Rev. Henry Muhlenberg was Lancaster’s Revolutionary botanist [Master Gardener columnist] | Home & Garden

America’s 250th anniversary celebration offers an opportunity to contemplate pivotal figures in the history of the new nation. One of the most important botanists of the new American Republic carried out his groundbreaking work right here in Lancaster.

The Rev. Henry Ernest Muhlenberg (1753-1815) was a man of many accomplishments. He served as pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church in downtown Lancaster for 35 years and was also the first president of Franklin College, which later became Franklin & Marshall College.

He has posthumously become known as the “American Linnaeus” because of his dogged pursuit to identify and classify plants unique to the New World.

A prominent American family

Henry Ernest Muhlenberg was baptized as Gotthilf Henry Ernest Muhlenberg. His father, Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, was a Lutheran minister who emigrated from Germany and is credited with founding the Lutheran Church in America. Muhlenberg family members held influential roles in politics, the military, religion and academia. Henry’s brother, John Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg, was a Revolutionary War general and statesman; his brother Frederick Augustus Conrad Muhlenberg was the first speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. Though born in Trappe, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Henry Ernest Muhlenberg received his Lutheran theological education in Germany.

This portrait of the Rev. Henry Ernest Muhlenberg is attributed to Lancaster-born artist Jacob Eichholtz. The painting is part of the Phillips Museum of Art collection at Franklin & Marshall College.

Courtesy of Franklin & Marshall College and the Phillips Museum of Art Collection

The ‘American Linnaeus’

After serving as a pastor in Philadelphia, Muhlenberg was called to Trinity Lutheran Church in Lancaster, serving as head pastor from 1780 until his death in 1815. Able to balance his botanical interests with his pastoral and educational responsibilities, Muhlenberg traveled the nearby countryside, collecting and classifying specimens. In a 1791 letter, he related that he had collected more than 1,100 different plants.

Muhlenberg made painstaking use of the system devised by Carl Linnaeus to classify his findings. He is known for communicating with botanists and scientists of his day, especially to ensure that his plant discoveries were original. His correspondence also led him to research and classify species that he would never encounter in person, which he preserved in his own herbarium.

His interest in plants from the Southwest and Mexico led to the naming of the genus Muhlenbergia. Muhlenberg’s publications included an 1813 work that was often referenced by later botanists: “A catalog of the hitherto known native and naturalized plants of North America, arranged according to the sexual system of Linnaeus.”

Pink muhlygrass (Muhlenbergia capillaris) is a perennial grass that can enliven landscapes with a cloud of pink. It’s one of the plants whose botanical name pays homage to the work of Lancaster botanist (and minister) Henry Muhlenberg.

PEXELS

Contemporary botanical connections to Muhlenberg

Check out the work of the Muhlenberg Botanical Society in Lancaster County, online at sites.google.com/site/muhlenbergbotanic. It honors Muhlenberg by fostering appreciation and understanding of native plants.

Consider acquiring a plant whose botanical name pays homage to Muhlenberg’s findings: Chinkapin oak (Quercus muehlenbergii), a moderately-sized oak with leaves like chestnut trees, or pink muhlygrass (Muhlenbergia capillaris), a perennial grass to enliven landscapes with pink, cloud-like panicles.

Celebrate America’s 250th at our demonstration gardens

Master Gardener demonstration gardens this summer feature crops grown by American Colonists of various cultures, as well as native plants known to Indigenous peoples. Gardens are located at Southeast Agricultural Research & Extension Center, 1446 Auction Road, Manheim, and are open free of charge from dawn to dusk through Aug. 30.

For information: lanc.news/DemonstrationGardens.

Lois Miklas is a Penn State Master Gardener for Lancaster County, and a former area Master Gardener coordinator.

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