56 THE GRAPES OF NEW YORK. 



Adaptability to varj'ing sets of cultural conditions; fair shipping qualities; 

 hardiness, productiveness and comparative immunity to fungi and insects. 

 Its influence on the grape-growing of the country has been great, too, 

 because from it have come a considerable number of the most valuable 

 varieties of American grapes; as Worden, Moore Early, Pocklington, 

 Martha and Cottage, all pure-bred seedlings and many cross-breds. 



At a meeting of the American Pomological Society in Philadelphia in 

 1852, Dr. William W. Valk of Flushing, Long Island, exhibited several 

 bunches of fruit from a seedling grape which he had grown from seeds of 

 Black Hamburg produced from blossoms fertilized by Isabella.' The cross 

 had been made in 1845, the first fruit was borne in 1850, and in 1851 speci- 

 mens of it were examined by Downing who wrote, " There can be no doubt 

 that this is the first genuine cross between the foreign grapes and our 

 natives." = The name of the variety, given by the originator, is Ada. Dr. 

 Valk gave full accounts of his hybrid seedlings in the Horticidtiirist in 1S51,' 

 and in the Proceedings of the American Pomological Society in 1852.'' He had 

 previously written on the subject of hybridization, an interesting paper hav- 

 ing been contributed to Hovey's ?>Iagazine as early as 1845.^ -^^^ available 

 information shows that Valk's is the first recorded hybrid between a native 

 and the foreign grape. Yet the honor of such a production has usually been 

 given to John Fisk Allen and to the grape, Allen's Hybrid. For the con- 

 ception of hybridity between species we can go back to the beginning of the 

 cultivation of native grapes. Nearly thirty years before, Xuttall, the 

 then famous botanist of Harvard Universit}', had recommended such 

 hybridization to American grape-growers.'^ Dufour mentions its possi- 



' American Pomological Society Report for 1852:45. 



' Horticulturist, 6:445. 1851. 



' Horticulturist, 6:444. 1851. 



* American Pomological Society Report for 1852:45. 



^ Magazine of Horticulture, 11:134. 1S45. 



' Nuttall says: " It is probable that h)-brids betwixt the European Vine {Vitis vinifcra) and 

 those of the United States would better answer the variable climates of North America, than the 

 unacclimated vine of Europe. When a portion of the same industry shall have been bestowed upon 

 the cultivation of the native vines of America, which has for so many ages and by so many nations, 

 been devoted to the amelioration of \'itis tnnijera, we cannot imagine that the citizens of the United 

 States will be longer indebted to Europe for the lu.xury of wine. It is not however in the wilds of 



