The exact page text, read by your browser's voice.
The orchardist
On the record
John Chapman was born 26 September 1774 at Leominster, Massachusetts, the son of Nathaniel and Elizabeth (Simonds) Chapman. His method was seed, not grafting: he planted nurseries of apple seedlings ahead of the frontier — the first recorded on Brokenstraw Creek in Warren County, Pennsylvania, about the turn of the century — and sold or gave trees to settlers as they arrived. He was also a missionary of the Church of the New Jerusalem, carrying Swedenborgian tracts through the same country where he planted.
Chapman was in Fort Wayne by 1834, on the word of the editor John W. Dawson, and kept nurseries on the St. Joseph River north of town. He died on 18 March 1845 at the cabin of William Worth near Fort Wayne; the Fort Wayne Sentinel's obituary of 22 March 1845 is the primary record of his death. Where he is buried is still argued: Richard Worth Jr. wrote in 1858 that it was David Archer's graveyard, two and a half miles north of town — the ground marked today at Johnny Appleseed Park — while another local tradition places the grave at Canterbury Green. His national fame came later, with W. D. Haley's article in Harper's Magazine in 1871. Fort Wayne's minor-league baseball club, the TinCaps, takes its name and its cap-and-pot mascot from him.
Find them on this page
- § 06 — people of the record
From § 06, People of the record, and the sources cited there; Wikipedia, "Johnny Appleseed"; Pennsylvania Center for the Book; News-Sentinel (egen.fortwayne.com) Chapman files.