Garden Sayings - from our founding fathers

Garden sayings from our founding fathers? It's hard to imagine that they were avid gardeners, but some of them were.

What with creating a country, waging war and tending to matters of state, how could they have time for vegetable gardening? It's hard to believe, but then gardening has always been a stress reducer.

Perhaps the founders didn't have much time for gardening, but they most certainly had an interest. Here is what they had to say:

Thomas Jefferson had many gardens at Monticello, and grew hundreds of varieties.

In letters, addresses and other writings, he said:

"But though an old man, I am but a young gardener."

"Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever he had a chosen people, whose breasts he has made his peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue. It is the focus in which he keeps alive that sacred fire, which otherwise might escape from the face of the earth."

"Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independent, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country and wedded to it's liberty and interests by the most lasting bands."

"I think our governments will remain virtuous for many centuries; as long as they are chiefly agricultural."

"With respect to the boys I never till lately doubted but that I should be able to give them a competence as comfortable farmers, and no station is more honorable or happy than that."

Perhaps George Washington didn't have much time for vegetable gardening, but this quote from him shows he knew something about our uniquely American horticulture:

"Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth."

Alexander Hamilton created two memorable garden sayings. Here is what he had to say:

"A garden, you know, is a very usual refuge of a disappointed politician. Accordingly, I have purchased a few acres about nine miles from town, have built a house, and am cultivating a garden."

"Power over a man's subsistence amounts to power over his will."

The garden sayings of our founders help take us back to the spirit of our country, and it reminds us of how far away from that spirit some of us have drifted.

If you have gardening quotes from our founding fathers, or others, let me know and I'll consider including them in these pages. In the meantime, visit my friends at Drought Smart Plants to see how one person shows the signs of the thymes. You could do something similar with your garden, and it not only puts your signature on the garden, but it can also make it a more special and pleasant place to spend your time.

Done with Garden Sayings, take me back to Gardening Proverbs