SAINT CLAIR - A flowering plant in the borough has been passed down through the generations and is at least 170 years old.
Now belonging to William and Darlene Bowler, the plant, known as Hymenocallis americana, or the "spider lily," originally belonged to Darlene Bowler's great-grandmother, Martha Shoemaker.
During both the lives of her great-grandmother and grandmother, Edith Shoemaker, the flower had never bloomed.
It wasn't until two weeks after her grandmother died that it bloomed for the first time.
"My mother (Martha Hane) hadn't seen them until after her mother died, then they bloomed several times," Darlene Bowler said. "They bloomed my entire lifetime, our daughters' entire lifetime and now our grandchildren's entire life."
Going through at least five or six generations of family, the plant remained with Bowler's mother until 2002 when she became ill.
The Bowlers said they knew it was at least 170 years old since, while they haven't been able to locate it, there was an article in The Pottsville Journal about 1939 stating the plant was already 100 years old.
"I don't know if she got them from her father, who was the first generation here, but all girls had them and they were just passed down," Darlene Bowler said. "I know they've been going strong since before 1937."
According to research by Patrick M. "Porcupine Pat" McKinney, environmental education coordinator for the Schuylkill Conservation District, who also helped the Bowler family identify the plant, it is a perennial herb that originated in the American tropics and the West Indies.
When the Bowlers received the plant, William Bowler said he wasn't exactly sure how to take care of it correctly, but he did know it was kept inside until about June, then was outside until the fall.
Since he was trying to figure out what kind of plant it was and how to take care of it, he took it to Trail Gardens, 154 Gordon Nagle Trail, Pottsville, who kept it over the winter after they received it.
Bowler said it was thanks to Trail Gardens' care of the plant, as well as humidity, that the plant came back to life.
Once he added an addition onto his house, he starting keeping the plants by the windows during the winters and outside in his backyard during the summer.
While the plant originally only consisted of two plants or bulbs, the seventh plant is now about to bloom.
"This is phenomenal," Bowler said.
Every year, he splits any new bulbs into separate pots, and now both of the Bowlers' daughters have received plants and even some neighbors.
They said their grandchildren are even starting to get a green thumb as well, and they hope the family will be able to enjoy the plants for generations to come.