HISTORY OF MICHIGAN HORTICULTURE. 219 



L. W. Case has a very good seedling apple, of very good size and quality, and 

 a good keeper. We will be glad to send specimens to Mr. Lyon or any one if 

 wanted this fall. No fruit to speak of has been shipped as yet from this 

 county. The old orchards are small, and set only for family supply. Many of 

 the trees proved to be unprofitable, not the right kinds for us. Many large 

 new orchards have been set within the last few years. A few plums, and, I 

 think, pears, have been shipped from Frankfort and brought extra high prices, 

 as they were of very superior quality. I do not know as we have ever had a 

 very destructive visitation from insects. We have our quota of the curculio, 

 codling moth, tent caterpillars, etc., etc. 



The Benzie county agricultural society has been the only society that has 

 paid much attention to horticulture. This body has had regular annual fairs 

 since 1863, and the most prominent part of its exhibition has been the show 

 of fruit. We have never failed to have an exhibit of peaches, pears, and 

 plums, as well as an abundance of apples. It was this county that showed in 

 competition with Grand Traverse county at Traverse City in the fall of 1873, 

 when the State Pomological Society met there. 



Latterly there has been a society formed at Benzonia, known as the Benzonia 

 Pomological Society. This society has quarterly meetings for discussion and 

 show of fruits. We shall try and re-organize as a branch of the State society 

 at our next meeting in September. 



There was a pomological society formed at Frankfort, but nothing has been 

 heard from it recently. 



I would, in conclusion, mention the following men as interested and engaged 

 to a greater or less extent in fruit-growing in our county at present : C. F. 

 Hopkins, S. Small, H. 0. Mack, J. A. and W. J. Pettett, J. E. Burr, John 

 Vaudmun, and A. B. Adams, of Benzonia; A. G. Butler, II. M. Spicer, N. A. 

 Parker, and Dr. Voorhies, of Frankfort; Wm. Voorhies and Mr. Axtell, of 

 Blain ; H. Cooper and John Greenwood, of Gilmore ; C. Parker, of Joyfield ; 

 W. Case, of Homestead; J. Reynolds, of Ireland. There are probably others 

 whose names I have not. 



BARRY COUNTY. 



PREPARED BY GEO. K. BEAMER, OF IRVING. 



I have made diligent search to obtain the historical facts relative to the early 

 or pioneer work in horticulture in the county of Barry. Hunting them out 

 has been a work of no little difficulty, partly from the weakness of human 

 memory of the few pioneers yet living, and more because so many are dead. 

 Thirty-five to forty years will remove by death a great number of men and 

 Avomen who w6re already twenty-five to forty years old when they commenced 

 life in the wilderness. I think I was not entirely unprepared for this work 

 which you called on me to do. I was born and brought up in one of the best 

 fruit regions in this latitude, the lime-stone ridges of Lewiston, Niagara county, 

 New York. I was a small boy when I found a very great variety of choice 

 fruit on my father's farm ; apples, pears, peaches, plums, apricots, nectarines, 

 grapes, currants, and gooseberries were grown in abundance. Prior to the com- 

 pletion of the Erie canal we were without a market, and wagon loads of the 

 choicest peaches and plums rotted on the ground; but not long after that time 

 fruit began to be an article of commerce, and as such has continued to increase 



