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John Bartram (June 3, 1699 – September 22, 1777) was an American botanist, horticulturist, and explorer, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for most of his career. Swedish botanist and taxonomist Carl Linnaeus spoke of him as the "greatest natural botanist in the world." Bartram corresponded with and shared North American plants and seeds with a variety of scientists in England and Europe.
He started what is known as Bartram's Garden in 1728 at his farm in Kingsessing (now part of Philadelphia). It was considered the first botanic garden in the United States. His sons and descendants operated it until 1850. Still operating in a partnership between the city of Philadelphia and a non-profit foundation, it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1960.
Bartram later wrote "all my younger years being subject to grip, grievous coughs, heartburn, acrimonious looseness, dizziness, and rheumatism." He was afflicted with a "slavish Astraphobia" that carried with him to adulthood. Bartram considered himself to be a plain farmer, with no formal education beyond the local school. He had a lifelong interest in medicine and medicinal plants, and read widely. He started his botanical career by devoting a small area of his farm to growing plants he found interesting. Later, he made contact with European botanists and gardeners interested in North American plants, and developed his hobby into a thriving business.
Bartram maintained a friendship with Peter Collinson, Alexander Catcot, and others through letter writing between London and the colonies, and he regularly collected specimens for Collinson and others in Europe who were interested in obtaining unfamiliar species from the New World for their gardens and scientific study.
In 1737 Bartram travelled by horseback through modern day Delaware and the Eastern Shore of Maryland to Northampton County, Virginia. In the fall of 1738, he made another excursion from his home in Philadelphia through Virginia, visiting the Gover family in Anne Arundel County, to Port Tobacco on the Potomac. Cedar Point, Maryland, opposite Rice Hooe in King George County, Virginia, and then went to Fredericksburg. He proceeded to visit John Clayton in Gloucester County, Virginia, crossed the York River to visit John Custis in Williamsburg, Virginia, and then journeyed up the James River to visit William Byrd II's plantation at Westover. He continued westware to visit Isham Randolph's Dungeness estate, and then continued west to the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Shenandoah Valley.
In 1743, he visited western parts of New York and the northern shores of Lake Ontario, and wrote Observations on the Inhabitants, Climate, Soil, Rivers, Productions, Animals, and other Matters Worthy of Notice, made by Mr. John Bartram in his Travels from Pennsylvania to Onondaga, Oswego, and the Lake Ontario, in Canada (London, 1751). During the winter of 1765/66, he visited East Florida in the south, which was a British colony, and published an account of this trip with his journal (London, 1766). He also visited areas along the Ohio River west of the Appalachian Mountains. Many of his plant acquisitions were shipped to collectors in Europe. In return, they supplied him with books and apparatus.
Bartram, sometimes called the "father of American botany", was one of the first practicing Linnaean botanists in North America. He forwarded plant specimens to Carl Linnaeus, Dillenius, and Gronovius. He also assisted Pehr Kalm, the student of Linnaeus, during his extended collecting trip to North America in 1748–1750.
Bartram was aided in his collecting efforts by other British colonists. In Bartram's Diary of a Journey through the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida, a trip taken from July 1, 1765, to April 10, 1766, Bartram wrote of specimens he had collected. During his time in East Florida, he was assisted by David Yeats, the secretary of the colony of East Florida.
About 1728, he established an botanic garden in Kingsessing, on the west bank of the Schuylkill River, about 3 miles (5 km) from the center of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Known as Bartram's Garden, it is frequently cited as the first true botanic collection in North America. It was designated in 1960 as a National Historic Landmark.
In 1743, Bartram was one of the co-founders, along with Benjamin Franklin, of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia. It supported scientific studies as well as philosophy.Bell, Whitfield J., Jr., Patriot-Improvers: Biographical Sketches of Members of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 1, 1743–1768. APS: Philadelphia, 1997, pp. 3–4.
"Bartram's Boxes", as they became known, were shipped regularly to Peter Collinson every fall for distribution in England to a wide list of clients, including the Duke of Argyll, James Gordon, James Lee, and John Busch, progenitor of the exotic Loddiges nursery in London. The boxes generally contained 100 or more varieties of seeds, and sometimes included dried plant specimens and natural history curiosities, as well. Live plants were more difficult and expensive to send and were reserved for Collinson and a few special correspondents.
In 1765, after lobbying by Collinson and Benjamin Franklin in London, George III rewarded Bartram a pension of £50 per year as King's Botanist for North America, a post he held until his death. With this position, Bartram shipped his seeds and plants also to the royal collection at Kew Gardens. Bartram also contributed seeds to the Oxford and Edinburgh botanic gardens. In 1769 he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm.
Bartram died on September 22, 1777. He was buried at the Darby Friends Cemetery in Darby, Pennsylvania. Darby Borough
His third son, William Bartram (1739–1823), became a noted botanist, naturalist, and ornithologist in his own right. He wrote Travels Through North & South Carolina, Georgia, East & West Florida,... which was published in Philadelphia by James & Johnson in 1791.
The family business in North American plants was continued after the American Revolutionary War by Bartram's sons John Bartram Jr. and William Bartram. A total of three generations of the Bartram family continued to operate and expand the botanic garden. Bartram's Garden was known as the major botanic garden in Philadelphia until the last Bartram heirs sold out in 1850.
A genus of mosses, Bartramia, was named for him, as were such plants as the North American serviceberry, Amelanchier bartramiana, as well as the subtropical tree Commersonia bartramia (brown kurrajong). This grows in an area from the Bellinger River in coastal eastern Australia to Cape York, Vanuatu, and Malaysia.
John Bartram High School in Philadelphia is named after him.
Bartram's Garden has been designated as a National Historic Landmark.
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