Oregon's Ft eritage 
© Kae @ LLY 
English Holly is but a single member of the widespread genus 
Ilex which numbers in its botanical family of the hollies of the world 
between five and six hundred named and separately identified 
species. In fact, English Holly is better known to those who specialize 
in the order and naming of our flora, the taxonomists, as Ilex Aqui- 
folium. This latin name when freely translated means holly whose 
foliage is armored with sharp spines, aqui being derived from acus the 
needle. By no means confined to England, Ilex Aquifolium is found 
widely distributed in its natural habitat reaching across the temperate 
zone of Europe, Asia Minor, and eastward to far away China. 
Yet here in the coastal region of the Pacific Northwest we have 
good reason for referring to our hollies as being of English origin. 
Well over a century ago the skippers of English trading vessels 
sailed their precarious way around formidable Cape Horn seeking 
cargoes of furs, and sea routes to treasures of oriental silks and 
spices. Following discovery and exploration of the rich Oregon 
country, colonies of hardy British fur traders and their families were 
established at ports of entry along the densely forested shores about 
the years 1824 to 1844. 
Presided over by Hudson’s Bay Company Factors our early 
English immigrants were supplied by sailing ships from their native 
country not only with articles of trade and the necessities of life, but 
with letters and packets of seed and even little potted hollies to 
remind them of their homeland. Thus well over one hundred years ago 
in a verdant new land of salubrious sunshine alternating with misty 
skies our earliest settlers planted and grew the first of Oregon’s hollies. 
How happy those lonely colonists must have felt as they decked 
their rude homes and hearths in the traditional Christmas manner 
with true holly from England. Today these original English holly 
importations and their multitudinous offspring remain our pride 
and joy, a veritable heritage of holly, a living legacy from Britain. 
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