Gardens and Gardening in the Chesapeake, 1700-1805

Book excerpt: In Gardens and Gardening in the Chesapeake, Barbara Wells Sarudy recovers this lost world using a remarkable variety of sources - historic maps, travelers' accounts, diaries, paintings (some on the back of Baltimore painted chairs), account ledgers, catalogues, and newspaper advertisements. She offers an engaging account of the region's earliest gardens, introducing us to the people who designed and tended these often elaborate landscapes and explaining the forces and finances behind their creation. From the favorite books of early gardeners to the republican balance between table and ornamental gardens, Sarudy includes details that give us an understanding of Chesapeake gardening from settlement through the early national period.