48 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN. 
EARLY NURSERY BUSINESS. 
In an article on “ The Nursery Business” in The Florist's 
Exchange, Professor L. H. Bailey says: 
It is impossible to fix a date for the beginning of the 
nursery business in America, Trees were at first grown 
in small quantities as a mere adjunct to general farm 
operations. Governor John Endicott, of the Massachu¬ 
setts Colony, was one of the best fruit growers of his 
time, and he grew many trees. In 1644, he wrote to JoV.n 
Winthrop as follows: “ My children burnt mee at least 
500 trees this spring by setting the ground on fire neere 
them; ” and in 1648 he traded five hundred apple trees, 
three years old, for two hundred and fifty acres of land. 
The first nursery in Maine is thought by Manning to have 
been that of Ephraim Goodale, at Orrington, established 
early in the present century. Other early nurserymen of 
Maine were the brothers Benjamin and Charles Vaughan, 
Englishmen, who settled at Hallowell in 1796- The first 
nursery in South Carolina was establi'^hed by John Wat¬ 
son, formerly gardener to Henry Laurens, before the 
Revolution. In Massachusetts there were several small 
nurserymen towards the close of last century, amongst 
others John Kenrick, of Newtown, whose son William 
wrote the “ New American Orchardist ” published in 1833, 
and which passed through at least six editions. The 
trees were generally top-grafted or budded, sometimes in 
the nursery and sometimes after removal to the orchard. 
Deane writes, in 1797, that “the fruit trees should be 
allowed to grow to the height of five or six feet before 
they are budded or grafted.” Stocks were sometimes 
grafted at the crown, and even root-grafting was known, 
although it is generally said that this operation originated 
with Thomas Andrew Knight, of England, in 18ii. But 
I am not clear as to the exact nature of this root-grafting 
of the last century, and it may have had little similarity 
to the method now in vogue. One of the most popular 
trees a hundred years ago was the Lombardy Poplar, 
which was then a new comer. John Kenrick had two 
acres devoted to it in 1797 ; and Deane writes that “ the 
Lombardy Poplar begins to be planted in this country. 
* -X- * "Pq what size they will arrive, and how durable 
they will be in this country, time will discover.” The 
tree is said to have been introduced into America by 
William Hamilton, of Philadelphia, in 1784. Deane 
speaks of raising apple trees as follows : “ The way to 
propagate them is, by sowing the pomace from cyder- 
mills, digging, or hoeing it into the earth in autumn. The 
young plants will be up in the following spring. And 
the next autumn, they should be transplanted from the 
seed bed into the nursery, in rows from two to three feet 
apart, and one foot in the rows, where the ground has 
been fitted to receive them.” Nothing is said about graft¬ 
ing the trees in the nursery. 
But the first independent nursery in the New World, 
in the sense in which we now understand the term, was 
that established by William Prince at Flushing, Long 
Island, and which was continued under four generations 
of the same family. The founder was William Prince. 
The second Prince was also William, the son, and author 
of the first professed American treatise upon horticulture, 
1828. The third generation was William Robert Prince, 
whose work and writings occupy a very high place in 
American horticultural literature. He was the author of 
“A Treatise on the Vine” (1830), “The Pomological 
Manual ” (1831), and “ Manual of Roses ” (1846). In the 
first two he was aided by his father William, the second. 
This William Robert Prince is the one who first distin¬ 
guished the types of the prairie strawberry into the two 
species, Fragaria Illinoensis and F. lowensis. From a 
large catalogue of William Prince second, published in 
1825—and which contains, amongst other things, lists of 
116 kinds of apples, 108 of pears, 54 of cherries, 50 of 
plums, 16 of apricots, 74 of peaches, and 225 of geraniums 
—I select the following account of the founding of this 
interesting establishment: “ The Linnaean Garden was 
commenced about the middle of the last century, by 
William Prince, the father of the present proprietor, at a 
time when there were few or no establishments of the 
kind in this country. It originated from his rearing a few 
trees to ornament his own grounds ; but finding, after the 
first efforts had been attended with success, that he could 
devote a portion of his lands more lucratively to their 
cultivation for sale, than to other purposes, he commenced 
their culture more extensively, and shortly after published 
a catalogue, which, at that early period, contained several 
hundred species and varieties, and hence arose the first 
extensive fruit collection in America.” The elder Prince 
died in 1802 “ at an advanced age.” 
Amongst the nurseries which were prominent from 1820 
to 1830 were Bloodgood’s, Wilson’s, Parmentier’s, and 
Hogg’s, near New York; Buel and Wilson’s at Albany; 
Sinclair and Moore’s at Baltimore. David Thomas, a man 
of great character and possessed of scientific attainments, 
was the earliest horticulturist of Central or Western New 
York. His collection of fruits, at Aurora, upon Cayuga 
Lake, was begun about 1830. His son, John J. Thomas, 
nurseryman and author of the “American Fruit Cultur- 
ist,” which first appeared in 1846, died at a ripe old age a 
month ago, and in his removal the country loses one of 
its most expert and conscientious pomologists. Between 
1840 and 1850 arose the beginnings of that marvelous 
network of nurseries which, under the lead of Ellwanger & 
Barry, T. C. Maxwell & Brothers, W. & T. Smith, and 
others, has spread the name of Western New York 
throughout North America. In 1857, Prosper J. Berck- 
mans, who had then been a resident of the United States 
seven years, removed to Georgia and laid the foundation 
of what is now the best known nursery in the South. 
Ills ADVERTISEMENT DTD IT. 
A. Pullen, MiIjPORd, Del.— “ Continue our advertisement one year. 
One responsililo dealer from Maryland called at the oUlce one day last 
week and placed his order for ninety-five thousand asparagus roots. 
Shipment this week. Said he saw advertisement in The National 
Nurseryman.” 
