1518 



HORTICULTURE 



HORTICULTURE 



about 1830. His son, John J. Thomas, nurseryman and 

 author of the "American Fruit Culturist," which first 

 appeared in 1846, died at a ripe old age in 1895. The 

 nursery of Thomas Hogg, referred to above, was an 

 important establishment. In a "Catalogue of the 

 ornamental trees and shrubs, herbaceous and green- 



1862. The original picture of the Houghton gooseberry. 

 From the "Horticulturist" for September, 1868. (Original size) 



house plants, cultivated and for sale by Thomas Hogg, 

 nurseryman and florist," 1834, there are sixteen small 

 pages, double columns, of mere lists of species and 

 varieties, comprising no less than 1,200 entries of great 

 variety. These were offered at "The New York Botanic 

 Garden in Broadway, near the House of Refuge." 

 The first Thomas Hogg, an Englishman, procured land 

 in 1822 in upper Broadway (where Twenty-third Street 

 now is), and began business as florist and nurseryman. 

 In 1840 they were removed to Seventy-ninth Street and 

 East River, and here the sons, Thomas and James, 

 assisted the father, who died in 1855. Later, James had 

 a garden at the foot of Eighty-fourth Street, and here 

 he grew many plants sent from Japan, by his brother 

 Thomas, who resided and traveled in that country 

 (page 1580). 



The nursery firm of Parsons & Co., on Long Island, 

 was founded in 1838. It was instrumental in distribut- 

 ing great quantities of fruit and ornamental stock at a 

 formative time in American horticulture, and it was a 

 pioneer in several commercial methods of propagation 

 of the more difficult ornamental stock. It was a 

 leading distributor of Japanese plants in the early days. 

 Between 1840 and 1850 arose the beginnings of that 

 marvelous network of nurseries, which, under the lead 

 of Ellwanger & Barry, T. C. Maxwell & Brothers, W. 

 & T. Smith, and others, has spread the name of western 



New York throughout North America. In 1857, Pros- 

 per J. Berckmans, who had then been a resident of the 

 United States seven years, removed to Georgia, and 

 laid the foundation of the very important business now 

 conducted by his sons. 



The oldest American seed house, David Landreth's, 

 in Philadelphia, was established in 1784. Another was 

 John Mackejohn's, 1792; others, William Leeson, 1794, 

 and Bernard M'Mahon, 1800, all of Philadelphia. In 

 1802, Grant Thorburn's was established in NewYork, 

 the first catalogue of four pages being published then. 

 The first and last of these businesses still exist under 

 the family names. M'Mahon did a large business in 

 exporting seeds of native plants, and it was through his 

 work that many American plants came into cultivation 

 in Europe. His catalogue of seeds of American plants 

 in 1804, for the export trade, contained about 1,000 spe- 

 cies of trees, herbs and shrubs. He also announced at 

 that time that he had "also for sale an extensive variety 

 of Asiatic, South Sea Islands, African and European 

 seeds of the most curious and rare kinds." "The prices 

 shall be moderate, and due allowance will be made to 

 those who buy to sell again." M'Mahon, through 

 business and writing, had great influence on American 

 horticulture in its formative period. He distributed 

 seeds of the very important Lewis and Clark expedi- 

 tion; but Landreth is said to have shared these seeds, 

 and also those collected by Nuttall. Those were days 

 of the enthusiastic exportation of the seeds of Ameri- 

 can plants. 



The development of the seed trade is coincident with 

 the development of the postal service. Burnet Land- 

 reth writes that "it was not until 1775 that the New 

 York city post office was first established, the mail 

 passing once every two weeks between New York and 

 Boston. In 1775, a through mail was established by 

 Postmaster Franklin between Boston and Savannah, 

 the letters being carried by post riders, each man cov- 

 ering 25 miles. Previous to that date, sixty days would 

 frequently pass without a mail from Virginia." 



The number of seed firms in North America is now 

 in the hundreds. With the development of the plant- 

 breeding enterprises, local or regional firms and associa- 

 tions are springing up, to do commerce with particular 

 strains or lines of breeding. The demand for good 

 seeds, with recognized merit, is one of the most hopeful 

 developments in American agriculture. It is of the 

 same order of excellence as the demand for pedigreed 

 and well-bred live-stock. 



Greenhouses. 



The first glasshouse in North America was probably 

 erected early in the century before last, in Boston, by 

 Andrew Faneuil, who died in 1737. This house passed 

 to his nephew, Peter Faneuil, who built Faneuil Hall. 

 The greenhouse which is commonly considered to be the 

 first built in the country was erected in 1764 in New 

 York, for James Beekman. A picture of this, from 

 Taft's "Greenhouse Construction," is shown in Fig. 



1863. One of the earliest American greenhouses (1764). 



