You might think that slide carousels labeled “A Walking Tour of Rice University” would contain the photos from the book entitled “A Walking Tour of Rice University.” I know I certainly thought that. It’s not quite so simple, though.
In the Bud Morehead collection there are several such slide carousels, none of which I had ever bothered to look at because . . . well, those pictures are much more easily available in the book and in the large stacks of photos in another part of the collection. I didn’t have any reason to look last week either but what the heck, I went ahead and looked anyway. (It’s summertime! I’m free as a bird.)
It turns out that there are a lot of images from the book in those slide carousels but there are also many that not only don’t appear in the book, but also don’t exist as photographs. Some of these slides are pretty exciting, others are less splashy but show things I’ve never seen before or frankly never even thought of.
Today I’m going for flash so hang on tight.
Here, from 1950 is a stunning shot taken by someone practically standing in Harris Gully looking straight up towards the new stadium construction:
Happy summer!
Bonus: Anyone know what this tree is?
The plant (tree?) looks a lot like a variety or relative of an oleander.
Looks like an oleander to me, too.
Yeah, could be oleander. That’s a lazy gardener plant. It’s an alien species with no native predators and it doesn’t contribute to the local ecosystem. Also toxic. It is one step up from a plastic plant. Or maybe one step down. A lot like eucalyptus, but not a fire hazard and you can’t feed it to koalas. Essentially, shrub kudzu.
Planted all along freeways in California.
Always looks lush because nothing eats it. They should be planting azaleas instead.
Oleander may be what it is, but to me it looks like a Desert Willow. We planted one on our patio when we moved into our new house in Magnolia Grove near Washington and Shepherd seven years ago.
I agree with Sigsby. Desert Willow (Chilopsis linearis) was my first thought when I saw this photo yesterday, and even more so seeing the second photos, posted today (Thursday).
The leaves appear too thin and sparse to be Oleander. (At least a healthy oleander.) And its open growth habit, shown better in Thursday’s photo, looks much more like Desert Willow than Oleander.
It’s great to see this desert wash plant growing to be so tall and happy in sopping-wet Houston. I had planted one in my San Jose, Calif., yard last fall … but it’s a baby from a 1-gallon pot … only 8 inches tall, and not flowering yet. 🙂
BTW, there’s no mention of either Desert Willow or Oleander (Nerium oleander) in Rice’s interactive campus tree map: http://fon-gis.rice.edu/ricetrees/
Now that we can see the trunk and branch structure (in Thursday’s picture), I withdraw my suggestion that it might be an oleander. It matches online photos of Desert Willow trees much better.
I agree it’s a Desert Willlow. I have one in my yard. They will grow any place that has very good drainage.
Could the photographer have been standing on the bridge over Harris Gully to the old stadium?
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