McKINLEY

Origin & History

The McKinley originated in Indiana (Beach). It was highly esteemed by Reuben Ragan, of Indiana, who found it profitable (Warder). It was propagated to a limited extent in portions of the Middle West (Beach, citing Bailey 1892) but was practically unknown in New York (Beach). Beach noted it was not recommended for planting in New York state; as grown at the Geneva Station the tree came into bearing rather young but had not been tested there long enough to determine its productiveness. Thomas associates the variety with Missouri.

Tree

As grown at the Geneva Station, the tree came into bearing rather young (Beach). No further tree characteristics described in sources.

Fruit

Size: Medium (Warder, Downing) to large (Beach, Thomas).

Form: Roundish, flattened, slightly conic, regular (Warder, Downing). Beach describes it as roundish oblate. Thomas calls it showy.

Stem: Short to medium, slender.

Cavity: Deep. Warder describes it as acute, regular, and brown. Beach describes it as rather narrow and thickly russeted.

Calyx: Large. Warder describes the eye as closed. Beach describes the calyx as closed or varying to wide open, with small lobes.

Basin: Warder describes it as regular and shallow. Beach describes it as broad, rather abrupt, shallow to moderately deep, and slightly furrowed.

Skin: Dull red on greenish-yellow, with indistinct stripes. Beach specifies the ground color as dull yellow, indistinctly blushed and striped with dull red, sprinkled with large areolar dots. Warder describes the surface as smooth with scattered, large, gray dots.

Flesh & Flavor: Warder describes the flesh as breaking, very fine-grained, and very juicy, with sub-acid flavor rated good to very good quality. Downing similarly describes it as breaking, fine-grained, juicy, and subacid, rated good. Beach describes the flesh as yellowish, rather fine-grained, and moderately juicy, subacid, rated good. All sources agree on the subacid character; Warder rates it highest at "good to very good" while the other sources rate it "good."

Core & Seeds: Core medium, closed; core lines meeting. Warder adds that the core is ovate and regular. Seeds numerous, plump, brown (Warder; not described by other sources).

Season

December and January (Warder, Downing, Beach). Thomas describes it as early winter.

Uses

Table apple (Warder). Beach characterizes it as a dessert apple of pretty good size, noting however that the color is not very good and the fruit does not keep late.

Subtypes/Variants

Not described in sources.