COMPOUND OBJECT (3 Items)
White Oak (Quercus alba) Item Info
- Title:
- White Oak (Quercus alba)
- Description:
- William Darlington was a physician and botanist in Chester County. To many historians, he is known for having served as a Democratic-Republican member of the House of Representatives from 1819 to 1823. In the plant sciences, Darlington is known for being Humphry Marshall's biographer and an amateur botanist. He wrote a lot about the plants Marshall placed about his home, as well as about plants in Chester County. For Darlington, studying the natural world was an important human activity. He wrote, ‘It is impossible for any one, endowed with the common attributes of humanity, to avoid being something of a Naturalist’. And like many of us, he felt that ‘There is a calm delight in the contemplation of Plants and Flowers, which is never felt - and can never be appreciated - by those who find their chief gratification in the turmoils and commotions of the animal world’. In his 1837 book, Flora cestrica: an attempt to enumerate and describe the flowering and filicoid plants of Chester County in the state of Pennsylvania, he wrote about White Oak, saying, 'This is one of our finest and most valuable forest trees - often attaining to an enormous size… The bark is astringent and tonic - while the acorns are sweet and nutritious, affording a favorite food for swine'. Darlington referred to oaks, in general, as a noble genus. The pride and ornament of our American forests’.
- Type:
- record
- Format:
- compound_object
Attribution
- Citation:
- "White Oak (Quercus alba)", Quaker Roots Walking Tour, Friends Historical Library, https://github.com/QRoots/Quaker-Walking-Tour/items/qr11.html