But rose lovers know her for the orange red variety bearing her name. The rose is a symbol of times. In fact, it's the official National Floral Emblem of the United States. Leave it to the romantic French to be the ones to first deliver roses. It was in the seventeenth century that French explorer Samuel deChamplain brought the first cultivated roses to North America.
Roses are truly ageless.
Recently, archaeologists discovered the fossilized remains of wild roses over 40 million years old. The people of ancient Greece used roses to accessorize. On festive occasions they would adorn themselves with garlands of roses, and splash themselves with rose-scented oil. Napoleon's wife Josephine so adored roses, she grew more than 250 varieties. For the past 30 years and counting, June has been the National Rose Month in the United States.