STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 361 



would soon render snow fences of less importance during our 

 snowy winter, and not many yeare would elapse before they 

 would furnish ties to repair the road. The roads west of St. 

 Paul have taken this matter in hand and have planted many 

 trees. The memory of the lateL. B. Hodges, of St. Paul, Minn., 

 will ever be revered for the zeal he manifested in his life-work 

 devoted to the forest tree planting in the West and Northwest. 

 Before closing this essay on tree planting, will say it is a sub- 

 ject in which I take a deep interest and wish I was capable of 

 giving you more information in regard to it. It calls to my 

 mind many associations of the past. A day spent in the large 

 orchard of A. R. Whitney, of Illinois, the originator of the 

 Whitney No. 20 crab apple, taught me lessons I never shall for- 

 get in tree planting. In this orchard 25,000 bushels of apples 

 have been gathered in a single year. Its eastern boundary is a 

 row of bearing chestnut trees half a mile in length; shade trees 

 and evergreens of all kinds abound and give the farm the ap- 

 pearance of a forest. In the door yards are groups of large pines, 

 some of them over three feet in diameter; they tower high above 

 the rest; the wind whistling through their branches sounds like 

 the noise of a pine forest. Under these trees that tree planter 

 eats his evening meal and visits with his family and friends. 

 Now, for me it was hard to realize that this very spot was, less 

 than forty years ago, a wild, naked prairie, like ours here, 

 where the knowing ones said timber and forest trees would not 

 grow. Then to me the thought arises, what will this country look 

 like in thirty years if the present generation of farmers, school 

 officers, and business men plant trees. Other associations crowd 

 my memory. The pleasant times I have enjoyed with the veteran 

 tree planter of Minnesota, Peter M. Gideon, who, in his ardor 

 for planting, discovered and gave us the Wealthy apple tree.^ 

 How can we of the North ever repay him; and still he pursues, 

 though his hair is white as snow, his favorite calling, hoping by 

 persistent planting to give us a long keeper as good as the 

 Wealthy. Days and nights si3ent in company with one of Wis- 

 consin's wheel horses in tree planting, Peffer, of Pewaukee, asso- 

 ciate with them many interesting facts learned about the business. 

 Time spent looking over the orchard and buildings of the late 

 Dr. Jewell, of Lake City, Minn., bring fresh to my memory the 

 first planting of Wealthy trees, which I obtained from him. I 

 can only imagine what the life work of my friend A. G. Tuttle, 

 of Baraboo, Wis., will result in while planting his one hundred 

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