19C Seed Dealer & Nurseryman W Atlee Burpee 1858-1915

Washington Atlee Burpee (1858-1915)

The W. Atlee Burpee & Company was founded by W. Atlee Burpee (1858-1915) in 1876 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Atlee was born in 1858 in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

At fourteen years of age, Atlee’s hobby was breeding chickens, geese and turkeys. He corresponded with poultry experts worldwide and wrote scholarly articles in poultry journals. With a partner in 1876, the 18 year old Atlee started a mail-order chicken business in the family home with $1,000 loaned to him by his mother.

Poultry farmers from the Northeast knew of his business, and he soon opened a store in Philadelphia, selling not only poultry but also corn seed for poultry feed. It wasn’t long before his customers started requesting cabbage, carrot, cauliflower and cucumber seeds.

In 1878, Burpee dropped his partner and founded W. Atlee Burpee & Company, mainly for garden seeds, but poultry wasn’t dropped from the Burpee catalog until the 1940s.

By 1888, the family home, Fordhook Farms, in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, was established as an experimental farm to test and evaluate new varieties of vegetables and flowers, and to produce seeds.

Before World War I, Atlee spent many summers traveling through Europe and the United States, visiting farms and searching for the best flowers and vegetables. Atlee shipped many of the vegetables and flowers he found to Fordhook Farms for testing. Those plants that survived were bred with healthier types to produce hybrids better suited to the United States. Fordhook Farms was the first laboratory to research and test seeds in this way. Fordhook Farms specialized in testing onions, beets, carrots, peas and cabbage.

In 1909, Burpee established Floradale Farms in Lompoc, California, to test sweet peas, and Sunnybrook Farms near Swedesboro, New Jersey tested tomatoes, eggplants, peppers and squashes.

In his travels, Atlee met Asa Palmer, a Pennsylvania farmer who raised beans, and who thought he had one plant that was resistant to cutworms. Burpee turned this bean plant into what is now known as the Fordhook lima bean, one of the company’s most famous items.

Another successful plant was the Golden Bantam sweet corn that the farmer William Chambers of Greenfield, Massachusetts had grown before his death. A friend of Chambers found some of the sweet corn seeds and sold Burpee seeds of the corn, and in 1902, Golden Bantam was featured in a Burpee catalog.

Before 1900 most people thought that yellow corn was fit only for animals, so in order to change their customers minds, many farmers slipped Golden Bantam corn in with the white corn they were selling. Within a few years, people in the United States were converted to yellow corn.

Iceberg lettuce was introduced in 1894 and named for its crispness. A key in Burpee’s business was the 1863 free delivery system, that required post offices to deliver mail to residents’ homes, and in 1896, free delivery was extended to rural areas. This allowed his catalogs to be delivered directly to people’s homes.

Thousands of letters were received annually from Burpee’s customers thanking him for his seeds. Burpee knew that the key to his business was advertising and the catalog was his advertising medium.

In his first year of business, his catalog was 48 pages, but by 1915 his catalogs were 200 pages and he distributed a million catalogs. Burpee personally wrote most of the copy of his catalogs. Burpee set up an advertising department and offered cash prizes for the best advertisements. This competition is what originated the slogan “Burpee Seeds Grow” in 1890.

The 1891 catalog was the first to feature engravings made from photographs, and by 1901 this process was done by machines. Burpee’s move to photography changed the whole industry and the hand-drawn illustration in catalogs disappeared. In another break with tradition, Burpee eliminated cultural information and put in testimonial letters and plant descriptions.

At Atlee’s death in 1915, the company had 300 employees, and it was the largest seed company in the world. At that time the Burpee company distributed over 1 million catalogs a year and received 10,000 orders a day.

Information from the Smithsonian Institution Libraries research..

19C American Graveyard Design Akin to 1900 BC Egyptian Funeral Gardens

In 19th C America, graveyards began to look like garden parks. Apparently, the practice dates back centuries before the birth of Christ.  In Archaeology magazine on March 20, 2018, Jarrett A Lobell writes of Funeral Gardens in Egypt.

Tomb garden, Luxor, 1900 B.C.  (Courtesy © Proyecto Djehuty/Jose Latova)

"The Tale of Sinuhe, a work of ancient Egyptian literature dating to the 12th Dynasty, around 1900 B.C., reads, “...and there was made for me a sepulchral garden, in which were fields, in front of my abode, even as is done for a chief companion.” 

The existence of funerary gardens is also known from representations in tombs from as early as the 6th Dynasty (2323–2150 B.C.). But no archaeological evidence had been found until last year, when, in front of the rock-cut tomb of a high-ranking 12th Dynasty official of the Theban court, archaeologist José Manuel Galán of the Spanish National Research Council uncovered a well-preserved garden buried under more than 15 feet of debris. 

The 10-by-6.5-foot rectangle was raised off the ground and divided into square beds. According to Galán, the Egyptians would have grown vegetables, fruits, and flowers intended as fresh offerings for the deceased, as well as small trees and shrubs. 

Galán’s team found one of these shrubs, a tamarisk complete with roots and trunk, in the corner of the garden next to a bowl of dates and other fruits, perhaps meant as offerings. In the next field season, he plans to retrieve seeds and pollen to learn what plants were available in ancient Thebes and which were chosen for religious and funerary purposes."

Tho Jefferson (1743-1824) Writes about Gardening

Thomas Jefferson by Tadeusz Andrzej Bonawentura Kosciuszko (1746 - 1817) 

1809 April 25.  (Jefferson to Etienne Lemaire).  "I am constantly in my garden or farm, as exclusively employed out of doors as I was within doors when at Washington, and I find myself infinitely happier in my new mode of life."

Étienne Lemaire (d. 1817) was Thomas Jefferson's second mâitre d'hôtel, or "steward," in the President's House. He was hired to replace Joseph Rapin late in the summer of 1801. Describing the ideal mâitre d'hôtel, Jefferson noted that "honesty & skill in making the dessert are indispen[sable] qualifications. that he should be good humored & of a discreet, steady disposition is also important." Lemaire was brought to Jefferson's attention by friends in Philadelphia, where Lemaire worked in the household of William Bingham. Transferring to Jefferson's employ, he would assume management of the domestic staff at the President's House, supervise the dinner service & dessert, handle household accounts, & conduct most of the marketing for groceries & other provisions.

Some of Lemaire's recipes have been preserved, along with his memorandum on the proper wine to serve with certain main dishes. A Monticello cookbook compiled by Jefferson's granddaughter Virginia Jefferson Randolph Trist credits Lemaire with recipes for Beef à la Mode, Bouilli, Breast of Mutton, & Pancakes. Jefferson had sent Lemaire's "reciepts" to his family at Monticello in 1803, noting that "the orthography will be puzzling & amusing; but the reciepts are valuable."

The Monticello overseer Edmund Bacon described Lemaire as "a very smart man, was well educated, & as much of a gentleman in his appearance as any man." Jefferson's granddaughter recalled him as "a portly well-mannered frenchman ... of whose honesty his master had a higher opinion than the world at large, & who I fancy made a small fortune in his employ. But he was a civil & a useful man & merited reward."

After he retired to Monticello in 1809, Jefferson wrote Lemaire a letter of appreciation, expressing "the sense of my attachment to you & satisfaction with your services. they were faithful, & skilful, & your whole conduct so marked with good humour, industry, sobriety & economy as never to have given me one moment’s dissatisfaction." In 1817, Jefferson heard from his former chef at the President's House that Lemaire drowned himself in the Schuylkill Rive. Jefferson responded to this news: "I sincerely lament the unfortunate fate of poor Le Maire."

Research & images & much more are directly available from the Monticello.org website. 

19C Seed Dealer & Nurseryman John Lewis Childs (1856 –1921)

John Lewis Childs (1856 –1921) was a horticultural businessman who founded Floral Park, New York.  Childs was born in Maine, & grew up in Buckfield.  Childs married in New York, in 1886, to Carrie Goldsmith & had 4 children: Vernon G., Norma D., Lyon L. & Carlton H.  His career in horticulture began in 1874, when he took a job with C. L. Allen of Queens. Soon afterwards he began buying land in nearby East Hinsdale, Queens County, near other nurseries. Within 5 years of building his own seed & bulb business, Childs was responsible for building more than 20 buildings in Floral Park, including hotels, lumber mills & his own printing press.

History of Long Island: From Its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time-1903 reports that "The year after Childs moved to New York he rented a few acres of ground a mile & a half from Queens, on the railroad line, & began business as a seedsman & florist.

"The total sales from his 1st catalogue or price-list—a publication of 8 pages—was barely $50, & it was 5 years before his business showed signs of rapid growth, but after that his trade increased extensively. Childs then purchased the land he occupied & from time to time added to it. The railroad company soon established a new station on his premises, which at Childs' request was called Floral Park. It became necessary to build bulb & seed houses, greenhouses, dwellings & a large store to accommodate his business. His mail became so large & important that the government established a post office at his place...Childs gives close attention to... the publication of the "Mayflower," a magazine of great value to any engaged in floral culture...

"...Floral Park is located on Long Island, fifteen miles from the heart of Brooklyn, & is now partly included in the territory recently annexed to New York City... The gardens at Floral Pork cover almost 200 acres, all in flowers. These gardens border on the Long Island Railroad for a distance of more than a mile... The land is perfectly flat, of a sandy nature & particularly well adapted to gardening.

"Childs receives & ships on an average several tons of mail matter each day...The great seed & florist business is accommodated with a railroad station & freight office close at hand. There are 30 trains each way per day to & from the heart of the city, both to & from the New York & Brooklyn divisions, also telegraph & telephone connections with all parts of the country, & several express companies receive & deliver goods.

The main building is an immense 4 story & basement building, built of brick & iron, & consequently fire proof... In this building arc located all the business offices, the seed department, which occupies the entire 3rd floor, & the packing & mailing department, which occupies all of the 1st floor as well as the great brick packing room in the rear of the building.

The Seed House No. 2. is a frame building.with a large amount of floor space, used for storing, cleaning & drying seeds & for making boxes, it is located about 500 feet from the brick building, &, like it, has an immense cellar for bulbs & a large range of greenhouses connecting with it in the rear.

The Bulb House is a large brick building 100 by 40 feet, 3 stories & a basement, used solely for storing bulbs. During the late fall & winter it is filled with gladiolus bulbs from top to bottom, which the late winter & spring sales reduce. The small bulbs which are not sold are planted in the spring & again fill this immense building when harvested in the fall.

The greenhouses are very extensive & are divided into four sections or blocks. There is a set of five large houses, some of which are 200 feet feet long by twenty feet wide, in the rear of the great fire-proof seed house ; a set of 9 houses in the rear of seed house No. 2: in another location there is another set of 8 houses, & on the lawn there is another set of 8 fancy houses used largely for rare & fancy plants.

There is a complete system of brick cold sheds connected with the packing department of the big seed house. In these sheds large quantities of shrubs, fruit trees & hardy perennial plants are stored that they may be available for filling...orders at any time during the winter. Besides the buildings above mentioned there are 15 or 20 more of various sizes, which are used for various purposes in connection with the business. One of these is a large farm house, with barns & stables, where the horses which are used on the place are kept.  Childs also has a steam lumber & planing mill, with all the necessary machinery for preparing lumber for building purposes...

Childs' foreign trade is so extensive that he has an agent in Liverpool & one in Auckland. New Zealand. All orders for England, Ireland & Scotland are packed separately & sent to the Liverpool agent, who forwards each parcel to its destination. All shipments for Australia & New Zealand go through the Auckland agency in like manner. Goods for Newfoundland go through the shipping agent at St. John.  Childs also has a great number of customers in the different European countries—in Africa, India, China, Japan, South America, Mexico. West India Islands...

The lawns at Floral Park surrounding Childs' residence & seed stores cover an area of nine acres & are artistically laid out & beautifully stocked with rare trees, shrubs & plants. There are over 300 different varieties of flowering shrubs. The lawn also contains several beautiful summer houses or pagodas, fountains & an artificial aquarium for rare water lilies. The trial & experiment gardens which Childs conducts for himself & the "Mayflower" are very extensive. All sorts of seeds, plants, fruits & vegetables are tested, various experiments made, diseases & insects treated. The state of New York has also established its trial & experiment gardens at Floral Park, on Childs' premises, & the 2 working in harmony afford the most complete & scientific establishment of the sort in the country.

Three catalogues are issued each year at a total cost, when mailed, of about $9,000. A regular spring catalogue is issued on the, 1st of January, is sent to all regular customers, & requires an edition of 500,000 copies. On the 1st of February a 500,000 edition catalogue of specialties & novelties is issued, & on the 1st of September appears the full catalogue of hardy bulbs for fall planting & winter blooming.

All the work of printing is done on the presses of the "Mayflower." & thus there is a great economy in the cost of issuing the catalogues. Fifteen years ago the first number of the magazine "Mayflower" appeared.  It is a monthly magazine devoted to flowers & gardening... A substantial brick building, 150 feet long by 40 feet wide, was erected & fitted with all modern machinery for the publishing business. The power is furnished by a powerful steam engine & light by an electric dynamo in the building. Seven presses of various sizes are employed, one of which is a &16,000 rotary Web, capable of printing & folding eighty thousand copies of the "Mayflower" per day. The other machinery consists of 3 trimmers or cutters, 5 stitching machines, 2 folding machines, a grinder, a powerful steam pump & a complete electrotyping outfit...

From January until June & from September until December are the busy months at Floral Park. During ibis period of 9 months it is not unusual for Childs to receive as high as from eight to 10,000 letters in a single day. The work of shipping & filing the letters is most complete & systematic, so that if references at a later date is wanted for any order previously received it can be made in about a minute. An experienced artist is constantly employed at Floral Park in sketching & photographing flowers & plants, drawing designs for cuts & painting for colored plates...

Tho Jefferson (1743-1824) Writes about Gardening

 

Thomas Jefferson by Tadeusz Andrzej Bonawentura Kosciuszko (1746 - 1817) 

1809 April 19.  (Jefferson to James Madison).  "Dinsmore & Neilson set out yesterday for Montpelier. if mrs Madison has any thing there which interests her in the gardening way, she cannot confide it better than to Nielson. he is a gardener by nature, & extremely attached to it."

James Madison (1751-1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, expansionist, philosopher, & Founding Father who served as the 4th president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. He is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for his pivotal role in drafting & promoting the Constitution of the United States & the United States Bill of Rights. He co-wrote The Federalist Papers, co-founded the Democratic-Republican Party, & served as the 5thUnited States Secretary of State from 1801 to 1809.

Research & images & much more are directly available from the Monticello.org website. 

Location, Location, Location...

Up & down the Atlantic coast, where the topography allowed, when gentlemen decided exactly where to build their house, they usually harked back to the traditional defensive habit of building on the high ground. Even when the need for surveying the countryside for marauders had long passed, gentlemen continued to look for the highest situation, in part so that they could remain above, superior, in the minds of others.

1800 Francis Jukes (American artist, 1745–1812)  Mount Vernon

Shortly after he arrived in the United States, British architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe wrote in 1798, ""When you stand upon the summit of a hill, and see an extensive country of woods and fields without interruption spread before you, you look at it with pleasure...this pleasure is perhaps very much derived from a sort of consciousness of superiority of position to all the monotony below you."
Benjamin Latrobe by Charles Willson Peale.

Latrobe (1764-1820) came to the United States in 1796, settling first in Virginia and then relocating to Philadelphia to design the waterworks. In 1803, he was hired as Surveyor of the Public Buildings of the United States & spent much of the next 14 years working on projects in Washington, D.C., where he designed the U S Capitol. Latrobe then traveled to New Orleans to work on a waterworks project and died there of yellow fever in 1820.

Plantation circa 1825, Unknown Artist

Latrobe knew that the situation of the house was meant to impress visitors viewing the surrounding landscape & to impress those passing-by who could only look up & admire the plantation or country seat. When choosing a homesite, gentlemen carefully considered the vistas & views available from the pinnacle of the property, as well as the practical aspects of the situation.

Visitors often used the powerful verb command to describe the placement of a dwelling on a site surrounded with vistas. A house would a view or a prospect. Those passing by would note that houses on high ground were situated on an eminence. Homage was due to the powerful and clever owner.

Francis Guy. Perry Hall near Baltimore, about 1804.

Even when the houses themselves were unfinished or left to decay, impressive sites were still admired. In June of 1760, Andrew Burnaby was traveling through Annapolis and noted, "the governor's palace is not finished...it is situated very finely upon an eminence and commands a beautiful view of the town and environs."

Andrew Burnaby (1732-1812) was a well-traveled English clergyman who visited the British American colonies in 1760, and published his travel journal back in England, just as the Revolutionary War was beginning.
c 1759 Moses Gill (1733–1800) by John Singleton Copley (1738–1815)

One of the most amazing descriptions explaining the meaning of the prospect from a gentleman's house to both its owner and to its neighbors, is the description of the home & property of Governor Moses Gill of Massachusettes, as reported by Rev. Peter Whitney in his History of Worcester County, 1793.
Samuel Hill, View of the Seat of the Hon. Moses Gill Esq. at Princeton, in the County of Worcester, reproduced in Massachusetts Magazine, November, 1792.

The magazine reported, Foreigners must have an high idea of the rapid progress of improvement in America, when they are told that the ground which these buildings now cover, and a farm of many hundred acres around it, now under high and profitable cultivation were, in the year 1766, as perfectly wild as the deepest forest of our country. The honourable proprietor must have great satisfaction in seeing Improvements so extensive, made under his own eye, under his own direction, and by his own active industry."

Rev. Whitney wrote his insightful history of Worcester County only a year later, "In this town is the country seat of the Hon. Moses Gill, Esq....His elegant and noble seat...The farm contains upwards Of 3000 acres.The buildings stand upon the highest land of the whole farm.br />
"The mansion house is large, being 50 x 50 feet, with four stacks of chimneys; the farm house is 40 x 36 feet; in a line with this stand the coach and chaise house, 50 x 36 feet; this is joined to the barn by a shed 70 feet in length - the barn is two hundred feet by thirty-two.

"The prospect from this seat is extensive and grand, taking in horizon to the east, of seventy miles at least. The blue hills of Milton are discernable with the naked eye, from the windows of this superb edifice, distant not less than sixty miles, as well as the waters of the harbor of Boston, at certain seasons of the year.

"When we view this seat, these buildings, and this farm of so many hundred acres, now under a high degree of cultivation, and are told that in the year 1766 it was a perfect wilderness, we are struck with wonder, admiration and astonishment.

"The honorable proprietor hereof must have great satisfaction in contemplating these improvements, so extensive, made under his direction, and, I may add by his own active industry. Judge Gill is a gentleman of singular vivacity and activity, and indefatigable in his endeavors to bring forward the cultivation of his lands...and deserves great respect and esteem, not only from individuals, but from the town and county he has so greatly benefited, and especially by the ways in which he makes use of that vast estate, wherewith a kind Providence has blessed him.

"Upon the whole, this seat of judge Gill, all the agreeable circumstances respecting it being attentively considered, is not paralleled by any in the New England States; perhaps not by any one this side of Delaware."
1764 Moses Gill by John Singleton Copley (1738–1815) 

A description of George Washington's home on the Virginia side of the Potomac River appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette just after his death. The account described the view from his porch, "A lofty portico, 96 feet in length, supported by 8 pillars, has a pleasing effect when viewed from the water...On the opposite side...an extensive plain, exhibiting corn-fields and cattle grazing, affords in summer a luxuriant landscape; while the blended verdure of woodlands and cultivated declivities, on the Maryland shore, variegates the prospect in a charming manner."

A variety of terms appear in contemporary descriptions of houses and grounds shedding light on the importance of the impressive view. I want to devote the next few blog postings to these terms, as they were used by visitors & observers in colonial British America & the early republic.

For a discussion of concepts parallel to those noted in the 1793 Whitney History of Worcester County relating to the landscape of Moses Gill's property plus Ralph Earl's 1800 painting Looking East from Denny Hill, see David R. Brigham's article at CommonPlace.org. Brigham is the curator of American art at the Worcester Art Museum in Worcester, Massachusetts.

1764 Plants in 18C Colonial American Gardens - Virginian John Randolph (727-1784) - Marjoram

A Treatise on Gardening Written by a native of this State (Virginia)
Author was John Randolph (1727-1784)
Written in Williamsburg, Virginia about 1765
Published by T. Nicolson, Richmond, Virginia. 1793
The only known copy of this booklet is found in the Special Collections of the Wyndham Robertson Library at Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia.

Marjoram

Marjoram, winter, pot and wild....Origanum. This may be propagated either from the seed, cuttings, or parting their roots in the spring; and if kept clear from the weeds will stand a number of years.
.