STORY OF THE ORIGIN OF THE WEALTHY APPLE. 185 



Story of the Origin of the Wealthy Apple. 



E. M. REEVES, WAVERLY, IOWA. 



I am glad to tell you the story, if you desire it. I do not 

 wish to upset any cherished ideas you have in regard to the 

 Wealthy, the one most prominent apple, I believe, of the whole 

 list. Take it the whole world over, I don't know of another apple 

 that is as prominent and favored in so many places. 



We all know that Peter Gideon had some peculiarities. We 

 all have them, and it is our peculiarities that get us into trouble 

 sometimes, and sometimes they make us prominent. Mr. Gideon 

 had his peculiarities, and one of them was that when he was 

 going to do anything of any moment he consulted the spirits, and 

 they guided him in whatever he was going to do. The general 

 idea is that he consulted the spirits and sent down to one of the 

 states in New England and got a small quantity of crab apple 

 seeds and planted them, and from that planting grew the 

 Wealthy. It will take a few moments for me to tell the story, 

 and then I will tell you what I believe, and I have good reason 

 for the belief I have. 



When I was about eleven years old a cousin of mine moved 

 from Excelsior, Minnesota, to Waverly, near my home, and I 

 was with him a good deal from that time on. He was a young 

 man, and he had homesteaded near Excelsior and had worked for 

 Mr. Gideon at various times, and he lived in his family and 

 worked for him at the time Mr. Gideon obtained the seed from 

 which the Wealthy was grown. He helped plant the seed and 

 cared for the little trees during the first summer of their growth. 

 In the fall he helped Mr. Gideon take up the row of seedlings 

 that he had grown, and they buried them for the winter. The 

 next spring he helped Mr. Gideon again in the planting of those 

 little seedlings. 



One little incident he tells concerning the matter is that this 

 Wealthy tree had a little branch or sprout that grew close to the 

 ground, or just barely under the ground, and had formed a little 

 sort of root on the lower end. Mr. Gideon cut off that branch 

 and stuck it in a potato with the idea of making another Wealthy 

 tree. He had not named the tree yet, but he was going to have 

 two trees of the same sort, but this second tree was destroyed. 

 This cousin told me the entire story of the origin of the Wealthy 

 apple at the time that he moved to Waverly and insisted upon the 

 facts, but we thought very little of it then. 



