FIRST - Old Apple Tree, near Fort Vancouver - First of its Kind on Waymarking.com

There are many stories and legends of the FIRST fruit trees in the Pacific Northwest. One of the stories tells of the FIRST apple trees in Vancouver.

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 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 of the FIRST apple trees still stands. It is now the oldest apple tree in the Pacific Northwest.

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