The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-11-24
A PIONEER PHILANTHOPlST
JOHNNY APPLESEED or OHIO.
Who Supplied All the EARLY Apple
Orchards of the state.

the most remarkable, and at the same
time most Iovab1e was Johnny Apple
seed" by which name wonderful old
John CHAPMAN was known throughout
the state years ago. He was the faith
er of the orchards that have made the
state famous for it's apples, and if all
he believed about the virtues of apples
was true he was the father of much OF
the healthfulness that blesses the sons
and daughters Of the state He be-
lieved that apples made people healthy,
and he gave to the early settlers of
Ohio all the chance they had in the
early days to get apples.
How well he is loved by the pioneers
of the state is shown by the handsome
monument to his memory that was I'M
yelled at Mansfield last Thursday. Not
many of those who knew Johnny
Appeseed" personally are alive now,
but his work has lived after him to an
extent that makes him the most re-
markable penniless philanthropist the
state ever knew. He was as poor as
Jobs turkey, as he would have said
himself in his fondnesS for the scrip
lures and their application to the every
day things of life, but he gave to the
pioneer of the state an endowment of
apple trees.
Cleveland had share in his pennl-
less benevolence, for here and there
about the city, notably in Newburg, are
orchards, which are pointed out by old
residents as having been planted with
trees that were once sprouts from other
tress which had been raised by "John-
Nsn
neer of the early years of the century.
Mansfield seems TO be the only city
of the state that has recognized John
my Appleseed," and what he did for the
state in it's youth, for nowhere else,
not even at his almost forgotten grave
out in Indiana is there a monument to
him. The monument to his memory
that was dedicated in Mansfield last
Thursday stands in the fine Sherman
Heineman park in that city, which was
the joint gift of the late Senator Sher-
man and a wealthy fellow townsman.
The monument was erected by Martin
3. Bushnell of Mansfield whose father
was one of the pioneers of that part of
the state and a personal friend of the
quaint Johnny Appleseed." The lower
part of the monument, which is of buff
stone, bears the inscription, I'm Mem
DRY of John Chapman, best known as
Johnny Appleseed, pioneer apple nurs-
eryman of Richland county from 1910
to $780," The quaint man for whom the
monument was erected was hero as
well as a crank, as he would have been
called had he lived to-day He roamed
through woods without anything in the
shape of a weapon, despite the fact that
the forest were thronged with Indians
and wild animals that We're almost
equally hostile and bloodthirsty. Once
he saved a settlement from the Indians
by thirty-mile trip through the woods
at night, trip which was as fine in it's
way as Paul Revere's ride
He was faddist, crank perhaps,
but at the same time he was an intelli-
gent Christian man in ragged clothes,
and no one who knew him not even the
children who were tempted to laugh at
him, nor the Indians, whose companion
he was on many a winter night in the
forests of the state could help but re-
spect him. He could easily have turned
his philanthropy into money, into
enough money to have made a rich man
among the pioneers, to whome the pos
sessions of a couple of thousand dollars
meant Independent wealth, but he did
not care for money, he said.
Johnny Appleseed' might very
properly be called an apple missionary.
He believed that apples We're good for
people, and he undertook to supply ap-
pies to the pioneers. His plan was as
simple as his life, and his life was al
most as simple as that of squirrel of
an Indian. He had no home, no money.
and not much in the way of clothes |
He would either go on foot or in a birch |
bark canoe where there were streams |
that made it possible to go by water.
across the line into the old settlements |
of Pennsylvania, where there were or
chards. The pioneers who came to Ohio |
were too poor, and it was too difficult |
to get themselves and their families
into the new state, for them to bring
any young apple trees and few of them |
had the patience to plant apple seeds |
and nurse them to the point where they
could be transplanted to form orchards. |
So there was scarcely an orchard wor-
thy the name in the whole state. The
quaint apple missionary sam this and
realized how many years it would be
before the struggling pioneers had time
to plant orchards, even supposing they
were able to buy the trees to plant, and
he devoted almost the whole Of his life
to giving orchards to the then scanty
population of Ohio.
From the older portions of the older
state of Pennsylvania he would bring
back to Ohio bags filled with apple
seeds. He got them at the cider mills
Of the keystone state. Apple seeds
were of no value to those who had ap-
pie trees and in Pennsylvania no one /
thought of saving apple seeds. So
Johnny Appleseed" had no trouble in
getting all the seeds he could carry
back through the wilderness to Ohio.
When he got to a part of the state
where there were no apple trees he
would plant the seeds he had brought
He had studded the matter until he
was able to pick out the most favorable
places to plant, so that they would be
most protected from the winter bliz-
Yards, and get most of the sunshine ;
that their rapid growth required
When he found the right spot, he .
would clear away the trees and shrubs
plant as many seeds as he thought 5
proper, and build a rude fence about
MS nursery in the wilderness. When
l,a1 rNIa |