1909 - Livingston Seed Co., on Columbus, Ohio's Main Street

Tracking down where this 1909 postcard was drawn was so much fun! 

This very cool postcard has enough clues to allow identifying the seed store as the Livingston Seed Company store. 





The store with "The Union" sign is The Union Clothing Store at the corner of Long and High.  That fits with Livingston's address of 114 High Street.   The lighted arches are wonderful!!

1923 - "Mighty Poor Stuff" - Bad Day for Cinnamon Vines

In 1896 A. T. Cook was offering Cinnamon Vines as the answer to the nurseryman's prayer for a great selling vine. 

He continued contracting growers to supply the tubers for many years. 

This note turned up on eBay illustrating some problems.

1922 - A. T. Cook Still A. T. Cook

A. T. Cook was an enthusiastic promoter of his seeds and plants.   

P. T. Barnum, self-proclaimed “Prince of Humbugs”, comes to mind when I think of Cook. 

This illustration of Cinnamon Vine from his 1922 catalog is a picture of healthy fecundity gone  rampant! 

In the days before air conditioning the leaf cover would help keep your house cooler.

Shirley Dare wrote in 1888 for the American Garden about the many benefits of vines on the house, from privacy to hiding the house's need for paint!  She advised it would keep you "cooler in summer and warmer in winter". 

Warmer in winter?  Assuming leaves were still on it,  I suppose it could weaken winds that could infiltrate...but it sounds far fetched to me.



More posts on this interesting man:

1898 - A. T. Cook Is At It Again with the "Vegetable Peach"

1905 - A. T. Cook, Seedsman and Temperance Man

1917 - Good News that Makes You Smile (and a seedsman)

1923 - Mr. Cook's Roots Disappoint Mrs. Graves
This post relates to the Cinnamon Vine :-)
A. T. Cook - Good Advice on More Than Seeds

1894 - Tricks With Morning Glories

I was thinking about vines for cooling houses after looking at A. T. Cooks colorful lithograph of a vine covered home. This story caught my interest. This is the first suggestion for using morning glories inside the house in a window box I have ever seen. It was published in May, so I am assuming this was an idea for summer.

First things first, though, seed packets!

Windows arranged with plants are very attractive when tasteful selections are made, and they are well cared for. Nothing adds more to the beauty or a room, and nothing is more cheering than blooming plants.

A window arranged with morning glories looks like an outdoor bank of the dainty little flower bells, and yet it must be planned and watched to bring about this natural grace through cultivation. 

A box — as long as the window and rather deep —
is fastened under a window where the sun shines in. 

A network of cord is fastened so that when the vines grow large enough they will begin to climb upon it, growing upward and toward the center of the room. 

The cords are fastened to the edge of the box inside, and when the plants are old enough to remain where they are trained, the net can be dropped to the floor, leaving an overflowing bank starred with blight blossoms of pink, blue purple and white intermingled.

The cords or net must not be fastened downward permanently, but as often as convenient the bank should be lifted up when the sun shines, and the windows opened in warm weather to give them fresh air and make them grow more hardily. 

Besides, this is more convenient when sweeping is done so vines are not in the way and liable to be injured.

1894 - Source - pg. 272

To get more of a feel for the seriousness of window gardening just look at this!


This photo was published in 1894 in American Gardening in an article titled The Ideal Window Garden.

Morning-Glories for the Window-Garden.

—If there is a more beautiful flower than the morning glory it has never been introduced to us. The only drawback to its general use is its cheapness, which destroys the reputation of any plant. Just make the morning-glory cost one dollar a plant and societies in its honor would spring up all over the country.

But the morning-glory has virtues not generally known or appreciated. It is a perfect success as a window-plant. Put a few seeds, say six, in a six-inch pot, and within a few weeks they will be in bloom, and that before they make any attempt at climbing; the first flowers coming with the second pairs of leaves.

1890 - American Agriculturist

In a Godey's Magazine and Lady's Book of 1844 the morning glory was being used for shade.

Each parlour window was shaded by luxuriant vines of the Convolvulus major, the “morning glory” of America, and at that time a rarity in England, and cultivated with much care. 

These were planted in capacious pots, and trained like geraniums to clamber over large fan-spreading frames.

In 1838 The Prairie Farmer suggested using morning glories for beautifying.

The morning glory is so well known, as to make description presumptuous. There are, however, two or three species, and more varieties. 

The common mode of growing them is to plant the seed under the window, and train them up the sides of the house. The effect is pleasing, especially when the house happens to be of rough logs, though it is doubted if those yielding fragrancy us well as bloom might not be substituted to advantage near windows. 

There are, however, various nooks, corners and unsightly places about every dwelling, which may be covered by this strong growing vine. There is also another mode of growing this, as well as other annual climbers, which might be introduced to great advantage. It is to form a circular bed, and fasten down a barrel or hog-ahead hoop around its circumference, securing it to the earth by hooked pins driven into the ground.

In the centre of the bed for a stout stake of any desired height; then fasten strings or small wires from this hoop to the top of the stake, forming a cone, as represented in the cut. 

The vines will cover the whole of this, and present a beautiful figure of mingled green leaves and flowers.

Lastly, this article by James Bancroft from Success With Flowers, A Floral Magazine

MORNING GLORIES.

IT is, perhaps, advisable to assume a quiet resignation when asked exasperating questions in floral matters, and it is then that questions asking for cultural directions for raising Morning Glories can be treated with the gentlest and fullest consideration; but when a certain line is overstepped, it may be more satisfactory when the question is asked, "What is a Morning Glory anyhow?" to snub the questioner by assuring him that he would never become a Morning Glory unless he changed his habits and rose much earlier than the customary middle of the forenoon.

At a recent exhibition in a large city, two ladies, upon seeing a many-flowered branch of Allamanda, stopped to admire the " lovely yellow Morning Glories," as they called them, though one of the ladies hesitated to give them that name saying that she had never seen yellow ones before; but on the emphatic assertion of the other lady, she moved away apparently satisfied. There was certainly no harm done here, unless either of these ladies should afterwards assert that she had seen yellow Morning Glories, and therefore knew such existed.

There can be but few cultural directions to give regarding this flower, but perhaps the following pgintsmay be interesting, for no garden is complete without the Convolvulus Major, or Morning Glory, as it is commonly called. In gardens, where it is grown, it is not necessary to sow the seed, for the dry seed pods still hanging on the vine will protect the seed in the severest Winter, dropping the seed the ensuing Spring. The young plants can be destroyed when spading up the ground in the Spring, or they may be retained, or transplanted to other locations. 

Some people like to set a few around the Hawthorns, Spireas, or such like shrubbery, but when planted in such locations the vine will respond with a greater number and better quality of blossoms if set out in a hole full of rich earth.

The vines will readily run up the bushes, the green leaves of both blending with each other, and in August, and all through the Fall until frost, the bushes will present a lovely appearance in the morning hours, or on dismal, cloudy days, covered with the different red, white or blue blossoms.    A screen of wire netting arranged in front of the refuse heap was one year covered with these vines, and made a beautiful appearance. Another year they were allowed to run over an old Grapevine, and the past year in addition to the Grapevine they have run up some tall Russian Sunflowers, and nestle and peep out of the broad green leaves with great effect.

Like most climbing plants their habit is to mount in a direct line, but they can with occasional attention be woven into horizontal lines on the trellis; even if left to themselves their leaves will fill a trellis better than Scarlet Runner, Flowering Cucumber or other quick-growing climber. In making a screen a good idea is to combine all these climbers and plant some of each. This will give a variation of leaf and also of color among the flowers.

When planted around or near Dahlias, Cannas and the like, the vines should not be set out till the larger plants have made a good tall growth, else the vine will soon run to the top and fling out its long finger anxious for more support and seemingly disheartened by the lack.

When seeds of the different-colored flowers are desired to be separated, while the flowers are in bloom tie a string of the same color around the vine, and at and time after frost, or even on a pleasant Winter day, the pods can be picked, the husks rubbed off, and the seeds put into envelopes properly marked as to the color of the flower shown by the string.

Two strings of different colors and a single string on a vine is all that is necessary, but greater accuracy may be secured by using more twine.

The bud of the Morning Glory only opens once, but as they come in clusters a succession of flowers is assured.

Where it can be given plenty of air, the Morning Glory does fairly well grown indoors; its blossoms are usually much smaller. There are so many climbers more suitable for house culture, more desirable as a change from Summer flowers, that it is natural to feel that the garden is its proper place.—

James H. Bancroft, Mass.

1887 - Leptosiphon??

What is leptosiphon?

Vick's Illustrated Monthly Magazine and Floral Guide had these border suggestions for the 1887 gardens.   I liked the look of the page, the simple pink gypsophila, the multi-colored leptosiphon... the what?!

What sort of name is that?! Leptosiphon sounds more like part of an octopus!

Leptosiphon.    Now that is a name not jiggered by any commercial hopes.  It is a seriously un-cute name!

I wondered, could it have stayed so aggressively unlovely for 120 years?   

Then I looked it up, and yes - it can stay so aggressively unlovely!

Most all ads for seeds or plants just call it Leptosiphon.  

One or two mention it has a cute name - False Babystars - but only two that I found listed it as such. 







I found no reference in a simple search of old seed catalogs for False Babystars. Wikipedia will fill you in on the plant.