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Browsing: Diary of John Adams, Volume 3
1795.
Docno: DJA03d205
Date: 1795
Mr. Meredith at Mr. Vaughans explained to me his Method.1 He takes a first Crop of Clover early: then breaks up the Ground, cross ploughs and harrows it. Then plants Potatoes. He only ploughs a furrow, drops the Potatoes a foot a sunder and then covers them with another furrow. He ploughs now and then between these Rows: but
{p. 226}
never hoes. As soon as the Season comes for sowing his Winter Barley: He diggs the Potatoes, ploughs and harrows the Ground, sows the Winter Barley with Clover Seeds and orchard Grass Seeds: and the next Spring he has a great Crop of Barley and afterwards a great Burthen of Grass.—He prefers Orchard Grass to Herds Grass as much more productive.
1. JA's informant was doubtless Samuel Meredith, formerly a member of the Continental Congress and from 1789 to 1801 treasurer of the United States (
Biog. Dir. Cong.
). His host was John Vaughan, brother of JA's old friend Benjamin Vaughan. John Vaughan settled in Philadelphia and was perpetual secretary of the American Philosophical Society (Robert Hallowell Gardiner, Early Recollections, Hallowell, Maine, 1936, p. 118–120).
Cite web page as: Founding Families: Digital Editions of the Papers of the Winthrops and the Adamses, ed.C. James Taylor. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2007.
http://www.masshist.org/ff/
http://www.masshist.org/ff/