HORTICULTURE AS A PROFESSION FOR WOMEN. 



BY MISS LAURA BLANCHARD DAWSON, JAMAICA PLAIN, MASS. 



Given before the Society, March 5, 1910. 



The subject of Horticulture as a profession for women has been 

 for some years past a topic of widespread interest both in Europe 

 and America. Now, while Horticulture means primarily the 

 culture and care of a garden, or of the plants for a garden, I am 

 using the word in its broadest sense to include floriculture, fruit 

 culture, vegetable culture, and the culture of plants for landscape 

 gardening. I shall stretch the point even a little further and 

 include the practice of landscape gardening itself. 



Even back in Colonial days women did much along horticultural 

 lines. Mr. Robert Manning, in his History of the Massachusetts 

 Horticultural Society, tells us that the first person who cultivated a 

 garden on a large scale in Charleston, South Carolina, was Mrs. 

 Lamboll. This was about the middle of the eighteenth century, 

 at which time, Mr. Manning goes on to say, "her garden was 

 richly stored with flowers and other curiosities of Nature, as well as 

 useful vegetables. She was followed by Mrs. Martha Logan who 

 when seventy years old wrote a treatise on gardening called the 

 Gardener's Kalendar, which was published after her death in 1779, 

 and as late as 1S08, regulated the practice of gardening in and near 

 Charleston. She was a great florist and uncommonly fond of a 

 garden." The letters of Abigail Adams, the wife of the second 

 President of the United States, show us that about this time she did 

 much to advance the interest in Horticulture by the beautiful gardens 

 which she so successfully managed. Since then from time to time 

 women have not only contributed substantially to the practical 

 side but also to the literature of Horticulture. In 1843 an Ameri- 

 can edition of Mrs. Loudon's works, "Gardening for Ladies" 

 and "Companion to the Flower Garden," were published by A. J. 



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