1572- 



HORTICULTURISTS 



HORTICULTURISTS 



Douglas, Robert (Fig. 1876), pioneer nurseryman in 

 Illinois, was born at Gateshead, England, in 1813. He 

 came to America in 1836, finally settling at Waukegan, 



Illinois, in 1844. Here 

 he founded a smaU nur- 

 sery where he raised 

 conifer and other tree 

 seedhngs. This was the 

 first attempt ever made 

 in America to raise 

 evergreen trees com- 

 mercially. Through 

 his efforts, many suc- 

 cessful plantations of 

 forest trees were estab- 

 hshed on the western 

 prairies. He has been 

 called "the apostle of 

 tree - planting in the 

 West." Mr. Douglas 

 was also a good bota- 

 nist and an authority 

 on evergreens. He was 

 an active member of 

 the Illinois State Horti- 

 cultural Society. He 

 died in 1897. 



1876. Robert Douglas. 



Douglas, Thomas Henry, nurseryman and forester, 

 was born at Waukegan, Illinois, July 31, 1852, and died 

 March 26, 1907. After completing his education at 

 Racine College, he engaged in the nursery business with 

 his father, the late Robert Douglas, whose early 

 experiments and later his success in growing conifers 

 from seefi gave him a national reputation. Inheriting 

 the natural qualities of a forester from his father and 

 being a close student of nature, he soon acquired a 

 wide knowledge of forestry which was recognized in 

 1886 when he was called to the State Board of Forestry 

 of California as Head Forester and soon after was 

 called to a similar position at Leland Stanford, Jr., 

 University. While there he collected many plants 

 then new to California, tested them out and intro- 

 duced them. In 1892 he visited the home of the weep- 

 ing spruce {Picea Brewerimia) on the summit of the 

 Siskiyou Mountains and succeeded in gathering the 

 first seed and raising the first seedlings of this species. 

 He cared little for publicity but was freely consulted 

 on all matters pertaining to forestry, and his articles 

 on this subject are considei-ed an authority. Many 

 of his introductions, notably the Smithiana Douglas, 

 Douglas Pyramid and Douglas Golden arbor-vita's 

 are well known and widely planted today. 



R. Douglas' Sons. 



Downer, John S., pomologist and nurseryman, was 

 born .lune 19, 1809, in Culpeper County, Virginia, and 

 died in Kentucky in 1873. Like the man "born to 

 fame" he seemed to evince a taste for horticulture from 

 his earliest days. While yet a youth, without friends 

 or fortune, he established and gradually built up the 

 Forest Nursery, which gained an enviable reputation 

 not only in Kentucky but in neighboring states. He 

 was patient and painstaking and tested many varieties 

 of fruits under his own inspection. He did much to 

 improve pomology in the Central States. He paid 

 special attention to the strawberry, and produced the 

 well-known Downer (Prolific), (Chas.) Downing and 

 Kentucky. These should perpetuate his fame, for it 

 was at a time when the strawberry industry of the 

 country was in its infancy. He introduced the Wild 

 Goose plum and he conferred the blessings of pomology 

 on the whole country by disseminating many choice 

 varieties of fruit. He was quiet and unobtrusive, but 

 was a man of worth and honesty. His nursery at Elk- 

 ton, Kentucky, was for many years a fruit experi- 

 ment station. He was vice-president for Kentucky of 



the American Pomological Society, and held other 

 offices of trust and honor. Q. B. Brackett. 



Downing, Andrew Jackson (Fig. 1877), the first great 

 landscape gardener of America, was born at Newburg, 

 New York, October 30, 1815, and perished by drowning 

 July 28, 1852, at the early age of thirty-seven. As a 

 boy, he was quiet, sensitive, and much alone with him- 

 self and nature. The Catskills, the Hudson, and his 

 father's nursery had much to do with his development. 

 His "Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape 

 Gardening," published 1841, when he was but twenty- 

 six years old, is, in many respects, a unique production. 

 It was the first, and is today one of the best American 

 books on the subject, and has exerted a greater influence 

 upon American horticulture, it is said, than any other 

 volume. "Cottage Residences," 1841, also had great 

 popularity. In 1845 appeared simultaneously in Lon- 

 don and New York the first edition of "Fruits and Fruit 

 Trees of America;" in 1846 he became connected with 

 "i'he Horticulturist," which he edited from his home at 

 Newburg until his untimely death. His editorials in 

 this excellent periodical (later represented in succession 

 by "American Gardening") were republished after his 

 death, with a letter to his friends by Frederika Bremer, 

 and a memoir by George William Curtis, under the 

 title of "Rural Essays." It was not until 1850 that 

 he had an opportunity to visit the great estates of Eng- 

 land, to see with his own eyes the landscajie garden- 

 ing of Europe. On his return in 1851, he was engaged to 

 lay out the grounds near the Capitol, White House, and 

 Smithsonian Institution at Washington. On July 28, 

 1852, he left Newburg on the steamer Henry Clay for 

 New York. The Clay took fire near Yonkers, while it 

 was racing, and Downing's life was lost in an attempt to 

 save others. It would be difficult to overestimate the 

 influence of Downing. He created American landscape 

 gardening. His only predecessor, Andre Parmentier, is 

 little known, and his influence was not of a national 

 character. Downing's quickening influence affected 

 country life in its every aspect. He stood for the simple, 

 natural, and permanent as opposed to the intricate, 

 artificial, and ephemeral. He was the first great Ameri- 

 can practitioner of what is known in pohte and technical 

 literature as the Eng- 

 lish or natural school 

 of landscape gardening 

 in distinction from all 

 artificial schools, as the 

 Italian and Dutch. 

 Downing's pupils are 

 many, and his spirit 

 still hves. He gave in- 

 spiration to Frederick 

 Law Olmsted, our next 

 great genius in land- 

 scape gardening, who, 

 by his early work in 

 Central Park, New 

 York, aroused that 

 popular enthusiasm 

 which has culminated 

 in the American idea 

 of great municipal park 

 systems, as opposed to 

 the earlier Old World 

 idea of exclusive pleas- 

 ure-grounds and pri- 

 vate parks. Downing's books have had large sales, and 

 have gone through many editions. His intellectual suc- 

 cessor in his purely pomological work was his brother 

 Charles, whose modest labors in the revision of the 

 "Fruits and Fruit Trees of America" have brought him 

 little popular fame, but much sincere admiration from 

 students. Most horticultural writings are, in reality, 

 only records of progress; they do not create progress. 



1877. A. J. Downing. 



