Johnny Appleseed

Johnny Appleseed, Harper’s Magazine, 1871

John Chapman (September 26, 1774 – March, 1847) was born in Leominster, Massachusetts. He is best known as an American pioneer orchardist. A deeply religious man, John Chapman became a self-appointed missionary for the Church of the New Jerusalem, a Christian church based on the Biblical interpretations of Emanuel Swedenborg, a Swedish scientist and theologian. [1]

Known to many as the beloved Johnny Appleseed he understood the practical value and real need for his service of supplying seeds and apple trees. He traveled through the Midwest states of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. His strategy was to plant the seeds he obtained from cider mills in Pennsylvania in areas he believed settlers would find appealing. The law of the day made it mandatory for each settler to plant 50 apple trees their first year. Transportation in those days was extremely limited, apples were a true necessity in the diets of early pioneers.<ref1>

He was an early conservationist, what would be called today an ecologist.

Chapman's family

John Chapman, aka "Johnny Appleseed", was the son of Nathaniel Chapman, who fought at Concord as a Minuteman as early as April 19, 1775, & later served in the Continental Army with General George Washington during the American Revolutionary War.<ref2> His mother, Elizabeth Simonds of Leominster, Massachusetts, Johnny was born around the time that the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. <ref3>

The famous scientist Benjamin Thompson, aka Count Rumford, was his mother's cousin. John Chapman had one sister, Elizabeth.

Nathaniel Chapman was an officer during the Revolutionary War, serving in Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania. While he was in military service, his wife died shortly after giving birth to a second son, named Nathaniel. The baby died shortly after birth, living perhaps two weeks. Nathaniel Chapman ended his military service and returned home in 1780 in Springfield, Massachusetts.

He married Lucy Cooley of Longmeadow, Massachusetts.

Chapman's mission

The apple orchards sown by Chapman were not today's familiar sweet snack, produced by grafting clones of a few exceptional varieties. Seed-grown apples vary significantly from tree to tree, but are typically small, sour fruits. Still, they added vitamin C and fiber to a frontier diet heavy in game meat.

Whole apples can be stored in a root cellar for months, and dried apple sections known as snitz keep indefinitely. Snitz were used to flavor soups and stews, and in such popular entrees as snitz and knep, an apple and pork dish.

The juice could be made into hard cider (sometimes frozen to make applejack or distilled to make brandy), which was the preferred alcoholic beverage in the early American West. ^[1] Although Chapman himself was a teatotaller as well as a vegetarian, his version of Swedenborgian theology condemned drunkenness, rather than requiring total abstention from alcohol. On the frontier, water supplies were often of questionable quality, and alcoholic beverages could be the healthful alternative.

In addition to the trees transplanted from Chapman's orchards, wild apple trees began to appear. Wildlife stealing windfall apples would deposit some of the seeds they ingested, complete with a nice dollop of fertilizer. Between the unimproved trees from Chapman's orchards and wild apple trees, a number of trees bore better apples, and an explosion of named varieties occurred. Many of today's most popular named varieties first appeared in the 1800s.

When settlers found that young apple trees would be available, they increasingly brought scion wood with them from New England, New York, and Virginia to graft into usable eating varieties.

Johnny's business plan

The popular image of Johnny Appleseed had him planting apple trees randomly, everywhere he went. In fact, he planted orchards, from which settlers could obtain trees at modest cost.

Johnny owned millions of dollars worth of apple orchards when he died. He would obtain land, paying for it with the promise of apple trees, clear it and plant an orchard, leaving it in the care of a nearby settler who would sell trees on shares. His orchard managers were instructed to sell trees on credit. As settlers were setting down roots in the community, this was sound credit management.

Johnny's outlays were very minimal. He obtained the seed for free from cider mills eager to have new customers. He dressed poorly, even for the frontier, and spent most of his time traveling from home to home on the frontier. He would tell stories to children, spread the Swedenborgian gospel to the adults, and received supper and shelter for the night in return. He would tear a few pages from one of Swedenborg's books and leave them with his hosts.

He made several trips east, both to visit his sister, and to replenish his supply of Swedenborgian literature. He typically would visit his orchards every year or two, and collect his earnings. The majority of earnings during his lifetime were given to his sister, to his church, and to various needy people he came upon.

Health

It has been suggested that Johnny may have had Marfan's syndrome^[2], a rare genetic disorder. One of the primary characteristics of Marfan Syndrome is extra-long slim limbs, and Johnny Appleseed was exceptionally tall and slim. Johnny was sickly as a child, and he died in his sleep as an adult. Marfan's is closely associated with death from cardiovascular complications.

Johnny was an ascetic of sorts, practicing a life of self-denial. He went barefoot and wore rags, even in the coldest Midwestern winter, and was a vegetarian. Those who propose the Marfan theory suggest that his compromised health may have made him feel the cold less intensely. His long life, however, militates against the theory that he had Marfan's.

Grave site

There is some vagueness concerning the date of his death and his burial. Harper's Magazine of November, 1871 (which is taken by many as the primary source of information about John Chapman) gives the date as 1847. Other sources, however, give the year as 1845 and some give the date as March 18, though it is difficult to find documentation of this date. Although the actual site of his grave is disputed, a national historic landmark grave site is located in Johnny Appleseed Park (formerly known as Archer Park) in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Some claim it to be on the present grounds of Fort Wayne's Canterbury Green apartment complex and golf course. Historical documents say he was buried beneath an apple tree along the St. Joseph River, on the Archer farm, "four miles north of Fort Wayne." Both the Canterbury Green and Archer/Johnny Appleseed park locations, now located in the central part of Fort Wayne, are on land that was once the Archer farm.

Notes

↑ Michael Pollan, The Botany of Desire (2001) ISBN 0375501290 - see chapter one
↑ http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9050845?query=Marfan%27s%20syndrome&ct=

External links

The Johnny Appleseed Outdoor Drama in Mansfield, Ohio, (founded by Appleseed book editor William E. Jones)
What's the story with Johnny Appleseed? Straight Dope staff report (2004)
"Johnny Appleseed: A Pioneer Hero" from Harper's Magazine November 1871

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[1] Michael Pollan, The Botany of Desire (2001) ISBN 0375501290 - see chapter one

[2] ttp://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9050845?query=Marfan%27s%20syndrome&ct=

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