orchids and orchidology in central america. 500 ... - lankesteriana.org

ossenbaCh — Orchids and orchidology in Central America
government hastily landed forces. Dedicated to freeing
the country of foreign domination and improving
the lot of Nicaraguan peasants, Sandino would fight
a war against U.S. Marines and the National Guard
for the next eight years. The Marines withdrew in
1933, leaving Anastasio Somoza as commander of
the National Guard. In 1937 Somoza, who had been
responsible for the murder of Sandino in 1934, was
elected president, initiating a dynasty of dictators that
would rule the country for the next forty years. The
antagonism between the dictatorship and the ideals of
Sandino would mark the history of Nicaragua during
the rest of the XX Century. “The penetration of foreign
capital – especially North American after World War
I – complements the already close relations of Central
America to international trade... The powerful banana
companies, with extensive interests in a vast scope
of activities (plantations, railways, shipping lines,
communications, etc.) played an increasingly relevant
role” (Pérez Brignoli, 2000: 127).
While Europe struggled with the problems and
the misery of the postwar years, the establishment of
communism and the rapid rise of fascism, the United
States consolidated, during the first three decades of
the XX century, their new American empire. In the
same manner, European explorers and scientists,
who had dominated the history of orchids in Central
America during the past four centuries, yielded the
field to a new generation of U. S. botanists, especially
after the deaths of Rolfe in 1921 and of Schlechter in
1925, giving way to what Robert Dressler would coin,
years later, “botanical imperialism” (in a letter to E.
Greenwood, January 5, 1981).
In Costa Rica, the strong impulse given to the
botanical exploration of the country by the ‘Instituto
Físico Geográfico’ and the National Museum in the last
years of the XIX century continued until after World
War I. It was the only Central American country where
a strong group of national scientists and naturalists was
formed, working together with foreign residents. In
Panama, the impulse came from the construction of the
canal, which attracted the interest of institutions such as
the Smithsonian and the Missouri Botanical Garden. In
northern Mesoamerica, Guatemala, Yucatan, Belize, and
to a lesser degree Honduras, were explored in the first
years of the XX century by naturalists who followed the
archeological exploration of the ancient Mayan cities.
Rudolf Schlechter
141
“Without a good memory it is of no use trying to
be a botanist; one had better give it up and be a
merchant”
Rudolf Schlechter (Reinikka, 1995: 293)
The previous quote is characteristic of the egotistic
self-confidence of the great German orchidologist
Friedrich Richard Rudolf Schlechter (1872-1925) (Fig.
45E), a man of driving ambition, a great capacity for
work and a remarkable memory, of whom it is said
that at an early age had set for himself the goal of
describing at least one new orchid every day (Reinikka,
1995: 293-294). Schlechter was born in Berlin where
he served an apprenticeship as a horticulturist, first
in the well-known commercial nursery of F. Bluth,
and later in the gardens of the University of Berlin
(Loesener, 1926: 912). At nineteen years of age he
left Europe on botanical explorations that carried
him to Africa, Sumatra, Java, Celebes, Borneo, New
Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago and Australia.
Of utmost importance were his explorations of New
Guinea (1901-1902 y 1906-1909) where he discovered
over 1,100 new species of Orchidaceae, described
in his work Die Orchidaceen von Deutsch-Neu-
Guinea, published in 1914. “Between collecting trips
Schlechter continued his visits to London, always
stopping in at the herbarium at Kew and the British
Museum. He was considered an interesting figure, but
being not respectful of persons or things, he was apt to
tread on other people’s feelings and sensibilities. He
was dogmatic in his convictions, a characteristic which
did not assist in making him popular; but on the basis
of his achievements and experience, he was accorded
great respect” (Reinikka, 1925: 294).
Schlechter’s work had been preceded, after the death
of Reichenbach, by Ernst Hugo Heinrich Pfitzer (1846-
1906). Pfitzer, since 1872 professor and director of the
Botanical Garden of Königsberg (Prussia), dedicated
himself to the classification of the Orchidaceae and
published in 1895 his Beiträge zur Systematik der
Orchideen (= ‘Contributions to the Systematics of
Orchids ’ ). Of jovial character, Pfitzer was respected all
over Europe. It was his untimely death, at only 60 years
of age, which really opened the way for Schlechter.
Schlechter described, in his Orchidaceae novae
et criticae (1906-1907), for the first time new orchid
LANKESTERIANA 9(1—2), August 2009. © Universidad de Costa Rica, 2009.