E. S. CARMAN 



One of the Greatest of American Plant Breeders — His Work Too Little 



Appreciated — Success With Potatoes Most Noteworthy — His 



Activity as a Journalist. 



E. M. East 

 Bussey Institution, Forest Hills, Massachusetts. 



IT IS a delightful epigram but hardl}^ 

 the actual truth that "If a man 

 preach a better sermon, write a 

 better book, or build a better 

 mouse-trap than his neighbor, though 

 he hide himself in the wilderness, the 

 world will make a beaten path to his 

 door." The world as a whole is likely 

 to give its applause to some very unim- 

 portant people. And after all is it not 

 probable that too general a commenda- 

 tion encourages superficial rather than 

 solid work? The anti-socialistic argu- 

 ment that a more even distribution of 

 earthly comforts would oppose progress 

 because it limits ambition is a pure 

 sophism. Few things worth doing have 

 been done with either money, power or 

 fame in view. For this reason there is 

 no need to feel sorry that E. S. Carman, 

 great alike as agricultural journalist, 

 public spirited citizen and creator of 

 new varieties of plants, never received 

 the panegyrics of which some others 

 have been since the recipients. He had 

 the happiness described by Marcus 

 Aurelius: "A man's happiness — to do 

 the things proper to man." Not that 

 Mr. Carman was unknown — perhaps 

 the editor of no rural paper was admired 

 and trusted more — but, even with the 

 temptation of a private medium for 

 exploiting his triumphs, he did no more 

 than describe carefully and impartially 

 success and failures alike with the 

 honesty of a true nature-lover and born 

 investigator. 



Mr. Carman would probably have 

 denied that he was a great plant 

 breeder. He originated no new methods 

 and made few contributions to the 

 study of heredity; but he did discover 

 many interesting facts during his hy- 

 bridization experiments and he added 



hundreds of millions of dollars to the 

 wealth of the country, keeping nothing 

 for himself. He was a national bene- 

 factor, and who will say he was not a 

 great man when he placed public 

 service before private gain? His atti- 

 tude in the matter is summed up in the 

 final paragraph of an article on the five 

 famous potato varieties placed on the 

 market between 1882 and 1896. "It 

 will now appear that for our 16 years of 

 potato work, we have sold five kinds for 

 precisely $1,000. We dare say that, 

 had we used our columns for advertising 

 the three kinds now offered for sale, 

 retaining the entire control as long as 

 possible. The Rural New-Yorker might 

 easily have made a snug little fortune. 

 But, tell us friends, were we to crack up 

 the plaiits that have originated at the 

 "Rural Grounds" while we sold them to 

 you cither directly or indirectly, do you 

 think that you would place as much 

 confidence in the thorough impartiality 

 of our plant reports, as you do now?" 

 Ten years ago the writer made a trip 

 through the great potato regions of 

 Wisconsin and Minnesota. During it 

 one of the most successful and best in- 

 formed growers stated that in the 

 previous decade 80% of the potatoes of 

 the country were either Mr. Carman's 

 productions or seedlings from them. 

 How much truth there was in this state- 

 ment it is impossible to say, but dis- 

 count it as much as one will, can it be 

 said that there is no such thing as 

 altruism ? 



POTATO CREATIONS. 



The famous potatoes from the Rural 

 Grounds were Rural Blush, Rural New- 

 Yorker No. 2, Carman No. 1, Carman 

 No. 3 and Sir Walter Raleigh. They 



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