GARDENS OF YESTERYEAR

Abstract

Begun as a response to a request to develop a historically accurate museum garden representing home gardens before and after Oklahoma's statehood in 1907, research reported in this article describes both native and non-native plants cultivated in gardens in Northeast Oklahoma, Southwest Missouri, Southeast Kansas, and Northwest Arkansas between 1841 and 1930. Much of the evidence of the diversity of plants grown in home gardens by Native Americans who were moved here and homesteaders who settled here is found in historic records that have only recently been digitized for global accessibility.