I spoke with Madelaine Zadik from the Lyman Center about the history of the Fall Chrysanthemum Show at Smith. “It’s been going on for over a century. It’s a longstanding smith tradition,” she told me. “We have pictures from the early 1900s of Smith students learning how to hybridize.” Where other fields of study are fast-changing, with old methods continuously becoming obsolete, it is somewhat reassuring to hear that Smith’s horticulture students are still learning what seems to me like a traditional occupation. I asked Madelaine about the process of creating Chrysanthemum hybrids, and she related that, “They choose a pollen parent and an egg parent, and clearly they’re choosing each one for some specific thing, maybe it’s the color of the flower, maybe it’s the form of the flower, but what actually results in the end is rather unpredictable;” the practice of hybridization is part science, part creativity, and part chance. Visitors will vote on their favorite flower, and the winner will be added to the Chrysanthemum hall of fame, which has existed since the 1910’s! Although photographs are taken of the winning flowers, and all of them are grown on for a year, Madelaine says, “Nowadays we don’t actually keep them.” The Fall Chrysanthemum show is a celebration of student contribution to the pattern of nature that is as transient as the reality. It will go on until November 19th.
by Tsemone Ogbemi ’21
