Stoke's Aster or Stokesia has been a favorite in Mississippi gardens for many decades. The clump in my backyard came from my grandmother's garden and originally from the old home place in Holmes county, so we can trace it back for a hundred and twenty years.

As often occurs in biology names are rather fluid. Take the members of the Compositae family. They were probably very happy with other members with composite flowers. Then along comes the aster who looks at the other members and sees a general lack of asterdness. At various and sundry Compositae botanical conventions around the world, there were botanists, who were small in number in the beginning, but were a boisterous lot in beer halls and wine cellars, constantly pushing their asters in the faces of inebriated composite botanists. It took some time, but eventually the aster group prevailed in their quest and convinced enough botanists to change the Compositae family name to Asteraceae. (Not to be confused with the Diplocystaceae family of fungi (formerly Astraeaceae).)