3o6 THE GRAPES OF NEW YORK. 



IRONCLAD. 



(Riparia, Labrusca.) 



I. Ohio Hort. Soc. Rpt., 1882-3:131. 2. Gar. and For.. 5:597. 1892. 3. III. Sta. Btd., 28:254. 

 1893. 4. Gar. and For., 7:509. 1894. 5. Bush. Cat., 1894:140. 



Ash (i, 4, 5). Diogenes (5). Pearson's Ironclad (4). Pearson's Ironclad (5). Scott (4, 5). 



Ironclad is of interest because of its history, and because of its possible 

 value for breeding purposes. If the history given below is correct, this 

 variety is one of the oldest of our cultivated grapes. From the accounts 

 of those who have grown it, Ironclad is as free from mildew and rot, in fruit 

 at least, as any of our cultivated native grapes. It is also very resistant 

 to phylloxera and has been used somewhat in France and Spain as a resist- 

 ant stock for Vinifera. It is also extremely vigorous and hardy and is 

 verv productive. The fruit is not of sufficiently high quality nor attractive 

 enough in appearance to make a good table grape but it is said to make 

 very excellent wine, the juice having color and body enough to make it of 

 value for adding color to lighter colored musts. Ironclad is a very capricious 

 bearer and especially so on rampant growing vines, one of the faults of the 

 variety being that it makes too rank a growth. 



The history of this grape, as given by A. W. Pearson of Vineland, 

 New Jersey, is as follows: In 1873 Pearson secured from Colonel Scott, 

 then president of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, cuttings of a vine 

 growing on the latter's grounds, near Darby about seven miles west of 

 Philadelphia. Scott's gardener reported the vine to be free from rot and 

 Pearson, who had named the variety Scott, changed the name to Ironclad 

 when he found the gardener's report as to rot verified. On investigation 

 Pearson found that the variety was over two hundred years old, and that 

 it had been cultivated locally under the name of Ash, from a former o^\^^er 

 of the Scott place and an ancestor of Pearson. This account is not fully 

 corroborated by early horticultural writers but appears to be sufficiently 

 accurate to give the variety historical interest. Ironclad is said to be a 

 hybrid between Labmsca and Riparia and its botanical characters justify 

 such a supposition. 



Vine a rank prower, hardy, productive. Canes long, numerous, thick to slender, 

 dark reddish-brown; nodes of average size, flattened; intemodes medium to long; 



