Liriodendron (Tulip tree Blossoms)

Flowers, Still Life, Trees

Dimensions

Image Dimensions: 23.0 x 18.3 cm | published June 20, 1890 | issue No. 457
Support Dimensions: 28.7 x 20.5 cm

Editorial comment on this plate:

In the January 24th issue of The Photographic Times appeared a communication on Photographs of Natural Flowers, from C. L. Lochman, of Bethlehem, Pa. Mr. Lochman spoke of five photographs selected from his list of photographs of medicinal plants, four of which had been suggested as candidates for the honor of being selected as the national flower. They were the tulip tree, the mountain laurel, the flowering dogwood and the trailing arbutus or May flower.
We then expressed the hope of showing our readers a reproduction from one of Mr. Lochman’s interesting negatives, and promptly received his kind permission to use any negative we might select. We therefore give our readers, this week, a phototype from his negative of the tulip tree (Liriodendron Tulipifera,) as that seems to answer the requirements which he thinks it necessary for the national flower to have, better than any other; though any one of the other four specimens which he sent would make an appropriate and beautiful national emblem.
“In the first place,” writes Mr. Lochman in the communication already referred to, “it should be a native, and in the second place, characteristic in form; that is, sufficiently striking to be known at a glance. * * * * The Mountain Laurel, Flowering Dogwood, and Tulip Tree are native Americans and very showy ; but I think the latter has a strong claim as a candidate as a national flower, there being but a single species of the genus, a single flower and leaf characteristic and showy, and cannot well be mistaken for any other plant. Moreover, the tree is one of the noblest in the United States ; straight as an arrow, and sometimes a hundred and forty feet high. The bark also has tonic properties.” In the following article Mr. Lochman has more to say on this subject.
The reproduction was made by F. Gutekunst, of Philadelphia, and is “superb” in Mr. Lochman’s opinion.
Mr. C. L. Lochman is perhaps better known to the pharmacists and physicians of this country than to photographers. His photographs of medicinal plants are used in nearly every medicinal and pharmaceutical college in the United States, also in the Superior School of Pharmacy, connected with the University of France, at Montpelier. His translation of the German Pharmacopoedia and his Dose and Price Label Book are found in all important drug stores, where his Rotary Cork-presser is also a familiar object.
His skill as a photographer is plainly evinced in the beautiful picture which embellishes our magazine this week.