245 



York. The daughter, Jane Golden, commenced the preparation 

 of a remarkably accurate flora of New York, of which the com- 

 pleted portion is preserved, in manuscript, in the Department of 

 Botany of the British Museum. 



Banister, Clayton, and Golden, as well as other early workers 

 on the flora of North America, such as Gatesby, Garden, Kalm, 

 Vernon, and Kreig, were all Europeans by birth. The first 

 native American botanist was John Bartram, a Quaker, who was 

 born near Philadelphia in 1699. He published but little, and 

 that little furnishes very slight evidence of his botanical attain- 

 ments ; but he was a correspondent of Gollinson, Gronovius, 

 and other famous European botanists of his day, and by the 

 number and accuracy of the observations contained in his letters 

 seems to have deserved their admiration. He traveled through- 

 out eastern North America, from New York to Florida, collect- 

 ing particularly seeds for his Old-World correspondents ; but he 

 is best remembered from the fact that he established, near Phila- 

 delphia, about 1730, the first botanic garden in America, and into 

 this garden he gathered representatives of the largest possible 

 number of native American plants. It was a small affair (the 

 entire property comprised only five acres), and a part of the lim- 

 ited space was occupied by the house, built by his own hands ; 

 but the garden was a remarkable project indeed for those days, 

 and is known to have contained many choice specimens. 



William Bartram, son of John, is perhaps better known as a 

 botanist, because of the fact that his account of his extended 

 travels in the southern Atlantic states was published, and con- 

 tains many important observations upon the plants of the regions 

 explored by him. He maintained the garden established by his 

 father, and after his death the property remained in the hands of 

 owners who were deeply concerned in its preservation, for many 

 years. During a short period of neglect, serious damage was 

 done to the old garden, but within the past twenty year§ it has 

 become the property of the city of Philadelphia, and is now a city 

 park. Its collection of trees and shrubs has always been a 

 notable one, and the old house is still in an excellent state of 

 preservation. 



