Dearborn

DEARBORN

1. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat. 36. 1883. 2. Ont. Dept. Agr. Fr. Ont. 155. 1914.

Dearborn's Seedling. 3. Kenrick Am. Orch. 154. 1832. 4. Downing Fr. Trees Am. 336, fig. 135. 1845. 5. Proc. Nat. Con. Fr. Gr. 51. 1848. 6. Hovey Fr. Am. 1:63, Pl. 1851. 7. Elliott Fr. Book 336. 1859. 8. Mas Le Verger 2:17, fig. 7. 1866-73. 9. Leroy Dict. Pom. 2:7, fig. 1869.

Once a favorite, Dearborn is now nearly lost to cultivation, and few or no nurserymen grow the trees. It is too good a variety to be lost, however, because of splendid fruit- and tree-characters. The fruits ripen early and are of good quality, though hardly as richly flavored as those of Elizabeth which ripen at the same time. Unfortunately the pears run small, but they are attractive in shape and color. In season, the crop succeeds that of Bloodgood and precedes that of Bartlett. The trees are almost flawless, and therefore are well adapted to home orchards where fruits cannot receive the care of skilled hands. Besides being almost free from blight, the trees are hardy, vigorous, and very productive. The variety has many valuable qualities for a summer pear in home orchards.

This pear was found growing in a border of shrubs in 1818 at Brinley Place, Roxbury, Massachusetts, the home of General H. A. S. Dearborn,¹ first president of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. In 1831, General Dearborn first exhibited fruit of the variety at the Massachusetts Horticultural Society where it was named Dearborn's Seedling in honor of the originator. This variety should not be confused with a pear raised by Van Mons of Belgium and named by him Dearborn. The Dearborn of Van Mons is larger and ripens later than the American Dearborn, and was long since taken from lists of pears recommended for cultivation in America. Dearborn was included in the American Pomological Society's first fruit-catalog in 1848, where it was called Dearborn's Seedling. In 1883, the Society shortened the name to Dearborn. Since 1891, the name has failed to appear in the catalogs of this Society.

¹ General Henry Alexander Scammell Dearborn, who followed the vocation of a soldier, statesman, and author, chose as his avocation horticulture and in several of its fields became eminent. A native of New England (1783-1851), son of General Henry Dearborn of Revolutionary fame, he was early educated to the profession of law and pursued that vocation until the war with Great Britain in 1812. Services in this war brought him the rank and title of general. After the war he served as Collector of the Port of Boston, in Congress, and as Mayor of Roxbury, Massachusetts, which office he held at the time of his death. But it is as a patron, friend, and lover of horticulture that the life and work of General Dearborn interest pomologists. He was one of the charter members in the Massachusetts Horticultural Society and a prime mover in its organization. He was elected its first president March 17, 1829. In the history of the Society published in 1880, of all the famous members of this truly remarkable organization, General Dearborn's portrait was chosen for the frontispiece. He was early interested in experimental gardens and rural cemeteries. The plans for experimental gardens advocated by him were never fully carried out, but no doubt his enthusiasm for such gardens, with his own garden as a model, did much to stimulate the planting in America in the early half of the nineteenth century of the many famous gardens which adorned and enriched every center of culture along the Atlantic seaboard. He helped to establish the Mount Auburn and Forest Hills cemeteries, famous among Boston cemeteries, and the first of rural cemeteries in this country. His life-long devotion to rural art as exemplified in gardens and cemeteries knew no bounds. On these subjects and on pomology he contributed many articles to the agricultural and horticultural papers of his time. Few men, it can be said, could better concentrate their thoughts and feelings on paper than he seems to have done. Besides the many papers from his own pen he published several translated treatises from the French, chief of which was a monograph on the Camellia in 1838 and another on Morus multicaulis in 1839, the "Mulberry Craze" being in full swing at this time. General Dearborn was an ardent pear-grower and helped to test the hundreds of seedlings then being brought from Belgium and France and grew as well considerable numbers from his own seed-beds. Of all his seedlings, however, only Dearborn survives.

Tree large, vigorous, spreading, tall, very productive; trunk stocky; branches thick, zigzag, reddish-brown partly covered with a heavy, gray scarf-skin, marked by many reddish-brown lenticels; branchlets slender, very long, with long internodes, older wood brown, new growth greenish, nearly covered with reddish-brown, mottled with ash-gray scarf-skin, smooth, glabrous becoming pubescent near the tips of the new growth, with numerous small, brownish, round, raised, conspicuous lenticels.

Leaf-buds very small, short, pointed, plump, free. Leaves 3 in. long, 1¼ in. wide, thin; apex obtusely-pointed; margin with very fine dark tips, finely and shallowly serrate; petiole tinged red, 1½ in. long, glabrous. Flower-buds small, short, conical, plump, free, arranged singly on short spurs; flowers showy, 1¼ in. across, in dense clusters, 9 or 10 buds in a cluster; pedicels ¾ in. long, pubescent.

Fruit ripe in late August; small, 2½ in. long, 2¼ in. wide, uniform, roundish-pyriform, with a slight neck, symmetrical, uniform; stem 1 in. long, slender; cavity obtuse, shallow, narrow, thinly russeted, often slightly lipped; calyx open, large; lobes separated at the base, narrow, acuminate; basin very shallow, obtuse, gently furrowed and wrinkled, symmetrical; skin thick, very tough, smooth, dull; color pale yellow, with russet specks; dots numerous, small, russet, conspicuous; flesh white, slightly granular at the center, tender and melting, very juicy, sweet but spicy, aromatic; quality good. Core large for the size of the fruit, closed, with clasping core-lines; calyx-tube short, wide, conical; seeds large, wide, long, plump, acute.

— U.P. Hedrick, The Pears of New York (1921)

Dearborn. Foreign. Large, pyriform, russeted. November, December.

— F.R. Elliott, The Western Fruit Book (1865)