Two hundred years ago, apples were growing on hill-farm orchards and lakeside slopes all over Vermont. One hundred years ago, the apple industry was strong, yet the McIntosh was still a newcomer. The "big three" varieties were Baldwin, Northern Spy, and Rhode Island Greening.
The old Vermonters grew apples in a rich and amazing variety. From orchards here were harvested Honeygold, Summer Rambo, Tompkins County King, Cox Orange Pippin, Pound Sweet, Nonesuch, Wolf River, Wealthy and Winter Banana. Vermont had apples named for towns, such as Bethel, Roxbury Russet, and St. Johnsbury Sweet; others were named for their shape (Sheepnose), their taste (Sops of Wine), and their color (Red Astrachan, Yellow Transparent, and Peach). Some of the apple names were mysterious, or pure poetry - imagine, for example, the taste of Seek-No-Further, Duchess of Oldenberg, King David, Black Gilliflower, and Lady.
Why so many? Apples have a natural tendency to reinvent themselves. A seed of one variety, once planted, will grow to bear something different. "They won't come true to themselves," a Vermont grower once said of apples. In time, Vermonters learned to experiment, to graft for desired and new varieties, and to use the different apples for all sorts of purposes.
In the Early 'Cider Time'
In 1932 the Vermont Rural Life Commission's Subcommittee on Apples divided the state's apple-growing history into three stages. The first, around 1700-1865, was called the cider apple period.
Apples were brought to Vermont from neighboring states and Canada in colonial days. Settlers planted Fameuse apples around 1700 at historic Chimney Point on Lake Champlain. In Vermont's first century, nearly every farm had an orchard. Apple growing was limited to seedlings of natural varieties, uncultivated and often diseased. Even so, large quantities of apples were produced - and cider, it is said, flowed more freely than water.
Several decades of home-grown intemperance ensued. By 1810, Vermont had 125 distilleries producing over 173,000 gallons of apple brandy. But by 1840, reform in liquor traffic had eliminated all but two distilleries, and reduced the year's production of apple brandy to 3,500 gallons.
In the years leading up to the Civil War, Vermont apple growers learned to cultivate with increasing skill. The first sizable Vermont apple orchard was set in 1819 in South Hero, by one Mr. Phelps, who had 20 acres of unimproved, ungrafted trees. After the 1840s, railroading began to offer orchardists the chance to sell their apples outside their communities. Fruit growers met in St. Albans in 1850 to discuss the growing interest in fruit culture, and the following year they formed the Champlain Valley Horticultural Society, for Vermont and New York orchardists.
With their better methods now producing an abundance of apples, farmers were on their way to the more sophisticated growing culture of the farm orchard period, from the Civil War to 1890.