Cbe fiational IRurscrjivinan. 
FOR GROWERS AND DEALERS IN NURSERY STOCK 
The National Nurseryman Publishing Co., Incorporated 
Vol. XXXII. HATBORO, PENN A,. NOVEMBER 1924 No. 11 
Nurserymen and Florists 
By Paul C. Lindley 
Before the North Carolina Florists’ Association, Durham, 
N. C., October 22, 1924 
First, I want to thank the ladies of Chapel Hill for the 
wonderful lunch and the coininittee on arrangements for 
selecting the arboretum at the University of North Caro¬ 
lina as the place for my talk to the North Carolina State 
Florists’ Association, concerning nurserymen and tlorists. 
Less than twenty years ago Dr. W. C. Coker started this 
beauty spot that has grown into one of the points of 
interest of our state and caused our entire convention to 
leave the comfort of a hotel and drive eighteen miles for 
the privilege of taking lunch and viewing what nature, 
aided by man, can do in a few short years. The first nur¬ 
seryman and florist in North Carolina had a vision, that 
customers would be attracted by beauty and he built an 
arboretum, the large Magnolia trees, clumps ot Crypto- 
meria and other specimens of large conifers are still 
growing on the ruins of West Green Nurseries, Greens¬ 
boro, N. C. 
Records in Guilford county court house show that 
Samuel Westbrook purchased this property in 1846, old 
residents remember the greenhouses, summer houses and 
a large pavilion built of chestnut bark. For his day this 
was an elaborate establishment, with glass houses. He 
evidently met reverses during the Civil War, for the bus¬ 
iness was discontinued about that time. 
It is impossible to fix a date for the beginning of the 
nursery business in North Carolina. There were many 
local nurseries doing business about the time of the Civil 
War. The earliest record I can find is one Mock, who 
had a nursery in Davidson county, but moved to Califor¬ 
nia in the late fifties, carrying seedlings, grafts, and 
apple seed with him. 
.Toshua Lindley had a local nursery in Chatham county 
previous to 1850. I have a catalogue in my files dated 
1872, which says that this catalogue is the seventh “addi¬ 
tion” and previous to this catalogue the owner had devel¬ 
oped new varieties and studied fruits for “upwards ol 
forty years.” 
In 1871 Joshua Lindley purchased land near New 
Garden, now Guilford College, and operated the first real 
commercial nursery in this state under the name, J. Lind¬ 
ley & Son. 
The sit-e of the old nursery is now ow ned by a Greens¬ 
boro man, purchased at a much higher figure because ol 
the foresight of this jiioneer in beautifying his home 
grounds. 
I feel that I can point w ith pride to my classification 
nurserymen and florists, as Joshua Lindley was my 
grandfather and 1 am now the third generation in the 
Lindley nursery business. 
The Ward and Ragsdale families also had local nur¬ 
series near Greensboro soon after this time. 
An early nursery in South Carolina w'as established by 
John Watson, formerly gardener to Henry Laurens, be¬ 
fore the Revolution. 
Also in Charleston, S. C., in 1787 appeared the earli¬ 
est American horticultural book of wdiich we have any 
lecord, “The Gardeners Kalendar,” by Mrs. Martha 
Logan. 
In 1857, at Augusta, Ga., P. J. Berckman one of the 
outstanding American nurserymen of his time, laid the 
foundation for the successful “Fruitland Nurseries.” 
The flower growing industry in the South did not as¬ 
sume the same importance as the early nursery business, 
owing to the fact that the early settlers w^ere a very prac¬ 
tical people and paid little attention to any ornamental 
feature, but as wealth increased we find a demand for 
flow^ers and plants. 
A few statistics, I feel will be interesting: 
The first greenhouse of which record can be found w^as 
built in Heidelburg, Germany, in 1619. 
The first greenhouses built in the U. S. A. were erected 
by James Beckman in New York, in 1764, also for Geo. 
Washington in 1765. 
The first house in Chicago of sash construction w^as 
about 1836. 
The first greenhouse in North Carolina about 1850, 
Samuel Westbrook, Greensboro, N. G. 
The first having permanent sash bars was built by 
Frederic A. Lord, Buffalo, about 1855. 
Most of the early houses had very little, if any glass 
in the roof and the sides were high. 
About 1852 the carnation was introduced. 
Previous to 1870 very few attempts w^ere made to 
force the then popular rose and 1890 really w as the be¬ 
ginning of the demand for cut tlow-ers in North Carolina. 
About the year 1877 Mr. Fairchilds, then connected 
w ith the Raleigh Graded Schools, started a florist busi¬ 
ness in Raleigh, N. C. He constructed one house, 7oxl2 , 
w ith an offset 25x12’, on a piece of land owned by the 
city of Raleigh, just opposite the Union station. 
In 1882 this business, including the greenhouses, w^as 
offered for sale and wuis taken over by Mr. H. Steinmetz, 
of New York City, who at the expiration of his lease of 
fifteen vears with the city of Raleigh, moved his plant 
to a new location just west of the city limits. Since 
