Alfred Byrd Graf

Who was Alfred Byrd Graf?

Alfred Byrd Graf was a German-American botanist who traveled the world in search of obscure plant species, discovering more than 100 previously undocumented varieties. He photographed and documented his findings in a number of richly illustrated books he wrote on the subject.

Graf was born in Nuremberg in December 1901 and studied at botanic gardens in Vienna and took courses in botany, photography and language throughout Europe, in California and at Fairleigh Dickinson University.

He came to work on a ranch in Nebraska in the 1920s and later established a floral shop in Sioux City, Iowa that failed after his greenhouse was demolished as the result of a hailstorm. He found a position in 1931 with the Julius Roehrs Company, a tropical nursery in New Jersey, where his experience growing orchids in his youth in Germany helped him tap into what was becoming a major field of interest in the U.S. With his position at Roehrs, his travels allowed him to bring back new species that the company could add to its catalog, which morphed into book form as the Exotic Plant Manual, complete with 7,000 photos.