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Vol. XXXIX. No. 33. 1 
Wholes No. 1594. \ 
NEW YORK, AUG. 14, 1880. 
1 Price Fite Cents, 
) $2.00 Peb Year. 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1880, by the Rural New-Yorker, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
- - - - - ■ r~ 
p0pap|iral. 
THEODATUS TIMOTHY LYON. 
Theodatus Timothy Lyon, the subject of 
this sketch, was bom at Lima, Livingston 
County, New York, on January 2Srd., 1813. 
His father was Timothy Lyon, for whom he 
was uamed. The family emigrated from Con¬ 
necticut to Western Massachusetts, and in the 
early settlement of the '“Genessee County” re¬ 
moved and settled in Lima. 
His mother, Mary, was the daughter of Jonah 
Davis, a farmer, who early emigrated to Lima 
from Delaware County, New York. His father 
owned and carried on a farm, but devoted his 
attention mostly to architecture and inill- 
wrighting. From the age of about twelve 
years, T. T. Lyon’s Summers were spent partly 
at farming and partly at mechanical work, he 
having developed a considerable liking for 
machinery. Aside from such employment his 
time was spent in a district school up to the 
Spring of 1828, at which date his school priv¬ 
ileges were brought to a close by removal with 
his father to the then remote and wild Terri¬ 
tory of Michigan, where this family settled at 
Plymouth about twenty miles northwest of 
Detroit. About the year 1828 or 1827, on visit¬ 
ing the grown-up orchard of a neighbor, ho 
found the owner in the topB of his apple treeB 
employed in inserting buds in the smaller 
branches. Ou returning home he procured 
and sharpened a ease-kuife and proceeded to 
cut buds from a favorite apple tree, and insert 
them in the limbs of other trcuB in the farm 
orchard, thus taking bis first lesson in practical 
pomology. 
During his first year’s residence in Michigan, 
he was employed in “ tending” a small country 
store established and conducted by his father 
at Plymouth. His employment was afterward 
for a time diversified by carrying the mail, on 
horseback, the route extending from Tecum- 
seh, in Leuaweo couuty, to Maumee, then a part 
of Michigan, but now belonging to Ohio, on 
the one hand, and Pontiac, in Oakland county, 
ou the other; with a weekly trip to Monroe, in 
Monroe county, at that time but little more 
than a French village. In obedience to the 
earnest desire of his parents, in the Sprlug of 
1836, lit gave up his long-cherished purpose of 
pursuing a course of study, and returned to 
Michigan from a visit to his old home In Lima, 
N. Y., resuming the businsss of selling goods 
and teuchlug school, aud llually turning his 
attention to farming aud manufacturing lum¬ 
ber, occasionally lilliug the position of town¬ 
ship clerk aud school iuspeetor, 
On December 6lh, 1838 he was married to 
Miss Manila Gregory, daughter of Mr. William 
S. Gregory, long a prominent farmer in Ply¬ 
mouth. In 1842 he spent a year at the Wayne 
county poor-house, in charge of the establish¬ 
ment as keeper and farmer. In 1844 he com¬ 
menced a small nursery at Plymouth, mainly 
with the purpose to grow a supply of trees for 
his own planting, as he had, In compliance 
with the wishes of friends, abandoned the idea 
of going further West to earve out a new home 
lu the wilderness. He collected the varieties 
for the nursery from surrounding orchards, 
accepting the names by which they were cotn- 
mouly known. He soon learned the fact that 
in so doing he had, in many cases, incorrect 
aud local names; this started him upon the 
process of correction aud identification. 
Such a work is likely to grow upon a person, 
and, in the case of Mr. Lyon, this proved not 
to be an exception to the rule. He soon saw 
the need of a broader knowledge, aud amid 
the toil and care of business he entered upon 
the study of the limited pomology of thirty 
years ago, A series of articles In a Western 
paper prepared by him, describing the ap¬ 
ples known and valued in Plymouth and vicin. 
ity, attracted the attention of Mr. Charles 
Downing, of Newburgh, N. Y,, and brought 
about an acquaintance between the two per¬ 
sons. From Mr. Downing’s tidal grounds at 
Newburgh, he was enabled to obtain numerous 
varieties of new and comparatively untested 
fruits and, h a vlng a decided •pmchanl that way, 
and bis recently planted orchards being in the 
right condition for the purpose, he indulged 
extensively In the testing of novelties as a 
matter of personal and public satisfaction 
but with little, if auy, regard to profit. The 
valuable test orchards at Plymouth are the 
outcome of these experiments. 
From 1861 to 1805, under a Republican 
county administration, he held ihe position of 
member and Secretary of the Board of Super¬ 
intendents of the Poor of Wayne county, aud 
was continued one year as Secretary by the 
succeeding Board of Democratic Connty Audi¬ 
tors. 
On June 17th, 1864, the Detroit and Howell 
Railroad Company was organized and Mr. 
Lyon was elected President. This was follow¬ 
ed April 13th, 1867, by the organization of the 
Howell and Lansing Railroad Company, and, 
as both were parts of the same line, Mr. Lyon 
was elected President of this also. This posi¬ 
tion ho held till, in 1870, and 1871, the roads 
were turned over to an Association of Boston 
men. As a consequence of his connection with 
the railroads, his attention was diverted from 
the subject of pomology, aud the care of his 
orchards was mostly delegated to other hands. 
This arrangement was hasteued by the failure 
of his wife’s health, together with the final 
sickness aud death of her pareuts. 
On the completion and opening of the De¬ 
troit and Lausing Railroad and its consolida¬ 
tion with the line from Lansing to Ionia, Mr. 
Lyon’s connection with it ceased, leaving him 
without special employment, but on ac¬ 
count of the continued feeble health of 
his wife he was disinclined to return to the 
farm. 
At this juncture strong inducements were 
offered him to remove to Western Michigan, 
and resume bis former pursuits, which he did 
in 1874, becoming connected with the Michigan 
Lake Shore Nursery Association as its Presi¬ 
dent. This enterprize was inaugurated at an 
inauspicious time; and. as a consequence of 
the subsequent shrinkage of values, together 
with the failure of a large number of tbe sub¬ 
scribers to the capital stock to fullfil their en¬ 
gagements, it has been thought best to dissolve 
the corporate organization. 
In December 1876, Mr. Lyon was elected 
President of the Michigan State Pomological 
Society, to which position he has been annually 
re-elected up to the present time. He was also 
for two years a member of the Executive Com¬ 
mittee of the Michigan State Agricultural So. 
cietj, and at three different times the delegate 
of that Society to the sessions of the American 
Pomological Society. 
These, and various minor positions of similar 
character, together with the supplying occa¬ 
sional matter for tbe press have entailed upon 
him a voluminous correspondence, drawing 
largely upou his time and energies, but with 
little direct advantage to himself. Mr. Lyon is 
a walking cyclopedia of the nomenclature of 
fruits, and can identify all the leading varieties 
of Western fruits at a glance, and Michigan is 
greatly Indebted to him for his long and per¬ 
sistent labors of love in this direction, i. c. h. 
$arm (Santomjj. 
A SCIENTIFIC VIEW OF COMPOSTS. 
FROFK8SOR F. H. 8T0BEK. 
In case the fermentation of a compost heap 
becomes so active that there is danger of losing 
fertilizing materials, it may sometimes be well 
to turn over the heap, with addition of new 
portions of peat or some other inactive ma¬ 
terial; and, on the other hand, by forking 
over compost heaps after the first fermenta¬ 
tion has run its course, so that air may be ad¬ 
mitted and the materials be thoroughly mixed, 
the fermentation may be renewed and carried 
much further towards completion than would 
otherwise have been the case. But, in spite of 
the well-known fact that composts gain very 
decidedly by the process of forking both as to 
the ehimical activity and the mechanical con¬ 
dition of the product, It seems to be question¬ 
able whether much forking is justifiable from 
the economic point of view. Repeated fork¬ 
ing may be proper enough when the compost 
is to be used for horticultural purposes, and 
the object is merely to provide the best pos¬ 
sible food for some fastidious plant; bnt for 
the general uses of a farm il would seem to be 
better not to refine the compost too ranch, but 
to rest content with bringing it to a fairly good 
condition. In this sense the establishment of 
new heaps and the procuring of ample sup¬ 
plies of material for their construction, would 
seem properly to take precedence of the sys¬ 
tem of frequent forking which was formerly 
in repute. It is to be hoped that the methods 
which have occasionally been proposed of 
stirring compost heaps with plows, harrows 
and road scrapers may be so systematized and 
improved that they shall meet all reasonable 
requirements, and that the method of forking 
by hand may be reduced to the lowest possiblo 
limits. It might even be possible to devise 
some simple method of forking by horse power 
which would supersede the mauual operation, 
Composts prepared lu the rnauuer above 
suggested have several good qualities which 
are peculiar to them as a class. As compared 
with barn-yard manure they are convenient of 
application, whether to plowed land or to 
grass, and they are easily incorporated with 
the soiL One good way of looking at a fin¬ 
ished compost is as loam highly charged with 
fertilizing iugredients, L t., as a “ saturated 
earth," fit to be strewn directly in the hills and 
furrows lu which seeds or plants are to be 
placed. A good compost Is both strong to pro¬ 
mote growth and mfief In that it will not hurt 
seeds or young plants. Ou the other haud, 
when comparing composts with the commer¬ 
cial fertilizers, we have to inqaire, in the first 
place, what the nitrogenized constituents have 
cost in either case, and there seems small room 
for doubt that, in very many Instances, all 
things considered, the compost-nitrogen which 
has been made, as it were, at the farm will be 
found much cheaper than that bought In the 
form of a chemical manure. Furthermore, 
the water-holding power of the compost must 
be considered, since in droughty seasons, aud 
particularly on light laud, It may be a point of 
no small importance. It may, indeed, happeu 
in some cases that the positum of a man’s 
farm as regards moisture may of itself deter¬ 
mine whether it is best for him to use commer¬ 
cial fertilizers or composts. It is mauifest 
that many a bottom land abundantly supplied 
with moisture might be as grateful for the ap¬ 
plication of commercial fertilizers as mauy of 
the 1L ht upland gravelly and sandy soils of 
New England have been found to be for com¬ 
posts. It is tolerably plain, at all events, that 
in situations liable to drought composts are, In 
general, better fitted than most commercial 
fertilizers for promoting that peculiar moist 
mellowness of the soil which is an esteemed 
THEODATUS TIMOTHY LYON.—Fig. 262. 
