Britton & Brown Illustrated Flora, 2nd Edition (1913) – VOLUME III (Gentianaceae to Compositae)

An Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States and Canada
Medicinal Plant excerpts

Michael’s Commentary: Nathaniel Lord Britton (1857-1934) was the first director-in-chief of The New York Botanical Garden and a giant of a taxonomist. From 1896 to 1898 he published the three-volume landmark floristic study An Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States and Canada (Brown financed it), and revised it again in 1913. There are about 4,600 monographs, each illustrated, with a terse taxonomic description and approximate distribution…little capsuled data kernels that I have scanned and updated botanically. It was revised in 1956 by Gleason, but that version is still copyrighted, so here I am with these three monster books from 1913. Dover has also published these titles, which are still readily available…haven’t seen them, just have my three big maroon volumes.

I have extracted all the plants that have substantial therapeutic use, either pharmaceutical or herbal, by the eclectic or physio-medicalist or homeopathic medical sects of the time, or that have widespread former or current Native American use. I have cut some corners…there are 39 Salix monographs, all willows are useful, so I have included the four most widely used species. Some herbs may seem obscure, but I know them to be of value. Some plants are at risk or endangered…were then, are now. I just figure knowledge is power, and as much of this site is heavily tilted towards the North American West, this is some broadening of scope. 

All files are gifs, and approximately 1000 X 650 pixels and 30 to 40 K in size.

VOLUME III – Gentianaceae to Compositae

All images, 4 to a page at 200 dpi for printing – Acrobat .pdf file, 92 pages, 9.5 MB