SOLON — There is a lot of history and heritage in Solon. Some is easy to see, such as the old buildings along Main Street, others, such as where the Rock Island railroad once ran, not so much unless you know what you’re looking at/for. But history and heritage go beyond brick and mortar, or steel rails and wooden poles. There’s also a natural heritage cultivated over the course of a hundred years or more in the form of plants descended from the town’s early settlers.
A highly informal group, The Solon Heritage Flower Society, was formed in 1985 to keep the town’s horticultural history alive and thriving for generations to come.
“Our effort is to preserve the old flowers and shrubs, many of which came with the immigrants (to Solon) in the 1800s,” said Toni Russo. “They (the seeds) came in their handkerchiefs and in their pockets. A lot of Solon was full of these little plants.” In recent years she has spearheaded efforts to relocate flowers believed to have originated in the 1800s, and that have survived as the city grew up around them. “We said we have to save these old plants, because everyone’s moving in, and they’re the first thing that goes (people digging up the old plants for new landscaping. To walk around Solon on a spring or summer night was just to blow your mind. All these things were here in everyone’s yard. As these people passed, new people came in who just didn’t understand. ‘Get that old rose out of there and put in one from K-Mart.’”
Today she is attempting to keep a new generation of apricot trees thriving and maintaining a legacy spanning possibly 100 years “We moved to Solon in 1974 and the original apricot tree was up the street, across from the old school in that empty lot, and it was split by lightning (in ’84). Half of it hanging in the street, and I would assume it’d been there a good 30-40-50 years before that. That was an old tree. Ronnie Worrell, I think had a relative in that house, and he grew one in his backyard because that old one was brought down (sometime) in the early or mid-eighties. That was the last of the apricots, or so we thought. I would often visit with him and one summer he gave me a bucket of apricots. I ate them and spit out the pits in the garden.” The pits (seed) took root and Toni found an apricot tree growing in her backyard. “It was an enormous, beautiful tree,” she said.
It also acquired a name – The Electric Tree, after it was covered by a buzzing swarm of honeybees enjoying the nectar and making a sound not unlike an electrical hum. “You could hear them down the street, you could hear them up a block or two. It became legendary because half of it was over the street and neighbors would come by, and people would come from up town with wagons to fill with apricots.
They were small and sweet, and when that tree came down (in the 2020 Derecho), I thought that was the end of it.”
But, as she said, “Au contraire. The next spring we dug out probably half a dozen.” Those seedlings went to friends and neighbors, continuing the legacy of apricot trees in Solon. In addition, it’s continuing a seed line of natural heartiness and resiliency, she said, which by default extended to the older generations who grew a variety of fruits throughout the spring and summer and preserved them in order to be able to enjoy them during the fall and winter.
“What we’re trying to do is to get people to see the value of these plants before they’re all gone.” These trees, arguably “native,” are no comparison to commercially grown trees one would find at a garden center, she said. “They’re (store bought) hybridized and really pretty for a year or two, and then it would freeze-out and wouldn’t bloom. Everything is hybridized for a different value than these old trees. Now we hybridize to look nice and have nice plump fruit, but there’s no hardiness and the fragrance is one of the first things that goes when we hybridize plants.”
Toni’s yard is an all-natural home to a variety of plants, shrubs, and trees that are descended from those 1800s settlers. “This (old Solon) was a little habitat. This is a little ecosystem, these backyards. We don’t use any chemicals, everything gets weeded by hand. They interact with the bees and the hummingbirds, with everything. Everything feeds off of that fruit. So these are rich trees.” Her chemical-free yard has become a haven for bees and praying mantis and has also attracted a new visitor since the March 31 tornado roared by across the street. “I’m proud to say we now have a cooper’s hawk. I’ve been seeing him for the last two weeks and he sits on that darned stump (of the Derecho-destroyed apricot tree) looking around. It’s habitat. It’s habitat.”
Toni is on a mission to bring back at least some of the old Solon natural habitat and is doing so in a unique way. As of Friday, April 14 she has 13 young apricot trees, which are blooming. They sprouted from pits that came from the now-gone tree. And “I want to get them into as many homes as possible because this is what we want to carry with us into this new century.” The store bought trees are “fine,” she said, but they’re dependent on chemicals. “These guys are the survivors and 100 years from now, if we keep planting them, if we keep an eye on them, they’ll still be here. And to say nothing of their beauty and their fragrance. You can smell them a block-and-a-half down when the wind is right. That’s how they attract the pollinators.”
If you would like to add one or more of these heirloom apricot trees, call Toni at 319-644-2777, “or just stop by.” But, she added “I want them to go to people who are willing to make a commitment to keeping them and passing them on. It’s not just something to ‘have,’ Its almost an unspoken agreement between us that for the rest of its life you’ll protect it, especially as soon as its hearty and steady enough; your job is to pass it on. 100 years from now, we’ll still have it.”
Young apricot trees were blooming recently in Toni Russo’s yard in Solon. Russo hopes to preserve “Old Solon’s” horticultural heritage by finding new homes for roughly a dozen such trees.