A rose grows along the roadside near my childhood home. A 90 year old lady living nearby said her mother always called it Mrs. Alkire after the woman who planted it and lived there. A check of census records does indicate a Mrs. Alkire that lived there in the late 1800s.

It is a once blooming rose, very much resembling in size, shape, and color the pictures I have seen of the Apothecary's Rose. However, it does not have the strong scent that rose is supposed to have. Sometimes there is no scent, other times it has an "old rose" scent. There are usually two or three roses in a cluster, and it blooms one time.

The rose has survived annual mowings (it gains enough new growth to bloom the following year), and even being plowed. When I took cuttings and gave it a little TLC, I found it to grow three or four feet tall. It suckers far and wide. I've had suckers as far as six feet from the mother plant.

Does anyone have any idea which old rose this might be? I do have pictures.

Tom