. The American florist : a weekly journal for the trade. Floriculture; Florists. igi The america x Fl nris t. 169 Chicasfo's First Commercial Greenhouse. Chicago's first commercial green- house was a lean-to affair about 14x50 feet at 100 Adams street, facing north on part of the present site of the post- oflSce. It was built about 1845 by Samuel Brookes. This greenhouse had an outside rear door but was entered also through a window from the house, against the east side of which it leaned. With our ranges of a mil- lion feet or more of glass, for which Chicago has become famous, this sepms a s
. The American florist : a weekly journal for the trade. Floriculture; Florists. igi The america x Fl nris t. 169 Chicasfo's First Commercial Greenhouse. Chicago's first commercial green- house was a lean-to affair about 14x50 feet at 100 Adams street, facing north on part of the present site of the post- oflSce. It was built about 1845 by Samuel Brookes. This greenhouse had an outside rear door but was entered also through a window from the house, against the east side of which it leaned. With our ranges of a mil- lion feet or more of glass, for which Chicago has become famous, this sepms a small enough beginning, but as a matter of fact in those pioneer days it was considered a big house and v.'as mainly used for the culture of azaleas, camellias and other pot plants. Abcut three years later, in 1847 or 1848 as F. W. Brookes now recollects it, Job Carpenter and his brother built a greenhouse on the west side, adjoin- ing Union square on the north. These brothers were market gardeners as well as florists. Samuel Brookes was an old-fash- ioned English gardener who had owned one of London's biggest places pre- vious to 1S32. He came over to the new world expecting to settle in Can- ada, but soon drifted to the United States and on October 23, 1833, with a family party of 16 he came around the lake from Buffalo by wagon. His son. F. W. Brookes, journej'ed with him, a lad about 7 years old. The lat- ter, now a man of So, lives at Morgan Park. Here five of the original Nor- way pine sash of the first greenhouse are still to be seen. "When seen a few years ago it was not a difficult matter to get him started in a reminiscent vein. It was here that his father died in September, 1875. This place on Lake avenue was sold out in 1892 and he moved to Morgan Park to take things a bit easier with advancing years, though, as above noted, he still clings to his garden. He well recalls early life in local floricul- ture, having been more or less inti- mate with Edgar Sanders,
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectfloriculture, bookyea
