Detours [ A NOTEBOOK OF THE CITY]
nature
PLANTING A LEGACY HOW A CALGARIAN’S LIFELONG HOBBY BECAME AN ACADEMIC TREASURE.
P H OTO G R A P H BY T K T K T K P H O T O S C O U R T E S Y O F L I B R A R I E S A N D C U LT U R A L R E S O U R C E S D I G I TA L C O L L E C T I O N S , U N I V E R S I T Y O F C A L G A R Y
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very vacation in the 1980s and ’90s for the late Isaac Rotstein and his family meant a road trip. But, it wasn’t your typical road trip: The family minivan would travel at a speed of around 25 kilometres per hour, as Rotstein scanned the roadside for unusual plants. Upon spying one — common nipplewort in Horseshoe Bay, B.C., perhaps, or common corncockle near the Idaho-Washington border — Rotstein would slam on the brakes. His wife, Linda, and daughters, Gena, Kim and Sam, grumbled while Rotstein took meticulous notes about the plant and its location, carefully dug it up with his trowel, and then pressed it between newspaper pages with his homemade plant press. Wrangled into the mission, the family was instructed to hold the plant at various angles for photos, and stand on the press for optimal cinching. “It was pure madness,” recalls Rotstein’s daughter Kim Nagan. “We’d have so many fights in the car. We wanted to go see stuff and my dad would say, ‘We are seeing stuff!’” Born in 1947 in a displaced persons camp in Heidelberg, Germany, Rotstein immigrated to Canada with his family in 1950, settling in Calgary. In 1969, he earned a zoology degree from the University of Calgary, followed by a pharmacy degree from the University of British Columbia in 1971. A career pharmacist — he owned the Alberta Clinic Pharmacy in Mission avenuecalgary.com
Solanum dulcamara Linnaeus (bittersweet nightshade).
Rhus radicans Linnaeus (poison ivy).
Lysimachia thyrsiflora Linnaeus (tufted yellow loosestrife).
Solanum sarrachoides Sendtner (ground-cherry nightshade). 21
