According to Washington – A Guide to the Evergreen State, c. 1941, p. 286, The FIRST APPLE TREE, at E. 7th and T St., was planted in 1826 by Dr. John McLoughlin. According to accounts Captain Aemilius Simpson, a dinner guest of Dr. McLoughlin, presented the factor with several appleseeds given him by a woman friend in London and suggested that they might blossom in the wilderness. McLoughlin carefully nurtured the seeds into shoots, which he planted inside the stockade.There are many stories and legends of the first fruit trees in the Pacific Northwest.
Captain Aemilius Simpson, an employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, received his orders to sail to the post at Fort Vancouver. Before he left London, in 1825, he attended a dinner party. Fruit, including apples, was served with the meal. One of Simpson's friends, a young lady, gave him a handful of apple seeds and asked him to plant them for her out in the Northwest wilderness. He put the seeds into his pocket.
Simpson traveled by ship to Fort Vancouver. He remembered the request and gave the seeds to Dr. John McLoughlin who had the seeds planted. Thus in 1827 began the first apple orchard in the Pacific Northwest. In about 1829, the first apple tree only produced one apple. But it became the tiny forerunner of the great Northwest apple industry.
Only one apple tree still stands near SE Columbia Way. It is now the oldest apple tree in the Northwest.
Instructions for logging waymark: A photograph is required of you (or your GPS receiver, if you are waymarking solo) and the place.
