauty of a plant in full bloom is enough to take one's breath away."
Slowly and painstakingly, many of Alister's roses have been identified and re-introduced. Some have even made their way to the distant shores of Canada and the USA.
In her book, Hillside of Roses, Susan Irvine writes about the trials and tribulations of tracking down many of Alister's varieties. She became the caretaker of the Ornamental Plants Collections Association's Collection of Alister Clark Roses. To date, only about one-half of Clark's releases have been located.
After his death in 1949, the National Rose Society of Victoria introduced a rose Alister raised called 'Glenara' and named for his home. Both Alister and his wife are buried in the Bulla cemetery. Over time, many of Alister's roses have been forgotten or lost. But in the 1980s, the city of Hume and the Garden Club of Bulla, in a joint effort, sought out and rounded up as many of his roses as they could find and put them altogether in what is probably the largest collection of his roses in Australia. It was no easy task. Some of the roses were found in old gardens. Others in the garden of Tid Alston, president of the Bulla Garden Club. Recently, a sport of 'Marjory Palmer,' called appropriately enough 'Alister Clark,' has been released. And St. Kilda Botanical Garden is also home to a Alister Clark Roses Collection.
As we gather more information about Alister Clark and his roses, we will add it to HelpMeFind.com/Roses. In addition, our roving rose reporter in Australia, Fran Cleland, has taken upon herself the daunting task of documenting as many of Alister's roses as she can find and we look forward to adding her photographs to the site as well.
For more information about Alister Clark and his roses, a good place to start is his page at HelpMeFind.com/Roses - you can organize his list of roses by Name or Year of Introduction. Just follow the links.
This article is also available in a .PDF version. Simply email me at Roses@HelpMeFind.com and I'll send you a copy. Having been a rose society newsletter editor, I know only too well how much work is involved and hope the availability of HelpMeFind.com/Roses articles in .PDF format will be an aid to newsletter editors everywhere!
