Persimmon in an antique plane would be highly unusual. But it is definitely a very good modern substitute pioneered by Larry Williams of Clark & Williams fame (now Old Street Tools). Matt Bickford also uses it in his planes.
Antique American planes of the 18th and very early 19th century don't generally have wear strips. However, by the time wooden plane making really got huge in the US, most of the wear strips (called "boxing" - for the wood tha was typically used) were indeed boxwood imported in vast amounts into the US.
You can still get European boxwood from Octopus in Turkey, but it's going to cost you a mint - about $125 - $170 a b.f. depending on grade.
But any hard-wearing, relatively stable wood will do. Even hard maple will work if the grain is nice and even. Many sources claim that the boxing in most antique planes were bias-cut so that the actual wear surface was end-grain. Personally, I've not seen a lot of evidence of that, and the face or edge grain of boxwood, a tropical hardwood like wenge or bloodwood, or a hard domestic species like hard maple or persimmon will give you more than enough wear compensation for your lifetime.
One thing I would definitely not suggest that you do - don't glue boxing back into a plane with CA or PVA type glues. Either you or a future owner will want to be able to get the boxing back out at some point so that it can be repaired/replaced. For that reason, I would use hide glue.
