Josiah Hoopes

Josiah Hoopes (November 9, 1832 – January 16, 1904) was an American botanist specializing in arboriculture. He founded one of the largest commercial plant nurseries in the United States in his hometown of West Chester, Pennsylvania.[1][2]

Josiah Hoopes
Hoopes circa 1898
Born(1832-11-09)November 9, 1832
West Chester, Pennsylvania, US
DiedJanuary 16, 1904(1904-01-16) (aged 71)
West Chester, Pennsylvania
Occupation(s)Botanist, nurseryman

Life and career

Hoopes was born to parents Pierce and Sarah A. Hoopes in West Chester in 1832. He attended Philadelphia high schools. In 1853, he founded Cherry Hill Nurseries (later Hoopes Brothers & Thomas) in West Chester, which expanded to one thousand acres by 1913 and became one of the largest commercial plant nurseries in the United States. Hoopes supplied fruit trees to all the country's national cemeteries and sold overseas in Europe and Australia. The business formally dissolved in July 1948.[2][1]

Hoopes was lifelong friends with botanists David Townsend and William Darlington. He wrote for The New York Times, The Horticulturist, Botanical Gazette and other horticultural periodicals and served as founder and president of the Horticultural Association of Pennsylvania for seven years.[1] His Book of Evergreens (1868) was an authoritative treatise on conifers.[3][2]

Hoopes was a fifth-generation Quaker. He collected taxidermy birds, nearly eight thousand of which were acquired by the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, and served as a trustee of West Chester State Normal School for fifteen years.[4]

The standard author abbreviation Hoopes is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.[5]

References
  1. Jones, Jim (2003). Made in West Chester: The History of Industry in West Chester, Pennsylvania, 1867 to 1945. West Chester, PA: Taggart Printing. pp. 15–21, 63. OCLC 52529857.
  2. Garner, Winfield Scott; Wiley, Samuel T. (1893). Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Chester County, Pennsylvania, comprising a historical sketch of the county, by Samuel T. Wiley, together with more than five hundred biographical sketches of the prominent men and leading citizens of the county. Philadelphia: Gresham Publishing Company. pp. 264–265.
  3. Hoopes, Josiah (1868). The Book of Evergreens: A Practical Treatise on the Coniferae, or Cone-Bearing Plants. New York: Orange Judd & Co. OCLC 1315090227.
  4. W. S. (1904). "Notes and News". The Auk. 21 (2): 311–312. doi:10.2307/4070088. ISSN 0004-8038.
  5. International Plant Names Index.  Hoopes.
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