Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens has received a collection of about 70 Siberian irises hybridized by the late Currier McEwen, a Harpswell resident who literally wrote the book – published in 1996 – on Siberian irises. Harriet Robinson of Otisfield, a past president of the Maine Iris Society and the Garden Club Federation of Maine and current vice president of the Region 1 of the American Iris Society, donated the historical collection that she has grown over several decades. In the world of irises, McEwen is king.
After a stellar career in medicine – he was dean of the New York University School of Medicine – he retired to Harpswell, where he turned his scientific mind from people to plants. According to the dust jacket on his 1996 book “The Siberian Iris,” McEwen “bred, registered and introduced 98 Siberian irises, 34 Japanese irises and 43 day lilies.” Not bad for a retiree’s hobby.
Courtney Locke, a horticulturist who has been working with Robinson on the project to bring the McEwen irises to the botanical gardens in Boothbay, said they agreed that the irises, all Siberians, should be displayed as a group rather than interspersed with other plants. “We thought that this would be the best way to honor a man who is not only a giant in the horticultural world, but in the history of Maine,” Locke said. The garden in Boothbay is about a half-hour drive from where the irises were created in Harpswell.
The iris collection is going to be planted near the Coast.
