Every botanical writer feels compelled to mention that this species is neither an artichoke nor from Jerusalem. One wonders whether anyone in the modern age has ever made that mistake. This is quite obviously a sunflower, though one more noted for its edible tuber than for its seeds. The flowers are delightful, to butterflies as well as to humans. The plant is very similar to Thin-Leaved Sunflower (H. decapetalus), but note the more robust leaves, hairy stem, and shorter bracts.

Flowers. Heads terminal on branching stalks. Disk flowers golden; rays (about 13) golden, darkening to pale orange toward center. Bracts about as long as the disk.

Leaves. Very rough; mid-green above, paler below; upper nearly sessile, lower on short petioles with tapering wings; mostly opposite, but upper alternate; upper nearly entire, lower with shallow teeth.

Stem. Narrow but very strong; purple most of its length; very hairy; branching, especially toward ends.

Gray describes the genus and the species:

HELIÁNTHUS L. Sunflower. Heads many-flowered; rays several or many, neutral. Involucre Imbricated, herbaceous or foliaceous. Receptacle flat or convex; the persistent chaff embracing the 4-sided and laterally compressed smooth achenes, which are neither winged nor margined. Pappus very deciduous, of 2 thin chafly scales on the principal angles, and sometimes 2 or more small intermediate scales. — Coarse and stout herbs, with solitary or corymbcd heads, and yellow rays; flowering toward autumn. (Named from helios, the sun, and anthos, a flower.)

§2. Perennials; receptacle convex or at length low-conical; lower leaves usually opposite.

Involucre looser, the bracts more acuminate or elongated or foliaceous.

Leaves all or most of them opposite, 3-nerved.

Leaves longer-petiolate, thinnish or soft, coarsely serrate, commonly broad; bracts loose, hirsute-ciliate.

H. tuberosus L. (JERUSALEM ARTICHOKE.) Pubescent or hirsute, 1.5-3.5 m. high; leaves ovate or subcordate to oblong-lanceolate, acuminate, scabrous above, minutely pubescent or cinereous beneath; bracts lanceolate, attenuate, little exceeding the disk; rays 12-20.—N. Y. to Minn., westw. and southw.; often cultivated, and introduced eastw.

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In his Wild Flowers of New York (1914), Chester Albert Reed gives us some of the lore of this beautiful sunflower:

This is an interesting native plant  often known as the Wild Sunflower. Indians and early colonists used its tuberous roots much as we use potatoes today. It was also carried abroad and cultivated extensively, particularly in Italy, where it was known as Girasole Articocco (Sunflower Artichoke), from which name it was corrupted into the Jerusalem Artichoke as we know it now. The stalk, which grows from six to twelve feet in height is very rough and the three-ribbed, toothed-edged leaves, the lower ones of which are set oppositely on the stalk, are also rough,—this roughness presumably being to discourage crawling insects from reaching the summit. The several flower heads are two or three inches across and consist of from a dozen to twenty rays about a greenish-yellow center. This species naturally grows in somewhat moist thickets but is often seen in or about old gardens where it continues to grow as a reminder of the days when it was cultivated for food.

The thin leaves are indeed a distinguishing feature of this plant; most sunflowers have coarse and strong leaves, but these are thin and rather weak. These plants were growing on a shady wooded hillside above a back street in Beechview.

Flower Heads. The disk is smallish and golden yellow. The matching golden rays are long and narrow; there were ten to twelve of them on each of the flower heads on this plant, but (as the specific name implies) ten is a good average for this species. Note the long, narrow bracts, visible on the bud to the left in the photograph above.

Leaves. Thin; rough on some plants, smooth on others; ovate, pointed; toothed; upper leaves nearly sessile; lower on winged petioles.

Stem. Smooth and tough, green with a few red spots; about 4 feet tall.

Gray describes the genus and the species:

HELIÁNTHUS L. Sunflower. Heads many-flowered; rays several or many, neutral. Involucre Imbricated, herbaceous or foliaceous. Receptacle flat or convex; the persistent chaff embracing the 4-sided and laterally compressed smooth achenes, which are neither winged nor margined. Pappus very deciduous, of 2 thin chafly scales on the principal angles, and sometimes 2 or more small intermediate scales. — Coarse and stout herbs, with solitary or corymbcd heads, and yellow rays; flowering toward autumn. (Named from helios, the sun, and anthos, a flower.)

§2. Perennials; receptacle convex or at length low-conical; lower leaves usually opposite.

Involucre looser, the bracts more acuminate or elongated or foliaceous.

Leaves all or most of them opposite, 3-nerved.

Leaves longer-petiolate, thinnish or sofl, coarsely serrate, commonly broad; bracts loose, hirsute-ciliate.

H. decapétalus L. Stem branching, 0.5-1.5 m. high, smooth below; leaves smooth or roughish, ovate, pointed, abruptly contracted into margined petioles; bracts lanceolate-linear, elongated, loosely spreading, sometimes foliaceous, the outer longer than the disk; rays about 10 (H. scrophulariifolius Britton?) — Copses and low banks of streams, centr. Me. and w. Que. to Minn., Mo., and southw.

A tall, sunflower-like plant that grows at the edge of the woods; this one was growing where the woods met a parking lot at a park in Beechview.

Flowers. Heads on long terminal stalks; disk florets numerous, golden yellow; rays about 10 to 12, linear-elliptical, golden yellow, to orange at base, with two prominent and numerous lesser parallel ribs, very slight notch at end.

Leaves. Mostly smooth; undersides rough at edges; oval, pointed, toothed; lower leaves with nearly flat base, upper leaves more rounded; net-veined, with very strong ribs; opposite, but upper sometimes alternate; upper not quite sessile, lower on short petioles; dark green above, much lighter below.

Also called Bushy Goldenrod, Grass-Leaved Goldenrod, Fragrant Goldenrod, and probably any number of other names. This is one of the class of flat-topped goldenrods that most botanists now put in their own genus, Euthamia, rather than lumping them in with Solidago the way older botanists did. Identification is easy, because this is the only flat-topped goldenrod reported to grow in the Pittsburgh area. These plants were growing beside a shopping-center parking lot in Banksville, where they were blooming in the middle of August.

Flowers. Heads in irregular loose flattish cymes; individual heads small; with a sweet scent, like chrysanthemum.

Leaves. Linear, sessile, alternate; dark green above and below; with three veins, the central vein much the strongest; underside somewhat rough if rubbed toward stem.

Stem. Strong, resists bending; not quite smooth; about 3 feet high (a meter or so).

Gray puts this in the genus Solidago with the rest of the goldenrods. We turn to Britton, therefore, for a description of the genus and species:

EUTHÀMIA Nutt. Erect, paniculately branched herbs, perennial by long rootstocks, with linear or linear-lanceolate entire sessile 1-5-nerved punctate leaves, and numerous small heads of both tubular and radiate yellow flowers, clustered in the large cymose, convex or nearly flat-topped inflorescence. Bracts of the involucre obtuse, appressed, somewhat glutinous. Receptacle flattish, flmbrillate, or pilose. Ray-flowers pistillate, usually more numerous than the disk-flowers, the rays small. Disk-flowers perfect. Anthers obtuse at the base. Style-branches with lanceolate appendages. Achenes top-shaped or oblong, villous-pubescent. [Greek, referring to the clustered heads.]

Euthamia graminifòlia (L.) Nutt. BUSHY or FRAGRANT GOLDENROD. Stem glabrous, sometimes slightly rough above, 6-12 dm. high. Leaves numerous, linear-lanceolate, acuminate or acute at each end, 2-12 cm. long, 4-8 mm. wide, minutely rough-pubescent on the margins and nerves of the lower surface; resinous dots few; heads 4-6 mm. high, sessile in capitate clusters arranged in a flat-topped corymbose cyme; involucre ovoid-campanulate, its bracts oblong or oblong-lanceolate, slightly viscid; disk-flowers 8-12. In moist soil, fields and roadsides, N. B. to the N. W. Terr., Fla., Neb. and Kans. July-Sept.

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In Wild Flowers Every Child Should Know, Frederic William Stack gives us this description:

BUSHY, OR FRAGRANT GOLDEN-ROD

Solidago graminifolia. Thistle Family.

This species differs so much from the true Goldenrods, Solidago, with which it is classed, that many botanists regard it as the leading type of a separate and new genus, Euthamia, a Greek word referring to its clustered heads. The crushed leaves and flowers are fragrant. This, together with its flat top has often caused it to be mistaken for Tansy. Its slender, leafy, green stalk branches widely at the top. It is occasionally rough to the touch, and grows from two to four feet high. The long and very narrow grass-like leaves taper toward either end, and their margins are entire, but very rough. They are very small, and thin-textured, grayish-green in colour, and show three or five ribs. The flowers are very small and are closely grouped in small, round clusters at the tips of the projecting, wiry branches, which are so graduated in length as to form a flat-topped, flowering head. The whole top is very free and open, and has a neat, trim appearance. The flowers are light coloured, and have from twelve to twenty very short ray flowers. This plant is found in moist soil in fields and along roadsides, from July to October. It ranges from New Brunswick to the Northwest Territory, south to Florida, Nebraska, and Missouri.

This once-ubiquitous garden annual was out of fashion for decades, but is now making a comeback. It never really went out of style in old city neighborhoods where gardeners still grow their gardens from seed. It’s also happy to escape from gardens and go wild wherever it finds an opportunity. Here we see one that sprouted against the curb at the edge of a busy street in Beechview, where it found just enough soil to flourish and bloom in late July.

Gray does not list this species, so we turn to Williamson Nevin Geddes, who describes many commonly cultivated plants in his Brief Flora of the Eastern United States (1904).

ZÍNNIA, L. Annual or perennial, American, chiefly Mexican herbs, with opposite, mostly sessile and entire leaves, and solitary terminal heads of showy tubular and radiate, variously colored flowers. Disk flowers perfect, with 5 velvety lobes. Rays pistillate, persistent on the akenes. Involucral scales imbricated, in several rows. Receptacle conical or at length cylindrical, its chaff clasping the disk flowers. Akenes of disk compressed, their pappus of 1 to 2 awns; those of the rays 3-angled, without pappus.

Z. élegans, Youth and Old Age. L.  A Mexican annual, 1° to 3° high, the parent of most of the garden Zinnias, with ovate-elliptic, clasping leaves 2′ to 3′ long, peduncles longer than the leaves and smaller upward, and heads 2′ to 5′ wide. Rays reflexed, originally in a single series, purple or lilac, but by cultivation double and of nearly every color, except blue and green, from white to dark purple. Disk flowers originally yellow or orange, but in the double forms nearly or entirely wanting. Pales serrated. Akenes of disk 2-awned. July to Oct.