Curtis' Botanical Magazine (1808)
Flower-Garden Displayed: in which The most Ornamental Foreign plants, cultivated in the Open Ground, the Green-House, and the Stove, are accurately represented in their natural Colours… continued by John Sims. London: Printed by Stephen Couchman, 1808.
Sim's common catalpa William Curtis, English botanist, entomologist, and editor, founded Curtis's Botanical Magazine; or, Flower-Garden Displayed: in which The most Ornamental Foreign plants, cultivated in the Open Ground, the Green-House, and the Stove, are accurately represented in their natural Colours. The famous British artist Sydenham Edwards did the drawing of Catalpa bignonioides (called by Sims Catalpa syringifolia-common catalpa) displayed here. The text credits Mark Catesby for introducing it into English gardens about the year 1728. In his 1818 Philadelphia flora, William Barton cites Edward's drawing with his description of the "Catalpa-tree" and states that it is "difficult to ascertain whether it has not been originally planted near the places where it is now so abundantly found, in the vicinity of this city." Botanists now consider Catalpa bignonioides as native to the southern United States and introduced in the Philadelphia area. Barton further states that it occurs "On the banks of the Delaware, and Schuylkill, and elsewhere; common." Today there are scattered sites for it in Fairmount Park.