Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 1.djvu/491

Rh the sheep's back, making an annual income of four million dollars to the wealth of the state.

Dr. J. R. Cardwell, the veteran horticulturist of the state, and president of the State Horticultural Society for nearly a quarter of a century, and whose lifelike likeness appears on another page, has saved the author a world of trouble by recollecting and writing down the early history of horticulture in the vicinity of this city. What is said here is what Dr. Cardwell says and knows to be the facts. The gentlemen of Hood river, and the most favored localities have not surpassed the big red apple of the '50's, that gave Oregon the world-wide reputation of "the land of the big red apples." That was before the advent of the codlin moth, the scale, and the fungus.

The fungus growths came first; were noticed on the apples in the '60's—first the bitter spots on the Baldwin, then the scab and all the rest.

The first bark louse, as a pest, was noticed in 1870—trees literally covered. The enemy came. In '75 it was gone.

The first codlin moth was discovered in a box of early apples from California, in 1882; did not become a pest until early in the '90's, when the wooly aphis and the whole aphis family with the San Jose scale and other pests from California, put in their appearance. We have them yet.

The introduction of the first cultivated fruits in the country in 1824 by employees of the Hudson's Bay Company is a pretty story, with a touch of romance. At "a dinner given in London in 1824 to several young men in the employ of the Hudson's Bay Company, bound for the far distant Pacific coast, a young lady at the table, beside one of the young gentlemen, ate an apple, carefully wrapped the seeds in a paper and placed them in a vest pocket of the young gentleman, with the request that when he arrived in the Oregon country, he should plant them and grow apple trees. The act was noticed and in a spirit of merriment other ladies present, from the fruits of the table, put seeds of apples, pears, peaches and grapes into the vest pockets of all the young gentlemen. On their arrival at the Hudson's Bay Company fort at Vancouver the young gentlemen gave the seeds to the company's gardener, James Bruce, who planted them in the spring of 1825. From these seeds came the trees now growing on the grounds of the Vancouver barracks, as transferred to the government on the disbanding of the company. One of these trees has been recently identified, marked and protected, and is now 85 years old, and in a healthy condition.

The apple and the pear trees and the grapevines from these seeds are yet annually bearing fruits on the grounds of the government barracks af Vancouver. Mrs. Gay Hayden of Vancouver, informed me she had eaten fruit from these trees for 54 years. The fruit is not large, but of fair quality. _ Fortunately the government does not allow a tree to be removed or destroyed without an order from the department. Captain Nathaniel Wyeth, in his diary of 1835, speaks of having grafted trees on his place, Fort William, on Wapato island, now called Sauvies' island. Grafts and stock must have come from the Sandwich islands, then the nearest point to the cultivated fruits, which early missionaries had brought to those islands. Captain Wyeth left the country soon after, and we have no record of his success with these fruits.

The Hudson's Bay Company introduced the first cultivated roses as early as 1830, a pink rose, with the attar-of-roses aroma. An occasional Hudson bay rose may 'yet be seen in the old yards in Oregon City, and at Vancouver. It is sometimes called the mission rose.

In the summer of 1847, Henderson Luelling, of Iowa, brought across the plains, several hundred yearling grafted sprouts— apple, pear, cherry, plum, prune, peach, grape, and berries— a full assortmentment of all the fruits grown in the then far west. These were placed in soil in two large boxes, made to fit into a wagon bed, and carefully watered and tended on the long and hazardous