702 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
October 24 
JESSE KERSEY SHARPLESS. 
The originator of the Sharpless strawberry was 
born at Catawissa, Columbia County, Pa., September 
3, 1818, in the old “high house” at the plant of the 
Catawissa Fiber Company, then owned by his father. 
The old house is still standing. Ilis parents, Ben¬ 
jamin and Harriet Bousall Sharpless, were Quakers, 
the former a native of Delaware County, Pa., and the 
latter of Philadelphia, Pa. 
As a boy, he worked for his father in the old paper 
mill. The educational facilities afforded in those 
days were very meager, and young Sharpless’s early 
education was confined to the “subscription” schools. 
At the age of 18, he entered the store of George Reif- 
snyder, at Newcastle, Pa, as clerk, where he re¬ 
mained four years. In 1840, he became a partner with 
his brother John in the mercantile business at Cata¬ 
wissa, the store standing upon the site of the building 
now occupied by his son, A. H. Sharpless. In 1842, 
this partnership was dissolved, J. K. Sharpless con¬ 
tinuing the business at the old stand. In this year, 
1842, on December 22, he was united in marriage to 
Mary Margaret Harder, of Catawissa, since deceased. 
For a quarter of a century, he successfully carried 
on the business alone. During this time, the mer¬ 
chants of this section purchased their goods in Phila¬ 
delphia, making bi-yearly trips to the city. When 
the canal was open, they made the trip by “ packet 
boat,” and in the winter by stage. It took from ten 
days to two weeks to get the goods from the city. In 
1867, he took his son, Ambrose II., into partnership, 
and later, his son, Charles C., the business passing in 
1889, to the two sons, and later, owing to the death 
of the latter, to A. H. Sharpless, by whom it is still 
conducted. By strict attention to business, coupled 
with a reputation for business integrity and honesty 
that was recognized and respected wherever the 
firm was known, he amassed a competence. He is not 
a member of any church, but his religious convic¬ 
tions are strongly with the Quakers, and his whole 
life has been strongly marked with the tenets of that 
faith. 
To the world of horticulture, he is well-known as 
the originator of the celebrated Sharpless straw¬ 
berry, which, notwithstanding its nearly a quarter of 
a century of existence, was never larger or of finer 
flavor than this year. It may be that the soil in this 
vicinity has an influence upon the life of this berry, 
for the crop in this section, this year, has been a 
marvelous one. The berry was the result of a series 
of experiments conducted by Mr. Sharpless, who 
early became interested in small fruits. Indeed, the 
spacious garden connected with his comfortable home 
was an experiment station upon a small scale, filled 
with the choicest varieties of small fruits. The berry 
was the result of mixed seed of the Jucunda, Charles 
Downing, Wilson and Colonel Cheney, and its charac¬ 
teristics have been fully desci’ibed years ago in these 
columns, plants having been set out as soon as it was 
announced in the Rural Grounds. 
While Mr. Sharpless had every faith in the excel¬ 
lence of the new berry, he would not place it upon 
the market without the indorsement of some of the 
noted fruit growers, and it was entrusted to the well- 
known firm of ELlwanger & Barry. At first, their 
letters to him were rather discouraging, in view of 
the great number of new varieties then being intro¬ 
duced, which were proving worthless. Too late, they 
discovered its merits ; Mr. Sharpless had sold and 
given away a number of plants when the proposition 
came making a flattering offer for the sole control of 
the growing and sale of plants, and, through his dis¬ 
inclination to call in and destroy those sent out, the 
monopoly of their growth and sale was lost. He 
eventually realized a couple of thousand dollars out 
of the plant instead of the big return he merited, 
and has lived to enjoy the honor of being a public 
benefactor which, to him, is greater than any money 
remuneration, and now in his declining years he is 
entitled to the thanks of the American people for 
producing one of the best varieties known. f. 
shaft. Use a stone 20 or more inches in diameter, and 
be sure to get a good one. An Amherst is better than 
a Berea, for all purposes. If geared higher than two 
to one, it will run hard, and much less gear would 
not turn fast enough. It is the fast motion that cuts. 
One may find an excellent pair of cranks from some 
old bicycle ; a friend gave me mine. One can grind 
anything. I use it more for grinding mowing ma¬ 
chine knives than anything else. Try it and see how 
your wife will stand by with admiring gaze, and praise 
your ingenuity. w. d. watson. 
Harrison County, O. 
Value of Millet for Hay. 
Many acres of millet are grown in this locality. I 
asked a farmer about it. He said, “ Oh, millet makes 
lots of feed ! I donlt know what one can grow that 
will make so much per acre. But I never like to feed 
SIT DOWN AT THE GRINDSTONE. Fig. 226. 
millet to horses ; it excites the kidneys. If fed to 
horses, it must be cut very early to leave the starch 
in the stalk, and prevent the formation of the mass of 
seeds. I like it for cows and young cattle. It is far 
better than Timothy for cows, and is a vastly greater 
yielder.” 
Farmers like to sow it by June 1, in central Indiana. 
A sharp frost in the spring may kill it, and, if sown 
too late, it comes off too late for timely seeding to 
wheat, and the heavy dews and short, cool days of 
September, cure it very slowly, as its swath is often a 
foot deep. I like to break millet ground when I break 
for corn, if I can, without making the corn late ; then 
harrow every week or two till the last week of May, 
and sow on a firm, clean seedbed. Last year, it was 
so dry that I sowed as above, through a shoe wheat 
drill, with the seed in the wheat box instead of the 
grass seed box, and it did the best of any I ever grew. 
The shoe parted the dust mulch, and the seed fell on 
the damp soil below. If sown and harrowed in, it 
would have mostly perished in the dry mulch. 
One needs a tedder to cure it, as it is so fluffy and 
coarse ; but if sown thickly, say, 1% bushel per acre, 
it will not be coarse. Be sure to get German millet 
seed, not imported, and test it before seeding, as it is 
often stacked before thrashing, and if it heat much, 
it will not grow. I lost a small sowing absolutely 
WHAT THEY SAY. 
Grindstone for Grundy. —In The R. N.-Y. of July 
22 , Fred Grundy makes a request for any device by 
which one man can turn and grind with comparative 
ease. The device shown at Fig. 226 may suit his pur¬ 
pose. I was once in the same fix, and had to call on 
my better half to turn, and I never once thought that 
she did it with any great relish ; so I went to plan¬ 
ning for a machine that would do the work, and at 
the same time cost little. The only thing about the 
grindstone business that a man’s wife can’t under¬ 
stand, is why she cannot hold the tool and he do the 
turning. 
Take the small sprocket wheels and chain from an 
old worn binder or other farm machinery, and gear 
it two to one ; that is, the lower or crank shaft wheel 
must have twice as many cogs as the one on the stone 
that way once. Since our improved fodder machines 
for harvesting and shredding have come in, we are 
not growing so much millet. e. ii. collins. 
Central Indiana. 
Roadmaking in Indiana. 
I must protest against the advice of The R. N.-Y. 
in a recent issue, about roadmaking. As I know 
farmers, they are practical men, and the roads of a 
country are in the best hands when at the command 
of the owners of the land. If a farmer has the ability 
to manage a farm successfully, none will be more 
interested or better prepared to manage the road that 
passes by it. And in the multitude of counsel, there 
is wisdom. It would, indeed, add much to our hard¬ 
ships if we had to pay all our road tax in money, and 
not nearly so much work, or so good work, could be 
done with it as the farmers themselves do in its stead. 
They have better teams, draw bigger loads, drive 
them along faster, and are not so particular about a 
little time, as those who make a living by teaming. 
All supervisors in this section will tell you that the 
farmers and land owners do the best and most work 
they get for the money, and the main roads leading 
into our little city, are far better than the streets of 
the city. There most of the road tax is paid in 
money, and the work is hired. The men employed 
are such as work on railroads and other corporate 
work, and their principal stock in trade is shirking. 
Such help is poor, the work done is poor and ex¬ 
pensive. 
Sometimes the trustee lets the work of ditching and 
grading by contract, and to the lowest bidder ; but in 
most cases, the supervisor, with the aid of the tax¬ 
payers, will do more grading and better work for the 
money, in working out the land tax, etc. There is 
one grave error in the present law—the supervisor 
does not get wages enough. Better wages would 
compensate for more ability, and would cause better 
men to be willing to accept the position. The county 
officers get good wages for doing little by comparison. 
The law is very lame there. The trustee and super¬ 
visor are of the most importance to the taxpayers, 
should be our best men, and be paid fair wages for 
what they do. w. w. latta. 
Noble County, Ind. 
A Test for White Lead Paint. 
The very general use of white lead as a paint, and 
the rather high cost of its manufacture, have given 
unscrupulous men ample chance to stock the market 
with worthless adulterations, and it is well to be pro¬ 
vided with a cheap, reliable test. Pure white lead is 
known as a basic carbonate, being formed by the 
corrosive action of carbonic acid and water upon the 
metal, frequently assisted by animal and vegetable 
matter in process of decay. Its value as a paint is 
due to its durability as well as to its color. It never 
peels, if pure ; and it is long before it tarnishes under 
normal conditions. 
The two adulterants are barium sulphate and sul¬ 
phate of lead. Both are hard to distinguish by sight 
alone from white lead, as they are of the same color. 
But they lack the smoothness and “body” of the 
latter. This would be a small matter, however if 
they proved satisfactory as paint. They crack and 
peel badly. Then the white lead or the oil is blamed, 
or the man thinks that he doesn’t know how to use 
the brush. 
Now for the test: Shake a tablespoonful of the 
suspected article into some benzine to get rid of the 
oil; benzine dissolves it. Strain through while 
blotting or filter paper When the benzine has 
evaporated from the mass, shake well in acetic acid 
(strong vinegar will answer). If it all dissolve, the 
white lead is pure. If there is any sediment, the 
white lead has been adulterated. The proportion of 
adulteration may be readily calculated by comparing 
the residue with the original amount taken. Some 
brands are wholly barium sulphate—worthless. 
White lead is very poisonous, but its effects do not, 
generally, appear at once, the poison being cumula¬ 
tive in its action. Two good remedies are, very dilute 
sulphuric acid in small doses; and (safer), Epsom 
salts (sulphate of magnesia). These change the poi¬ 
sonous carbonate into harmless sulphate, which then 
passes out of the system. But with reasonable care 
in washing off any paint adhering to the skin, no 
danger from poisoning need occur. m. g. k. 
Cornell University. 
WHAT SAY? 
Cold Storage in a Tunnel —How would apples 
keep in a tunnel where cement rock has been re¬ 
moved and the mercury stands at about 48 degrees F. 
without much variation? Would potatoes keep at 
that temperature, without sprouting ? j. b. c. 
Akron, N. Y. 
Single-Horse Steel Harness. —I desire to submit 
for consideration an idea which I have for a single 
harness to be used without a whitfletree, for the pur¬ 
pose of cultivating among fruit trees, berry bushes, 
and even in the corn field. See Fig. 227 It is to be 
made from two bars of iron, one inch by 5-16 or %- 
inch thick (according to the ground) with fastenings 
with hames, extending back with a curve behind 
the horse, until with a downward curve, they 
come together and are fastened by rivets or bolts, 
with a weld at the end to form a hook for attach¬ 
ing to the cultivator. The whole is to be held up by 
a strap over the hips of the horse, attached to the 
back strap. I have not put the above into practice, 
but intend to try it as soon as convenient. Let me 
add that the curve should be sufficiently high, and the 
downward curve far enough from the horse not to 
come in contact, or interfere, with the movement of 
the horse’s hind legs. A. h. b. 
Vienna, Va. 
