¢ 
438 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
in the same way. It is not desirable to cut plum scions of our 
hardy kinds in autumn, because they are liable to lose their buds, 
during the winter even if they are carefully stored, and the chances 
of success are much better when they are cut at the time the work 
is done in the spring of the year. 
Currant cuttings can be made up now to good advantage, 
although it would have been better to have them made earlier in 
the fall. The same is true of willow cuttings. Butif the ground 
is still open after the willow cuttings are made they may be set at 
once, when if covered with two or three inches of earth they will go 
through winter in good shape. 
After the ground is frozen too deep for plowing, there may bea 
considerable time in which pipe may be laid for irrigating or a tile 
drain put in for the drainage of some wet spot. 
* Biography. 
F. W. KIMBALL, AUSTIN, MINN. 
The subject of this sketch was born in Reading, Mass., in the year 
1844, and spent his boyhood days on a farm in that town. In 1866he 
came west to Minnesota, and has passed mostof his time since then 
in Civil engineering, though he had two or three years’ experience 
as a farmer in the county in which he now lives. For eleven years 
between 1878 and 1889, he had charge of the surveys and construc- 
tion of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul railway. Since then, as 
the writer understands, he has been doing railroad construction as 
a contractor. 
Mr. F. W. Kimball’s first interest in horticulture in our state dates 
back to 1874, at which time he planted a good many apple trees on 
the farm he then owned. There are still a few of these trees living, 
although most of them were of varieties not well adapted to our 
latitude. In 1861, he bought the place in Austin he yet occupies as 
a home, and since then has taken an active interest in fruit growing 
in an amateur way, and by precept and example has done very much 
to encourage this industry in his locality and through the state. 
Mr. Kimball can scarcely be ranked with the old members of this 
society, as he first became identified with it in 1892, but he has been 
very active and forceful in its interests. The value of his services 
was recognized in his election to the presidency of the Southern 
Minnesota Horticultural Society the first year of its organization. 
He has been a very regular attendant at the meetings of the state 
society and one of its most zealous supporters. Being a compara- 
tively young man,we may expect much further service from him in 
our beloved art. 
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