I had to have 'Manchester Guardian Angel' when I saw how vigorously it had grown in a friend’s garden, after only one year. It wasn’t until later that I found out about its interesting California heritage.
Pamela Temple created this releif by casting the face on the original marble sculpture, in the Manchester cemetary.
In 1980, Joyce and Virginia Demits discovered the rose flourishing near an aged marble statue of an angel at the Evergreen Cemetery, in the village of Manchester. Founded in 1857, on the Mendecino coast, the little town today has a population of 350. Joyce named and sold the rose as ‘Manchester Guardian Angel’.
Amazingly the rose was discovered two more times by two more people, in two completely different cemeteries, and ended up in the market place with three different names! Jeri Jennings, well-known rose rustler and scholar, writes a fascinating article about all the confusion.
'Manchester Guardian Angel' grows along our front walkway, on a lattice fence made of 2x2 redwood.
Three separate introductions into the market couldn't be a better endorsement for a rose. The blooms have a rich fruity fragrance, leaves are dark green, and thorns are plentiful and sharp. The first bloom is glorious, but its repeats are fabulous as well.
Here’s a look at the rose in the garden of Gregg Lowery and Philip Robinson. That fence is eight feet-high or more. This nice lady posed for me to give a sense of scale. Sorry, I don’t know her name.
With so many panicles (branched clusters of flowers), it’s fun to fill my hand with stems, and then tie or wire them together, before placing them in a vase. This allows the flowers to spill over the edge, but not fall out.
Here you can see the twist of wire I used to hold the stems together.
'Manchester Guardian Angel' is available by mail order at Vintage Gardens.
