EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 497 



he discovered that they were covered with a very heavy coat of long 

 and unusually fine wool, and he purchased 20 of them. During that 

 and the two years succeeding he purchased quite a number of sheep 

 from prominent breeders of Vermont and New York, but found that his 

 sheep purchased in Washington County were superior in many respects, 

 such as their feet, wool, and carcass. In 1876 he purchased 15 descend- 

 ants of the Wylie flock, and in 1879 2 rams and 6 ewes of the Berry 

 flock, represented as pure-blood descendants of the Dickinson sheep. 

 They were from the Humphreys importation of 1802. The Kalston flock 

 is owned in Armstrong County, Pa. 



In 1821 Alexander Reed, of Washington County, was the possessor 

 of some farms that were not paying him 3 per cent interest on their 

 cost, so he was driven into sheep husbandry and bought sheep to make 

 up flocks. The average cost of his flock was $4.55 per head. The 

 highest price paid was $25, the lowest $2.50, and among the purchases 

 was a flock of 134 full-blood Merinos from Alexander Wilson, near 

 Philadelphia. They were superior in smallness of bone and form to 

 any Merino that Mr. Reed had seen. In form they were but little 

 inferior to the Dishley. Many of the wethers, bred in 1824, weighed 

 from 110 to 120 pounds on foot, and this 'without any extra feeding. 

 Mr. Reed increased his flock to about 3,000 and was a very successful 

 wool-grower, and is believed to have been the first to test the Eastern 

 market with Washington County wool. The failure of the Steuben- 

 ville factory in 1829, and the cessation of manufacture by Mr. Rapp's 

 colony at Economy, Butler County, ruined the home market, and the 

 Washington County wool followed the market opened by Mr. Reed, 

 and has ever since done so. 



Collin M. Reed, sr., in a paper on the history of fine- wool growing in 

 Washington County, says : 



In 1819 the late Alexander Reed, of Washington, father of the writer, brought 

 from Philadelphia a flock of 134 Spanish Merinos, and soon after the celebrated flock 

 of Richard W. Meade (father of the late Gen. George G. Meade), our then consul in 

 Spain. The flocks of pure blood, good size and form, greatly improved the stock of 

 Washington County. 



The Victor-Beall Delaine Merino Register fixes the importation of 

 these sheep at about the year 1820, and says they were kept for some 

 time on the farm of Alexander Wilson, near Philadelphia. 



They did not do well there, and were subsequently sent to Washington County. 

 A part of them were placed on the farm of Alexander Reed, near the town of Wash- 

 ington, and the rest on the farm of Wilson Cunningham. These two flocks were 

 among the pioneer Merino flocks of Washington County, and from them sprung very 

 many of the fine-wool flocks that afterwards gave to Washington County the popu- 

 larity it has long enjoyed as the banner fine-wool growing county. 



There is an evident mistake in the date assigned by Mr. C. M. Reed 

 to the purchase of the 134 Spanish Merinos at Philadelphia, for Alex- 

 ander Reed in March, 1824, fixed that date at 1821 and not 1819, and 

 the Delaine Register in fixing the importation at about 1820, and then 

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