Part 8 (1/2)
The next paper, by Mr. J. F. Wilkinson of Rockport, Indiana, ”Observations and Experiences with the Persian Walnut in Southern Indiana.” Mr. Wilkinson.
(Paper not available for this Report.)
DR. MacDANIELS: We have a choice of doing several different things.
There are several other papers we have here, the authors of which are not present. Then the other possibility would be to go on and have some papers that require the use of the lantern, as long as we have this all fixed up.
Perhaps the thing to do is to have Dr. Anthony's paper on chestnuts, using the lantern, and then have these other papers on the Persian walnut summarized after that. Does that seem to be a reasonable thing to do?
(Chorus of yeses.)
DR. MacDANIELS: We will go ahead on that basis, then. Dr. Anthony has the talk on chestnuts.
(This talk, withdrawn for revision, may appear in next Report.)
MR. CORSAN: Dr. Anthony, I knew Captain Sober very well, and he showed me quite a group--a double handful--of Korean sweet chestnuts. They were a little thicker than the native Pennsylvania chestnut, they are rounder and a little larger, but they weren't as large as some of the Chinese or nearly as large as the j.a.panese. What about those nuts, because, you see, the blight killed all his Paragon chestnuts--you know, the cross between the European and the American chestnuts--killed them all off completely, as it did with me.
DR. ANTHONY: In our detective work we were instructed to follow down that plantation. Mrs. Sober is still alive, living in Lewisburg. The planting has practically disappeared. I am going over there next week.
It is still with the man who wrote ”Chestnut Culture in Pennsylvania.”
MR. CORSAN: It broke his heart.
DR. ANTHONY: We are going over there next week, but I think that whole planting has disappeared. When these things change hands, another man comes in who is not interested, and things disappear very rapidly.
(Continue with paper.)
MR. CORSAN: I want to tell you how to keep the deer out of the chestnut orchard. Plant filberts five feet apart all around the place, and after while just put one single electrified wire five feet from the ground, and the deer won't get in through that.
DR. ANTHONY: Glad to hear that, because deer is one of our problems.
(Continue with paper.)
DR. ANTHONY: There is a tree beside the blacksmith shop, and the old man used to go there early in the morning as a boy to get chestnuts. Today he has taken down the old blacksmith shop and built a home, but he preserved that tree in Linglestown. It practically covers his house, six feet six inches in trunk circ.u.mference, 60 feet high and a spread of 60 feet. It isn't too long before we will have chestnuts that big to eat alongside the old blacksmith shop.
DR. MacDANIELS. It is about three o'clock. We will take a five-minute recess.
(Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)
DR. MacDANIELS: For the first paper after the recess, we will call on Sargent Wellman to speak to us about the Persian walnuts in England. Mr.
Wellman.
Notes on Persian Walnuts in England
SARGENT WELLMAN, Topsfield, Ma.s.sachusetts
MR. WELLMAN: Members of the a.s.sociation: I was fortunate enough to be in England last summer, and I agreed that I would say a few words about nut growing there. What I am really going to do is largely to read you a few things from some articles that I found there.
I was very much impressed with the little interest that there is in nut growing in England, and I was very much surprised at it. Of course, you all know that the walnut grows there. The chestnut grows there. There are some fine, marvelous trees in Kew Gardens, of course, that I saw, and if you read the English poets, you will remember how they talk about chestnut blossoms on chestnut trees, but curiously enough, there is now very little interest.