Mighty Atom snowdrops
Mighty Atom snowdrops
John Gray was a well-known snowdrop enthusiast who gardened at Benhall in Suffolk. His garden contained some extremely fine and un-named snowdrops. When John Gray died in 1952, some of the finest plants passed to E.B. Anderson, who made a special trip to collect them.
One clump was to be named John Gray and remains distinct to this day. The other clump was of a small-statured plant with extremely large flowers and was named Mighty Atom. Mighty Atom, though, is fertile and can and does occassionally produce seedlings very similar to the parent. As Mighty Atom increased and was passed around, some of these seedlings were given out such that the name began to apply to a considerable number of different but very similar plants.
A successful attempt was made in the 1990s to clarify the confusion with samples of all the main contenders gathered with details of their known provenance. The result was an article by Dr.A. C. Leslie in The Plantsman giving details and photograhs of them all as well as a useful key.
The "full set" described in this article are:- Mighty Atom, Falkland House, Bertram Anderson, Eliot Hodgkin, Little Ben, Moortown, Imbolc and Bill Bishop.
