Orchids for all

Former Director of Palm Garden Schoser turns 80

He would not like to "steal the show" from those who today have the responsibility. That is why for some years Gustav Schoser has not all too often been seen at his former workplace. Unless he is asked for his help - or he is celebrated as this Sunday. Tomorrow, the City of Frankfurt organises a great reception for the 80th birthday of the long-standing director of the Palm Garden. He was "more than surprised" about this honour - and even more about the number of people who have confirmed their attendance at the event, he says.

Gustav Schoser, born in 1924 in Trochtelfingen in the Swabian Alb is still a famous man in Frankfurt - and beyond. After all, both an Indonesian orchid species and a Dutch tulip are named after him. In 1968, the Ph.D. botanist who previously worked as curator of the Botanical Garden of the University of Tübingen, took over the management of the Palm Garden. He took his office always very seriously - and if need be was not afraid of conflict. Every generation must ask itself the question how the Frankfurters' "citizens garden" can best meet its functions, this is still his belief.

He himself began at a time when the justification of so many bourgeois traditions was challenged, if necessary by force: While at the gates of the garden at Siesmayerstraße, the first Molotov cocktails were thrown, Schoser set himself to continue the concept of the garden's founder Siesmayer "to preserve the garden in change." For him, part of it was, among other things, to also make the audience in the Palm Garden understand the gradually emerging issue of the protection of species - "so people would understand what they were talking about." One manifestation of this idea has now become one of the main attractions of the popular Palm Garden - the Tropicarium. "Shrewdness and cunning" were sometimes necessary, the jubilarian is reminiscent of many a project, including the expansion of the Palm Garden by some 20 hectares: A tennis club had to give way to the Palm Garden which did not happen without litigation. 

Likewise, the rose garden in its present from and the garden pedagogy of the "Green School" are innovations that Schoser introduced before his retirement in 1991. He wanted to familiarise the visitors with the creations arising from the "gardener's art": "Everyone can have a relationship with plants", says Schoser whose special love are orchids. In 1975, he managed to get the world orchid conference to come to Frankfurt - and not only for professionals. Long queues were shoving into the Palm Garden. Today, Schoser sees his then almost zeitgeistily formulated objective "orchids for all" realised: Anyone can get them for home - a development that Schoser welcomes.

Orchids are still his commitment. Currently, he is revising his orchids manual which is to be published next spring. However, he has withdrawn from most other obligations, also outside Frankfurt: he did not want to give the impression of interfering constantly, says the modest Swabian, who now lives with his wife Rita in Hofheim. His task, however, has shaped not only Schoser himself, but his whole family. "For our children, the Palm Garden is home", he says today.

The four children and five grandchildren will return to this "home" when the successor's successor Matthias Jenny will welcome Gustav Schoser in the Palm Garden on Sunday at 11 clock. In addition to a recognition of his merits by the competent city councillor Jutta Ebeling (of the Green Party), he will be awarded two honours: Schoser will be appointed honorary chairman by the present chairman of the Palm Garden Society, the botany professor Georg Zizka. Moreover, Schoser will receive the Zander medal of the Association of Botanical Gardens from Stephan Schneckenburger.

EVA-MARIA MAGEL

German original of this article published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 21 August 2004