All posts tagged with horticulture

Anna Botsford Comstock (1854-1930) held a significant role as a proponent of nature education at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, at the turn of the 20th century. Comstock was born in New York State, the only child to Quaker parents at the edge of the pioneer era. The doctrine of her parents, Marvin and Phoebe Botsford, was one of appreciating a higher creation in all things natural. It is in this philosophy in which a young Comstock was raised, and it was her mother who particularly influenced her child’s curiosity, and knowledge, of the surrounding natural wonders of the world.

Prominent botanist and cataloger of gardens, William Sherard (1659-1728), was hired by an aristocrat to tutor her grandson in botany for “hee loving my diversion so well.” This was Mary Somerset, the first Duchess of Beaufort (1630-1715), an accomplished gardener and botanist in her own right. She sought solace in “natural learning” and tending plants, some cultivated in what she referred to as her “infirmary.” As detailed in landscape historian and conservator Mark Laird’s splendid A Natural History of English Gardening (2015), her gardening activities were a refuge from bouts of depression. She remarked in a letter of her cataloging: “When I get into storys of plants I know not how to get out.” Laird’s chapter on Mary Somerset, and other recent scholarly investigations, examine her work and help elevate her role in the history of science. Rather than simply a diversion from melancholia, she was dedicated in her studies, blossoming late in her life.

The National Agricultural Library (NAL), Special Collections has one of the world’s largest collections of nursery and seed trade catalogs totaling over 200,000 from American as well as international companies. This collection, representing businesses located in all states plus over 50 countries, was named after its long-time curator, Henry G. Gilbert. The earliest catalog is from William R. Prince & Company dated 1771. NAL continues to collect modern-day catalogs.

Join us for Seeds in the Stacks, a Facebook Live tour at the USDA National Agricultural Library! We’ll go behind-the-scenes to explore selections from the Library’s collection of over 200,000 seed and nursery catalogs.