CHARLES ROGERS BULLIS

In March we honored Nettie Bullis on her birthday. Now, as crocuses show their colorful faces and daffodil shoots poke through April's warming soil, our attention appropriately turns to her only sibling, Charlie, and his horticultural achievements.

He was Abraham and Josephine's eldest child, born October 13, 1891. After finishing high school at Macedon Union School, Charlie briefly taught at District #2 school in Walworth, New York. In 1913 he applied and passed the entrance exam to Cornell University but never attended the school. Following service in World War I, he devoted himself to projects conducted in and on the family's Canandaigua Road property.

His horticulture interest evidently stemmed from both genetic and environmental factors, according to Elizabeth Ferrari's 1984 account in THE BULLIS FAMILY OF MACEDON, NEW YORK:

Abraham's wife, Josephine, was a very fine lady. Her home was always
spotless and her yards filled with beautifully kept flower gardens of
tulips, daffodils, irises, and lilacs. These gardens were begun by
her husband.

Ferrari also notes that Charlie was a highly intelligent man who thought differently than others. He had a variety of interests and would start projects that he soon lost interest in, such as his flying glider invention that he abandoned "before he could put the feathers on it!" However, he never lost interest in breeding his flowers and plants.

Through years of experimenting, Charlie bred many of his own hybrid plants. He developed a hybrid corn that interested American Can Company, collected sweet corn from Indian tribes all over the world, and bred a corn kernel one inch in diameter. As a result, Cornell University asked him to help them with the breeding of corn. He pursued these horticultural projects over many years, but did not follow through on either American Can or Cornell's proposals.

Although Charlie did not earn a higher-level educational degree, he became a renowned botanist by extensive self-study (reading the vast choice of books and materials in the family library) and through experimentation. His expertise was greatly respected and other botanists throughout North America sought his advice. His urge to share knowledge with others is evident in his contributions to horticulture bulletins and journals. One of these papers was respectfully referred to by a Canadian forest-tree geneticist.

A favorite story of Charlie-admirers centers around a horticultural manuscript that he needed typed in order to submit it for publication. He found a neighbor who was willing to do the work and paid for that clerical work with some of his prized tulip bulbs. (He was a staunch believer in bartering.) Other examples of his New England thriftiness, as well as the high value others put on his horticulture achievements, regularly occurred in Charlie's lifetime.

Charlie's only apparent extravagance was in producing the beautiful, showy flowers that brought pleasure to everyone who saw them. Local residents today still speak of driving by the Bullis house when he was alive and admiring the sea of red poppies and yellow daffodils.

Charlie Bullis died in the springtime on May 13, 1974, when all his flowers were blooming.