238 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Old clocks and old crockery are heir-looms. Even the spot where the first 

 shanty of the pioneer stood is consecrated ground. Gray haired veterans re- 

 count their early exploits with pardonable pride as they swing in hammocks in 

 the ample shade of the trees they planted. A few years more, and they who 

 planted the seeds of our earliest trees will be laid beneath them. Hammocks 

 will swing, children will laugh in the shade, strangers will eat of the fruit, but 

 the memory of him who planted the tree will fast fade away. It is very ap- 

 propriate that these items shall now be gathered. 



The pioneers of our county came principally from New York and New Eng- 

 land. They came to make homes. They "came to stay." They had been 

 accustomed to the use of fruit, and they thought that nothing would conduce 

 so much to the comforts of their new homes as the fruits they were familiar 

 with; so they, in many instances, brought witli them seeds and cions. The 

 first apple seeds planted in the county was in the spring of 1836, by John 

 Lyle, sen., brought by him the fall before from Utica, N. Y. They were 

 planted on the farm now owned by T. Adriance, northwest of Paw Paw, near 

 the southwest corner of the farm, adjoining the road. Only a pint of the seed 

 was brought, and a part was reserved for the next spring's planting, fearing 

 lest some change of climate might destroy it all. The balance of the seed 

 was sown in the spring of 1837, across the road, west, on the farm now owned 

 by Thomas Tuckey. Mr. Lyle was not a nurseryman, and he let his son-in- 

 law, Edwin Barnum, have a part of the seedlings, which he transplanted to 

 his farm, or clearing, west of the village ; and George Smith, a tailor of Paw 

 Paw, who knew something of grafting, had some of them. 



In the spring of 1838 James Lee came in from Ogden, Monroe county, New 

 York, and brought with him cions of several of the then well-known varieties, 

 and most of the older orchards now have some of those old varieties, viz. : K. 

 I. Greening, Seek-no-Further, Spitzenburg, Spice Sweet, Roxbury Russet, Big 

 Stem Harvest, Holland Pippin, Early Harvest, Swaar, Twenty Ounce, Sweet 

 Bough, Oheesboro' Russett, Redstreak Harvest, and Ox Heart. These cions 

 were divided between Smith and Barnum and grafted on their seedlings, — Lee 

 receiving one-third for the cions. 



Joshua Bangs come to Paw Paw in 1836, sent back to Monroe county, New 

 York, for some apple seeds, and planted them in the spring of 1837. He had 

 learned to bud and graft before leaving home, and was the first to bud seed- 

 liugs in this county. In 1840 he set an orchard from the seedlings in his 

 nursery, and most of the old orchards in the vicinity of Paw Paw are from that 

 stock. The first apples grown near Paw Paw were from the orchard of Mr. 

 Bangs. It may be stated as a matter of interest that this seedling orchard, 

 after growing to twelve inches or more in diameter, began to die out several 

 years ago, and last fall (1879) the trees were all dug out and the field is now 

 (Sept. 1, 1880), ripening a good crop of corn. 



John Hunt came to Michigan from Vermont in 1837, cleared a small piece 

 of ground on his farm five miles east of Paw Paw, and the next spring went to 

 Dunham's nursery, south of Kalamazoo, and purchased apple trees for an 

 orchard, which is still standing, although showing signs of decay. 



After the Bangs seedlings were used up, the Dunham nursery furnished most 

 of the trees to the settlers, although some came from Plymouth, Wayne county, 

 and a few from Schoolcraft and Cooper, Kalamazoo county. This was between 

 1840 and '44. 



Isaac Barnum came to Paw Paw in 1836, from Cayuga county, N. Y., and 

 brought with him peach pits. From these pits came the first peach trees 



