John Richardson, Boston MA (1798-1887).
[From
The Magazine of Horticulture; Botany and all Useful Discoveries, etc., 1852, p. 361:] Some very fine seedlings have been raised by our own amateurs. Messrs. Cabot and Putnam, of Salem, and
Mr. J. Richardson, of Dorchester, have each raised quite a number of plants, and among them a few very superb kinds; they have not, however, we believe, been increased sufficiently to find their way into the trade. In a few years, no doubt we shall find the production of seedlings as common with our amateurs as the growth of seedling camellias or azaleas. If accompanied with the same success, there will be little need of importing the productions of our transatlantic friends.
[From
The Book of the Peony by Alice Harding, 1917, p. 60-61:] John Richardson, an enthusiastic lover of ornamental plants, raised in his small garden in Dorchester, Massachusetts, a number of important varieties of peony. Some fragrant flowers of his growing are noted as far back as 1857, about thirty years after the first fragrant flowers were produced in France. From that until his death in 1887 he was actively engaged in growing seedlings. He had only a few mature plants - some forty albiflora peonies - but in addition he carefully tended their descendants, "candidates for fame" as he called them. He originated about eighteen double varieties distinguished by their fine form, colour, vigorous upright habit, large size and uniformly high Quality. Many of them were awarded certificates of merit by the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. The chief stock from which his seedlings came probably was: Festiva Maxima, Festiva and Potsii plena, and a double white seedling originated by Mr. Carter of the Harvard Botanic Garden.....Most of his varieties are light in colour and late flowering. Richardson's seedlings were not offered for sale until after his death, at which time all of his productions were named by his friends, John C. Hovey and Prof. Robert Tracy Jackson, of Cambridge, Massachusetts.
