“The Country in the City” Centennial Blog

The Country in the City:

Natural History in Northwest Philadelphia Blog Series

Edwin C. Jellett and unknown companion, circa 1905

In 1903, regular newspaper readers in Germantown enjoyed a weekly series of articles titled, “A Flora of Germantown.”   Written by Edwin Jellett, they ran every Friday for almost 40 weeks.  Jellett, who lived from 1874 to 1931, wandered throughout Northwest Philadelphia, recording plants in bloom, noting changes in the flora from previous decades and referencing local history.  In celebration its centennial as a public institution in 2016, Awbury Arboretum republished Jellett’s articles in sequence, re-creating for the 21st century electronic reader what the newspaper consumer of 1903 enjoyed – a vicarious Friday jaunt through Germantown.

Podophyllum peltatum (mandrake, may apple), from Wild Flowers of New York, 1917

Please click the links below to read through the entire 2016 Blog Series:

• Introduction to “The Country in the City”
• April 10, 1903
• April 17, 1903
• April 24, 1903
• May 1, 1903
• May 8, 1903
• May 15 and 22, 1903
• May 29, 1903
• June 12, 1903
• June 19, 1903

• 

  Illustration from American Ornithology by Alexander Wilson and Charles Lucian Bonaparte, 1835

• June 26, 1903
• July 3, 1903
• July 10, 1903
• July 17, 1903
• July 24, 1903
• July 31, 1903
• August 7, 1903
• August 14, 1903
• August 21, 1903
• August 28, 1903
• September 4, 1903
• September 11, 1903
• September 18, 1903
• September 25, 1903
• October 2, 1903
• October 9, 1903
• October 16, 1903
• October 23, 1903
• October 30, 1903
• November 6, 1903
• November 13, 1903
• November 20, 1903
• December 4, 1903