Georgeson is not worth the trouble it has caused pomologists in
straightening out its nomenclature; and Professor Georgeson deserves to
have his name attached to a far better plum. The rich yellow color of the
fruit makes this a particularly handsome plum, but here praises end. The
flesh is so astringent and clings so tenaciously to the stone as to unfit
the variety for either dessert or culinary use. Moreover, the fruits are
exceedingly variable in color, size and shape, in the last character
ranging from flattish to round, with sometimes round and sometimes
pointed apex. The tree has too much of the sprawling habit of Burbank
to make it a good orchard plant. This plum, and those that have been
confused with it, can be spared without great loss to American pomology.
Georgeson was imported by H. H. Berger & Company, San Francisco,
California, and brought to notice chiefly by J. L. Normand, Marksville,
Louisiana, who named it for Professor C. C. Georgeson, then of Manhattan,
Kansas, a student of Japanese fruits. In the Georgia Horticultural
Society Report for 1889, L. A. Berckmans mentions two types of Hattankio,
one of which may be this variety. Normand, in 1891, said that he received
two varieties of Hattonkin from different sources and in order to
separate them he numbered the earlier, No. 1, the later No. 2. Bailey
and Kerr, however, in 1894, published Hattonkin No. 1 as a synonym of
Georgeson and Hattonkin No. 2, the later, as a synonym of the Kerr. The
Georgia Horticultural Society accepted this latter nomenclature in their
report published in 1895. The Mikado, White Kelsey and Yeddo as tested by
this Station have proved to be identical with Georgeson, but as tested
by Kerr,[212] the Mikado alone is the same. Normand, which is said to
have been imported and introduced in 1891 by J. L. Normand, is also
indistinguishable from this variety. In 1897, Georgeson was placed on the
American Pomological Society fruit catalog list.
Tree medium in size and vigor, upright-spreading or
broad-vasiform, not always hardy, productive; branches
roughish, slightly thorny, often with bark cracked
longitudinally, zigzag, dark ash-gray; branchlets glabrous,
with characteristic raised lenticels; leaf-scars enlarged;
leaves folded upward, broadly oblanceolate or obovate, one and
three-eighths inches wide, three and three-quarters inches
long, thin; margin crenate or serrate, with small, amber
glands; petiole five-eighths inch long, reddish, with from
one to ten brownish-red glands usually on the stalk; blooming
season early to medium, of average length; flowers appearing
before the leaves; borne in clusters on lateral spurs, in pairs
or in threes; petals pinkish at the base; anthers reddish;
pistil longer than the stamens.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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