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Extinct seed company?

(Another Library of Congress find. Mea culpa, if you prefer another sort of winter gardening post.  The year to date is wet with chilly rain, in the Metro DC area. I do not want to go outside and find something blog-worthy.)

I found a reference to this seed company at the University of Delaware special collections on seed companies. Rochester, home of a lilac festival rivaled by none, was a hotbed of horticultural publishing activity in the late 1800s.

Lewis Chase founded the seed company in Maine, moving to Rochester, NY, by 1868.  Fast forward to the 50s: According to John Sheret the Chase Brothers garden store -- what remained of the seed concern -- ceased operations in 1956 when Bilt-Rite Wood Products bought one of the storefronts owned by the Chase family. 

Later in the mid 1970s, Wegmans Food Markets opened its first Home Repair Center next to its supermarket on Lyell Avenue in Rochester; Wegman's expanded this store into a small chain, naming the stores Chase-Pitkin Home and Garden. For more detail on the rise, middle-years, and decline of this seed company, see the full article at Crooked Lake Review.

In 2005, Wegmans announced that Chase-Pitkin centers would be closed, due to the inability of the home-styled chain to compete with the big box retailers.  

RIP, Chase. 

 

Read more on great seedsman (two women, too) at the Smithsonian Library horticultural-biography resource here.

 

.

 

 

TITLE:  Chase Bro's and Woodward. Flower & vegetable seeds

CALL NUMBER:  PGA - Clay, Cosack & Co.--Chase Bro's... (D size) [P&P]

REPRODUCTION NUMBER:  LC-DIG-pga-00507 (digital file from original print)
LC-USZ62-86209 (b&w film copy neg.)

RIGHTS INFORMATION:  No known restrictions on publication.

MEDIUM:  1 print.

CREATED/PUBLISHED:  [no date recorded on shelflist card]

NOTES: This record contains unverified data from PGA shelflist card. Associated name on shelflist card: Clay, Cosack & Co.

REPOSITORY:  Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA 

DIGITAL ID:  (digital file from original print) pga 00507 http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pga.00507 
(b&w film copy neg.) cph 3b32718 http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3b32718 

CONTROL #:  2003674673

 

Posted on Thursday, January 8, 2009 at 08:55AM by Registered CommenterMinxterBloom in | CommentsPost a Comment | References8 References

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    Gardening with MBloom - Journal - Extinct seed company?
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