Note 85 — Chapter V · THE MINOR VARIETIES OF CHERRIES (continued 2)

Andrew Jackson Downing was born in Newburgh on the Hudson, the town in which he always lived and which he loved, October 30, 1815. He perished while trying to save other passengers in the burning of the steamer Henry Clay on the Hudson River, July 28, 1852, at the age of 37. Andrew Downing's education was largely acquired from self instruction although he attended the schools of his native town and the academy in the adjoining village of Montgomery. His father, a nurseryman, whose work was mentioned in the sketch of Charles Downing, elder brother of Andrew, gave the younger son every opportunity to cultivate an early developed taste for horticulture, botany and the natural sciences. When but a youth he joined his brother Charles as partner in a nursery firm, a relationship maintained for but a few years and which he severed to begin a career as a writer on landscape gardening and pomological subjects. His first publication was a Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening adapted to North America, with a view to the Improvement of Country Residences, with Remarks on Rural Architecture, a book published in 1841, the author being but 26 years of age. The work passed into instant popularity and is the word of authority which has told thousands of Americans what to do to make their grounds beautiful. Within a few months so great was the success of the first venture that in response to the demand he published his Cottage Residences, a companion book which was received with equal favor, thus giving Andrew Downing first rank as an authority on rural art. In 1845 the Fruits and Fruit Trees of America, then and now the chief pomological authority of this continent, was printed simultaneously in London and New York, a second edition coming out in 1850. In 1846 Andrew Downing became the founder and editor of the Horticulturist, which he continued to publish until his death. In 1849 he wrote Additional Notes and Hints about Building in the Country, published in Wightwick's Hints to Young Architects. The summer of 1850 was spent in England in the study of landscape gardening and rural architecture from the result of which came his Architecture of Country Houses. His last work was the editing of Mrs. Loudon's Landscape Gardening for Ladies though Rural Essays appeared after his death as a collection of his writings with a memoir by George William Curtis and a Letter to his Friends by Frederika Bremer. He was employed in planting the public grounds of the Capitol, the White House and the Smithsonian Institution at Washington when he met his untimely death. Downing is the creator of American landscape gardening and shares with his brother Charles the honor of being the most distinguished pomologist of the country. In the epoch-making Fruits and Fruit Trees of America Andrew Downing was the real genius, Charles Downing the conscientious and painstaking student who worked out the details.