115 Years Ago: The Arrival of the Spring Seed Catalogs

I enjoyed reading this and hope you do as well.  In 1899 Edward Payson Roe wrote the book Play and Profit in My Garden.  It was interesting for me to find his comments on many of the seedsmen I am following...Thorburn, Vick and Landreth for starters.

1899

Play and Profit in My Garden

By Edward Payson Roe

The spring catalogues are now arriving, and they are enough to give one a perfect fever over gardening. Lying before me is one that is a marvel of good taste and beauty, sent out by Mr. James Vick, if Rochester. 

In it advertising becomes a fine art. So suggestive and accurate are the engraving of vegetables, and especially the flowers, that we recognize old friends at a glance, and the latter stand out so clearly on the page, that it would seem that we could gather them into a bouquet. In sending out thousands of such catalogues, or rather pretty little volumes of one hundred and thirty two pages, Mr. Vick may justly be regarded as a public benefactor, for they cannot fail to greatly increase the love for rural life; and they certainly impart much practical instruction in regard to it, while at the same time offering for sale the varied contents of the largest seed store in the world.

Looking as if it "meant business," R. H. Allen & Co.'s Catalogue, with its sober, solid appearance, catches my eye. It is an old friend, and has laid on my table every spring for ten years or more. Direct, simple, plainly indicating the best varieties among the many candidates for favor, it always inspires confidence. How often in the wane of winter I have looked through its pages, and marked the kinds I decided upon raising.

I can assure the ladies that the bliss of looking through the fashion-plates and ordering the spring styles, is not to be compared with the deliberation on the seeds you intend raising. Then only less welcome, because less familiar, are the catalogues of Peter Henderson, B. K. Bliss & Sons, Thorburn & Co., Bridgeman, Flemming, Landreth, Briggs & Brother, and others; and between them you are like a gourmand, who, instead of being invited to sit down to one feast, has placed before him a dozen banquets at the same time, and is bewildered how to choose.

As by a winter fire we turn over these dainty pages, what visions they conjure up to the imaginative amateur ! "Conover's Colossal Asparagus!"  How that sounds! but from brief trial I am coming to the conclusion that it does not sound too large. Farther on, the eye is

startled by "Egyptian Blood " oh!  “Egyptian Blood Turnip Beet, the earliest variety grown," and we breathe freer. What names they give these innocent useful vegetables! Why "Egyptian Blood”?  Who wants so sanguinary an association while weeding his early beets?  Now here is something sensible: "Large Flat Dutch Cabbage." That is very appropriate. The carrot list commences badly. "The Early Horn!" I hope none of my readers take it, early or late. Then here is "Carter's Incomparable Dwarf Dark Crimson Celery." Such a name as that certainly requires a carter. "Early Russian" or "Rushin," as it is generally pronounced, is a good name for a fast cucumber, but I protest against "Blue Peter Pea."  I told you the onion was irrepressible and supreme in every age ; for see, they have named the last variety discovered, "New Queen," and I promise you she will maintain her rank when so many of her degenerate sisters are losing theirs. Other queens may frantically sway their sceptres in vain, but a breath from her will cause many to grow sick and faint. Long live the new Queen—onion. For the sake of our Democratic friends, I will add that she is described as having a " white skin." Here is something called Scorzonera. The idea of asking your youngest child if he would take some of that for dinner! We come next to a squash called " Hubbard," probably in honor of the good old lady of that name, in hopes that her "cupboard" will never be "bare" of the delicious pies it makes. 

Strange! here is one called the "Boston Marrow". The profanity of suggesting in faintest allusion that the marrow of Boston enters in a squash! We hardly know what we are coming to in the way of Tomatoes. Every year there are several novelties so far superior (according to the catalogues) to anything else known, that it would seem perfection might be reached in this vegetable, if nothing else earthy. Two or three years ago, we had a variety named General Grant, indicating that all competitors were vanquished. We bought General Grant, sowed it, hoed it, and ate it, and were satisfied. General Grant didn't disappoint us—never. It was a good tomato, solid all the way through; and though not so large as some others, was very prolific. We hoped to "have peace" on the tomato question. But so far from being satisfied, like the people, with the great namesake for eight years, the seed-growers all proved Liberal Republicans on the tomato question, and every spring new candidates are pressed upon us. And now, Mr. "Smith" has sent out a novelty that renders it almost impossible to wait till next July before seeing the wonder in fruit. The only thing that can be done at present is to buy the seeds at twenty-five cents per half dozen or so.

Tomorrow's Blog - The General Grant Tomato