HORTICULTURISTS 



HORTICULTURISTS 



1597 



19, 1910. For ten years, Mr. Smith was a director of 



the Association, of which he was made president in 1889, 

 and a life member in 1900. No man in Canada has done 

 more initiatory work in the development of the fruit 

 industry of the province than A. M. Smith, insomuch 

 that he has been called "the father of the commercial 

 peach industry of Ontario." Linus Woolverton. 



Smith, William Robertson, botanist, bibliographer, 

 horticulturist, philantlu-opist, was born at the village of 

 Athelstaneford, East Lothian, Scotland, March 21, 

 1828, and died July 7, 1912. He was educated in the 

 schools of his native village. His earliest practical work 

 in liorticulture was done on the grounds belonging to 

 the Earl of Wemyss, and later at Airthrie Castle and 

 still later at Kew Gardens. On coming to America he 

 located in Philadelphia, but was soon called to take 

 charge of the work of the United States Botanic Gar- 

 dens. These Gardens, nesthng at the foot of the Capitol 

 of the United States, were conceived by George Wash- 

 ington and are all that remains of his grand scheme of a 

 national college and a national church. In 1S22 a 

 Botanical Society was formed and some planting was 

 done on the drier portion of the marshy reservation. 

 This society published what is now a very rare book 

 entitled "Prodomus Columbiana," and it contained a 

 hst of the plants then in the District of Columbia. To 

 this collection, John D. Breckenridge, prominent 

 botanist of his day, added large quantities of plants of 

 interest. The plants secured by the Wilkes' expedition 

 around the world, placed in the Patent Office conserva- 

 tory, were consigned to the United States Botanic 

 Gardens in 1850 and Mr. Breckenridge was employed 

 to give them expert attention, and with him was 

 associated Dr. Asa Gray, botanist. All expenditures for 

 the Gardens from 18.51 to 1854 were paid from funds 

 accredited to the Wilkes' expedition. WiUiam R. Smith 

 became Superintendent of the Botanic Gardens in 

 1853. The times were troublous, and the first appro- 

 priation from Congress, including the pay of the super- 

 intendent and assistants was but $3,000. At this time 

 the gardens were marshy, and ague-breeding. His 

 first work was the fiUing in of 500,000 yards of soil. The 

 development of the Gardens was necessaril}' slow and 

 tedious, but in the period of Mr. Smith's tenure they 

 were developed from a tiny flower-garden and botanical 

 collection to the largest horticultural collection, pubhc 

 or private, in America. The work of Mr. Smith is 

 well known to students of horticulture everywhere, 

 and through this great work he came to be styled "the 

 father of horticulture." Q. B. Brackett. 



Stark, James Hart, nurseryman and fruit-grower, 

 was born July 30, 1792, in Hutchison, Bourbon County, 

 Kentucky. He was the son of Capt. James Stark, who 

 came to Hutchison, Kentucky, in 1785 from Virginia. 

 The Starks were originally from Glasgow, Scotland, one 

 brother settling in New England and the other in 

 Virginia. Both were enthusiastic horticulturists. On a 

 fly-leaf of one of the old law books of the Kentucky 

 lawyer, preserved by the family, is a planting record of 

 the family orchard which was probably the first orchard 

 of grafted apples planted west of the Alleghanies. 



For his miUtary service in the war of 1812, Judge 

 Stark was given script for land, in what is now Pike 

 County, Missouri, where he located in 1815. Here, 

 near the present site of Louisiana, he cleared a large 

 tract of land, and went back to Kentucky for cions 

 from the old family orchard in order to estabhsh a 

 nursery and orchard in Missouri. From this stock was 

 started in 1816 the pioneer nursery west of the Missis- 

 sippi. From the trees produced, the first commercial 

 orchard in this section of the country, 45 to 50 acres in 

 extent, was established. Northern buyers came each 

 year and bought the crop of apples from this orchard, 

 amounting annually to several thousand barrels. The 

 nursery which he estabUshed in 181(3 has been main- 



tained and augmented by Mr. Stark and his descen- 

 dants untU today it is said to be the largest nursery in 

 the world. Judge James Stark at first furnished trees 

 for planting by his neighbors. In this way he began the 

 dissemination of grafted stock of the best-known varie- 

 ties of the time. The district in which he was located 

 was also somewhat famous for wild plums, berries, 

 grapes, and other fruit, and this stimulated in him an 

 interest in the introduction and dissemination of new 

 and superior varieties. The business which he estab- 

 lished then has been responsible for the introduction 

 into the Mississippi Valley and the far West of a very 

 large number of the leading varieties of commercial 

 fruits now being grown in western orchards. 



Judge Stark in his day was regarded as the horti- 

 cultural leader in his section of the country. That he 

 knew thoroughly and loved his work, that he believed 

 in it fully and got daily inspiration from it, is perhaps 

 best emphasized by the fact that instead of his work 

 dying with him, his inspiration, zeal and energy for it 

 has been handed down through his descendants who 

 have ably followed in his footsteps. j_ q_ Written. 



Starr, Robert W., eminent fruit-grower of Nova 

 Scotia, was born in 1830 at Starr's Point on the shore 

 of Minas Basin. He came of an old United Empire 

 Loyalist stock of Connecticut, a family which for four 

 generations furnished mihtia officers. He was educated 

 at Sackville Academy, New Brunswick. About the 

 year 1860 Major Starr settled down to a life of fruit- 

 and fruit-tree-growing, a line in which he became not 

 only successful himself, but also of great service to his 

 province. In addition to his vocation, he continued to 

 serve in the mihtia as adjutant and later as major. 

 In 1873 he was appointed Justice of the Peace for 

 King's County. Major Starr was one of the original 

 founders of the Nova Scotia Fruit-Growers' Associa- 

 tion, which was started in 1863. Several times he was 

 made president, and in 1873 was made a life member. 

 In 1876 he was sent to the Centennial Exhibition, 

 Philadelphia, with a large exhibit of Nova Scotia fruit, 

 and in 1893 he was sent by his province to the World's 

 Fair, Chicago, with a similar charge. Major Starr has 

 been much in demand as a judge of apples, at exhibi- 

 tions in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward 

 Island, and Ontario, and is considered the leading 

 authority on the apple in the province of Nova Scotia. 



Linus Woolverton. 



Stayman, Joseph, physician and pomologist, was 

 born in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, October 

 17, 1817 and died October 4, 1903. He studied medicine 

 and in 1846 began to deUver lectures on scientific 

 subjects. He engaged in the practice of medicine until 

 1858. In 1859, he estabUshed a nursery in Illinois but 

 later in the year moved to Leavenworth, Kansas. For 

 forty years, he engaged in experimental work on fruits, 

 producing hundreds of hybrids and testing many varie- 

 ties produced by others. The best known of his original 

 productions are the Clyde and StajTnan strawberries, 

 the Stayman Winesap apple and the Ozark graiie. ^ Dr. 

 Stayman was a charter member of the Kansas State 

 Horticultural Society and was appointed as the Kansas 

 delegate to the Centennial Exposition at Phila- 

 delphia in 1876. 



Stiles, William Augustus, journalist, editor and park 

 conmiissioner, was born iMarch 9, 1837, at Deckertow-n, 

 Sussex County, in northern New Jersey, and died 

 October 6, 1897, in Jersey City. His grandfather settled 

 on a farm near Deckertown in 1819, where his father, 

 Edward A. Stiles, in 1833, founded Mount Retirement 

 Seminary, a successful school of the highest rank 

 during the following thirty years. William A. Stiles 

 graduated at Yale in 18.59 in a class which included 

 many men who have since attained high rank in public 

 affairs. Prevented from taking up the profession of 



