As this time rolls around each year, my mind can’t help but wander back through time imagining early Thanksgiving-esque meals and colonial life in general. I find history fascinating and, when combined with gardening, irresistible. I decided to indulge these mental meanderings this year and share some of what gardening was like during the early days of this country and before.
Because most early gardening books during the colonial period (1600-1775) were published in Europe, much of the gardens found in colonial America were designed around the same principles used across the ocean. While each garden reflected in some way the region that its particular owners immigrated from, all European and colonial gardens originated from Tudor and Medieval gardening styles. They were often square or rectangular in shape with raised beds framed by tree saplings inside of an area surrounded by fencing or the more economical option of a hedge to keep wildlife at bay. Many were set in a more formal alignment with pathways between the beds of gravel, dirt, or crushed shells and oftentimes a focal point in the center that could be a well or other stone structure.
The first and foremost character trait of colonial gardens was their practicality. The gardens were sized according to how many people they would be feeding. They were sited in easy to tend and harvest locations such as near or around pathways, livestock pens, structures, and fences. Ones that were used to grow small kitchen vegetables were situated close to a door of the house to make quickly grabbing onions, carrots, leeks, kale, etc. convenient. Planting was often done in tightly packed rows to make full use of the space and herbs were simply interspersed with the vegetables.
As time went on, fruit trees began to be incorporated where they made sense, often on the edges of the garden or sometimes as the central focal point. Crops that needed more space like melons, corn, and squash were grown in field areas away from the home where they could spread out more. Thoughtful colonial gardeners would utilize any natural hills on their property by planting cool-season crops like peas, lettuce, and radishes on their southern faces to get a head start on the season thanks to the warmer soil available in these spots.
Garden work fell to a variety of people responsible for the garden’s success. Men often laid out the beds and would hoe them in the early spring, but women were usually the ones to choose what to plant, tend those plants throughout the season, and then harvest them at the appropriate times. They were also the ones responsible for preserving them. Herbs would often lose their potency after six months and so the task of consistently maintaining a good supply for medicinal and culinary uses was an important one.
On plantations and in households with slaves, gardens were usually tended by enslaved men, women, and children. The Smithsonian shares, “Hidden from view at the “back of the big house” on plantations, the gardens created by African American slaves in the U.S. are an important part of garden history. In addition to tending the crops of slave owners, many African Americans found time to cultivate their own garden plots. These gardens provided additional food to the enslaved community and sometimes yielded enough produce to sell for profit.”
As for the particular plants in these gardens, you can imagine the variety that was possible. People brought plants and seeds from their homelands, adopted native American varieties, and were even able to acquire exotic species from time to time that made their way through the shipping lines to North America from places like China and the Middle East. Flowers, vegetables, fruits, and herbs were all part of the colonial garden.
Flowers that could often be found included hollyhocks, irises, foxgloves, daylilies, violets, lilacs, roses, marigolds, and peonies. The vegetables that were grown were some of the heirloom ancestors to the plants we have today such as peas, cabbage, radishes, melons, beans, cucumbers, and carrots. Popular herbs that found their way into garden beds were horehound, angelica, oregano, mint, winter savory, rosemary, Lady’s Mantle, hyssop, nasturtium, thyme, lavender, bee balm, calendula, and sage which were often used medicinally as well as for seasoning. Then there were the herbs that could be useful in other ways like tansy, parsley, madder, walnut and bayberry that were used for dying cloth.
Tomatoes, one of today’s garden sweethearts, had a slow start in the colonies. While it was grown in some of the southern colonies like the Carolinas in the early 18th century it was used as an ornamental plant in most other locales until the 19th century, partly because it was thought by some to be poisonous. However, there were certainly people who saw their potential earlier, like Thomas Jefferson who grew and ate them at Monticello, and Dr. John Cook Bennet whose promotion of them as a health food helped to dispel the distrust around the ‘love apple’ and bring it into its well-deserved popularity.
While I enjoy digging into history and imagining the gardens of yesteryear, I’m beyond grateful that I don’t have to rely on mine for survival. Instead, I can immerse myself in the beauty and ecological benefits my gardens can offer. So much gratitude goes to the early botanists, collectors, breeders, and gardeners around the world that have passed down the gifts of plants to us all. Let us all lift a glass to them this Thanksgiving season!
