The Autobiography of Warren H. Manning
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The Autobiography of Warren H. Manning (Copied from the original manuscript by Warren H. Manning) Table of Contents CHAPTER I. Family Background. (Prior to 1860) CHAPTER II. Childhood. (November 7, 1860 - Sept. 24, 1866) CHAPTER III. Schooldays. (Sept. 24, 1866 - June 30, 1879) CHAPTER IV. Apprenticeship. (July 1, 1879 - January, 1888) CHAPTER V. Olmsted Office Employment. (Jan. 1888 - Dec. 1895) CHAPTER VI. Early Professional Practice. (Jan. 1, 1896 - June, 1901) CHAPTER VII. The Work of J. Woodward Manning and Warren H. Manning. (June 15, 1901 - December, 1904) CHAPTER VIII. Growth of Practice at Boston. (Jan. 1, 1905 - Oct. 1915) CHAPTER IX. Billerica. (Oct. 1915 - Sept. 1923) CHAPTER X. Cambridge Expansion. (Sept. 1923 - Dec. 1928) CHAPTER XI. Cambridge. (Jan. 1, 1929 - Nov. 30, 1934) CHAPTER XII. The Past two years, the present, and the future. CHAPTER I FAMILY BACKGROUND (Before 1860) Howarth’s History of Downe, Kent, England, states that the Mannings were ―The most distinguished of the earlier families of Downe.‖ They came from Simon de Manning, ―the first of the English Barons to go with King Richard I (1189–1199) to the Holy Wars in the Second Crusade, when he was knighted.‖ (Manning genealogy) My father, Jacob Warren Manning, born 1826, died 1894, was of the eighth generation from William Manning of England, who settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1634. Father’s parents were Solomon, born 1799, died 1862, and Mary Fletcher Manning, born 1800, died 1878. They were descended from Fletcher, Warren, Andrews, Woodward, Beard, Sprague, and other families. Mary Fletcher was of the seventh generation from Robert Fletcher, who was in Concord, Massachusetts, in 1630. Her mother was Lucy Andrews of the seventh generation from Robert Andrews of Ipswich, Massachusetts. She lived with her son, Solomon, at Bedford, who was a town officer and a member of the State Legislature from 1900–1. In 1856, Jacob W. Manning married Lydia Brooks Chandler, born 1839, died 1908. She was the daughter of Abial and Mary Felt Chandler, of Concord, New Hampshire. The ancestor, William Chandler, was in Roxbury, Massachusetts, in 1637. There were the Felt, Abbott, Copp, Nagle, Upton, and LeBosquet families in the Chandler line. My father was a well-developed man of average height and weight and with a full beard. He was raised on the Bedford home farm, and proud of the fact that he could lead others in hoeing, cutting cord wood, and other farm work. He was educated in the public schools with a year in the Francestown, New Hampshire, Academy. At 21 he went to Massachusetts FAMILY BACKGROUND where, until 1854, he directed horticultural work in nurseries and on important private estates. In 1849 he planted the first layer from the Concord grapevine, in Concord, Massachusetts, to the Winnisimet Nursery, in Chelsea, before the grape was named. He also took the first plants from the Houghton Gooseberry. In 1854 he bought property for his Reading Nursery, in Reading, Massachusetts. He introduced to cultivation the Woodward Arbor Vitae and received a medal therefore from the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, of which he was a member and on Fruit Committees for many years. His portrait in one of the offices of this Society. He received a medal from the Massachusetts Pomological Society for a collection of pears at the Chicago Exposition, where he planned and planted the Massachusetts State Building grounds and was awarded a medal for this. He discovered and introduced the Cut-leaf Staghorn Sumac. He introduced the Cutter’s Seedling Strawberry and Dracut Amber Grape. He pictured and offered new fruits and ornamental plants as soon as they were on the market and urged the horticultural value of native plants. He gave special attention to the introduction of the Clethera, Adams Needle, Minnesota Honeysuckle, White and Rocky Mountain Blue Spruces, Double Perennial Sunflower, and new varieties of Apple, Pear, Grape, Gooseberry, Blackberry, Wineberry, and others. From his nursery, plants went to nearly every state in the union and many foreign countries. To broaden his knowledge, he traveled in this country over 125,000 miles in trips of not less than 500 miles. From June 14 to August 12, 1880 he made a 7,000 mile trip, on which he was up to 7,345 foot elevation in Colorado, where he walked 100 miles in four days from Georgetown at 8,000 foot elevation to Argentino pass at 13,000 feet, then down the Snake River and Hall Valley to Denver. He returned home by way of the Lakes Superior, Huron, Ontario, and George, and on the St. Lawrence and Hudson Rivers, and Long Island Sound. In the Massachusetts Horticultural Society are his business account books, his diary, and the diary of his wife, and about 100 Reading Nursery circulars and catalogs from about 1857 to 1901. In an 1884 catalog, he states that, ―Warren H. Manning, who makes landscape gardening a distinct feature of his duty as one of our assistants and salesmen, will make sketches and lay out grounds.‖ In 1887, he states that three of his sons were his assistants. In 1897, J. Woodward Manning, born 1866, is named as Manager of the Landscape Department and Superintendent, with A. Chandler Manning, born 1874, as Assistant Superintendent. Mr. J. Woodward Manning was associated with me from June 15, 1901 to December 1904, when he took over the Reading Nursery. He is still in Nursery and Landscape work at Duxbury, Massachusetts. His son, Gerald G. Has an independent landscape practice in Chicago, Illinois. Mr. A. Chandler, born 1874, was engaged in his own landscape work, and then with the Olmsted firm until his death in 1935. Mr. William S. Manning born 1862, was in the Olmsted office with me. He was active in the development of estates, then Superintendent of the Essex County, New Jersey, Park System, and of the Baltimore, Maryland, Park System, before he passed away in 1885. Mr. Benjamin F. Manning born 1877, who died in 1938, was also active in Landscape work during a part of his days. It is unusual that all the sons in a family should continue the work of the father. My mother was an attractive lady of average height who was an artist in water colors, but who gave up this work when she married my father. They enjoyed a life of wonderful companionship, always working together FAMILY BACKGROUND over every home and business problem. She was his bookkeeper and, for much of the time, office and business manager. It was largely through her influence that her sons have been so anxious to develop and execute plans for home grounds, communities, and regions, with a view to making America a finer place in which to live. The family genealogies indicate that there is an excellent background for this, as many ancestors were constructive leaders. The second William Manning, of Cambridge, of my line, with Deacon John Cooper, was appointed by the Overseers of Harvard College in 1672 to act as agent and steward for the erection of college buildings during a ten-year period. Mr. Manning was also sent to England to secure the services of Rev. Uriah Cakes as a Cambridge pastor, and who was later President of Harvard College. William Manning was a Cambridge selectman for fifteen years, and held many other places of trust and responsibility. His son, Samuel, went to Billerica, Massachusetts, as a pioneer and built the Manning Manse that is now the family headquarters. William’s grandson, William, was a Lieutenant in the French and Indian Wars, and held many town offices, operated the Manse as a tavern, and wrote the Key of Liberty that the Manning Association has published, and that is looked upon by students as being a ―unique and important study of the political problems of his day.‖ The manuscript is in Harvard’s Weidner Library, and the Tavern Book record is in the Business Historical Library of Harvard. CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOLDAYS CHAPTER II CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOLDAYS (1860–1879) In 1860, on November sixth, my father records in his diary, ―Very rainy, from two to three o’clock, the last showers with sharp lightening and loud thunder with hail. An uncommon occurrence at this time of the year.‖ On the following day he writes, ―At five minutes past 12 this morning, we had a son born to us. He is strong and healthy to all appearances. I set Hackett at work to dig the hole while I planted the Elm tree to commemorate the day that our first child was born. I think that there should be a tree planted at the birth of every child so that in the aftertimes it may be seen which is most useful.‖ My first recollection as a baby is of sitting on my mother’s knee and turning, as she pointed, to see a mouse on the corner of the woodbox looking at me with his black beady eyes. He soon hopped down and ran into a hole back of the stove. I still have that woodbox, and we call it the Lady Mouse Box and use it for children’s souvenirs at family reunions. My education was begun by my mother leading me about the home garden and showing me birds, flowers, toads, butterflied, and beetles. Seeing my first snake was a thrilling event. During the mudpie era of my childhood I modeled in sand and mud hills, valleys, tunnels, houses, roads, and gardens with pools. The trees were branchy weed tops; there were moss lawns, and tine weeds and other flowers for the garden. A little later, I began to explore the world about me.