With Christmas weeks away, poinsettias are already beginning to show up in stores — but you may have also noticed that the name Poinsett is common in Greenville. There’s the Poinsett hotel, bridge, highway, apartment complex, and the upcoming Christmas parade that bears the name.
Since flower growing was a dominant part of Elizabeth Garraux’s life, chances are good that she probably grew the dramatic winter blooms. They were first brought to America by a man who lived in Greenville about 20 years before she got here.
Joel Roberts Poinsett was the first-appointed U.S. ambassador to Mexico. He was, among other things, also a skilled botanist. In 1825 while visiting Taxco, Mexico, he fell in love with cuetlaxochitl — showy, red-topped shrubs that were common in that region. Poinsett, who was from Charleston, shipped some plants back to his summer home in Greenville.
Over the years he propagated the plants and gifted them to various friends and other botanists. After some years, a nurseryman in Philadelphia became the first person known to have marketed poinsettias commercially. In 1833, the plant was given its common name in honor of the man who first imported it.
If you’d like to meet him face-to-face, there is a life-size bronze statue of Joel Poinsett in front of the Westin Poinsett in downtown Greenville, and a portrait of him hangs on the ground floor.
Every year more than 35 million potted poinsettias are sold in the U.S., almost a quarter of all the potted plants that are sold.
