Yes, it probably does work for the East and the South. And it would work for the American Southwest and California, up to the point when settlers from the US moved in.

You can still see it in the architecture of "Mormon" settlements and today in places like Phoenix, Arizona where retirees and emigrants from the East replace the native vegetation with things they are familiar with -- and allegeries to the pollen of which many of them left the East to alleviate!

We like that with which we are familiar, whether it's appropriate to where we are or not.