Wednesday, May 29, 2013

When apple blossoms grow up

Young apples-to-be cluster on a branch in Concord, Mass., earlier this week.

Friday, May 10, 2013

America through the lens of Johnny Appleseed

public-domain image

Eccentric and saintly, Johnny Appleseed is an unlikely member of the pantheon of American folk superheros that includes such he-men as Davey Crockett, Paul Bunyan, and John Henry.

Like Crockett, Johnny Appleseed was a real person, though his name was John Chapman.

Born in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, in the early days of the American Revolution, Chapman grew up in Westfield and headed west to become a frontier nurseryman, bachelor, and sometime Swedenborgian evangelist.

He gleaned apple seeds from cider mills and eked out a living planting them and selling saplings to settlers.

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Apple blossom time

Full bloom today on an apple tree in Arlington, Massachusetts.


After several years of harvest jeopardized by early springs, it is a relief to see the trees in bloom in May.