There is no doubt in my mind that if the great plant explorer Joseph Rock was alive today he would be best known through his many social media connections. Even as a world traveler in the beginning of the 20th century, he was fond of having his picture taken, often with a large format camera with glass negatives.
In the course of his life time he botanized in Hawaii and much of Central Asia. Self taught, Rock collected and recorded new plants and identified animal and bird species while he worked for the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology. He wrote ten articles for the National Geographic, almost all of them about his difficult expeditions to western China. His last expedition was for Charles S. Sargent (of the Sargent's crabapple) while he was employed by the Arnold Arboretum. There you can find a database of his photographs, as well as those of other plant explorers.
To look at his many black and white photographs, one can tell that he was curious about the people and dress. Numerous photographs show Rock himself in local garb, once again posing for the camera.
He traveled with a full set of silverware and an Abercrombie and Fitch canvas bathtub. I can only imagine that he may have been a challenging man to work for but despite his eccentricity, he was successful in his many expeditions.
Naturally there are many photographs of plants, everything from rhododendrons to large conifers but then you run across this photograph of prayer flags made of sheep bones.
Or just a few guys posing before they go about their day.
So often the posing was done beside a large tree so the viewer could understand scale, Joseph Rock made sure you saw everything, as well as himself in his standard pose.
So you understand what I mean about social media. His Facebook page would have 2 million fans (of course I would be one) and most of his photographs would be selfies. Instagram, twitter, oh yeah. His Pinterest boards would be "Images of Tibet", "Maps of China", and "Plants I Have Discovered". For his blog we would see and read about the beautiful mountains of Western China as well as the colorful wardrobes of the Tibetan people. In his honor I put together a little blog header page.
Just imagine!
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