File:Ancient and modern Germantown, Mount Airy and Chestnut Hill (1889) (14781109255).jpg

Identifier: ancientmodernger01hotc (find matches)
Title: Ancient and modern Germantown, Mount Airy and Chestnut Hill
Year: 1889 (1880s)
Authors: Hotchkin, Samuel Fitch, 1833-1912
Subjects:
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa., P. W. Ziegler & co.
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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sweete, but tliere it may be foundTo bud out faire, and throwe her sweete smels al around. This inclosure, in after years so exquisitely cultivated, and whose fragranceis such as belongs only to gardens mellowed by time, and filled with the sweetmemories of many generations of fruits and flowers, had originally betterclaims to the title of orchard, for John Wister, the elder, brought with himfrom the Fatherland the German taste for cultivation of fruits, and a greatvariety of pears, plums, etc., were cultivated by him; several remnants ofwhich old stock still flourish, and produce though they have witnessed atleast a hundred and fifty returning summers. The name of Wister was never spelled Wwster, as has been stated. TheGerman u, with the umlaut (u) having no equivalent in the English language,the letter i was substituted as that most nearly approximating it. The Philadelphia News, gives this note on this place: On the grounds of the old Physick mansion on Fourth street, which I have
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GERMANTOWN. 49 told you about, there grows a mighty elm, which, although not quite so hand-some as the Dundas tree, is still an object of admiration and a great source ofspeculation as to its age to the hundreds of working people who daily pass uj)and down Fourth street. On the grounds of Mr. Charles J. Wisters place inGeriuantown there grows a specimen, probably of the rarest tree in America;it is called the Virgilla lutea, I believe. It is said to have been named afterthe poet Virgil. A few of these trees were transplanted to this part of thecountry from Kentucky, where the) grow wild sparingly along the Kentuckyriver. This tree bears a white flower, which resembles that of the wisteria;the wood is extremely hard and has a yellow color; on this account the treehas been vulgarly called the yellow wood. There is a storj connected witliit—that the shittim wood spoken of in the Scripture is one and the samething as tiie Virgilla lutea. In 1779, Major Lenox dwelt here briefly and was m

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