Since working on a project about the Gurney Seed and Nursery Company in Yankton, I’ve been digging into the history of horticulture in South Dakota as I have opportunity. In research searches about the phenomenon of farmers’ institutes, I hit a point of cross-over in John Robertson. Robertson had a fruit orchard nursery in Hot Springs and was one of the few prominent players in the field of horticulture in early South Dakota from the Black Hills region. [Fred Noerenberg had another well-known orchard at Cascade Springs.]
John Stevenston Robertson (1866–1937) was born in Ohio to Scottish-immigrant parents and migrated with his family to Nebraska. He moved to Fall River County in March 1889 and homesteaded land in the Erskine/Minnekahta area near Hot Springs in June 1892. He planted his first apple trees in 1896 and eventually had a twenty-acre orchard that included over a hundred varieties of apples (at various times), as well as grapes, plums, pears, cherries, currants, gooseberries raspberries, strawberries, pansies, corn and small grains, and asparagus. He experimented with different varieties and growing techniques to find what was best adapted to the climate and terrain. He cooperated with horticulturalists across the state, particularly N.E. Hansen and his students at the Agricultural College in Brookings, to test developed varieties and share results. He also sold some “limited” nursery stock of dependable varieties.
History in South Dakota 