Erlangen, Germany, 1946 or 1947. Mom contemplates the blossoms. The flowers likely are Dahlias; Mom does not recall that Zinnias grew in Germany.
UPDATE: In the comments, Peter Hoh identifies the flowers as Zinnias, and he points us to the German origins of Zinnias.
2 comments:
It's not my intention to play the part of contrarian fact-checker on this blog, but these flowers look like old-fashioned zinnias to me. The height of the stems and the position of the leaves all remind me of the zinnias we grew when I was a child.
Dahlias come in a variety of shapes and sizes. It would be hard to rule them out. And I must admit that I have not grown substantial numbers of them.
Zinnias are named after German botanist, Johann Gottfried Zinn. Link
Here's another source that puts the zinnia in Germany: Link.
Thanks, Peter! I appreciate the fact checking--no need to apologize. I thought they looked like Zinnias, too, but I did not do the background work on the German origins. I assumed they were Mexican.
I posted a photo earlier of my Grandmother's sister, Natasha, with her Dahlias.
BTW, in Lithuanian, "Dahlia" translates as "George Flower" ("Jurginas").
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