Gideon Peter Miller was a pioneer pomologist of the northern Mississippi Valley. For 41 years, he bent his efforts toward developing varieties of fruit hardy enough to withstand the northern winters of Minnesota.
Background
Peter Miller Gideon was the son of George and Elizabeth (Miller) Gideon, of German and English-Welsh descent respectively.
George Gideon served in the War of 1812 as an ensign in Leslie’s division, Virginia militia, enlisting from Leesburg, Loudoun County. About 1817, he emigrated to Champaign County, Ohio, settling first at Millerstown, named for his wife’s family, and then moving on to a farm near Woodstock, where Peter was born.
During his boyhood, the family moved westward once more, to Clinton, Illinois.
Education
Gideon’s schooling was “the three R’s, with the rod not spared, ” but at home, he read for himself Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, the Bible, and Josephus.
Career
In Minnesota, challenged by the rigor of the climate, for forty-one years, Gideon bent his efforts toward developing varieties of fruit hardy enough to withstand the northern winters.
Time and again a killing frost destroyed his work, but, indomitable, he always began once more, with enlarged knowledge. After many setbacks, he produced from the seed of the Siberian crab a full-sized apple the introduction of which “proved a boon to the Northwest” and marked an epoch in American apple-growing.
The “Wealthy, ” named for his wife, had its first published notice in the Western Farmer in 1869.
Though not ironclad in cold endurance and therefore not successful in the coldest portions of the Old Northwest, it was far superior in quality to most of the Russian varieties being introduced in the North at about the same time, proved dependably productive, and was attractive in appearance throughout a wide climatic range.
It had, however, too delicate a skin to be a “long keeper, ” and during the rest of his life, Gideon sought by blending to evolve a fruit with as fine a flavor and a tougher outside. In the course of his efforts to attain his ideal he originated several new varieties, chief among them “Peter, ” which closely resembles “Wealthy, ” and “Gideon, ” which though beautiful and productive, is of most importance as a vigorous, cold-enduring stock for other varieties.
Three crab-apples which he developed, “Florence, ” “Martha, ” and “Excelsior, ” also became popular in his region. For several years, he was in charge of the state experimental fruit farm established in 1878 on a tract adjoining his own.
He described some of his work in a paper, “Growing Hardy Fruits, ” published in the Proceedings for 1885 of the American Pomological Society, and contributed “Our Seedling and Russian Apples” to the Annual Report for 1887 of the Minnesota State Horticultural Society. He distributed many thousands of seedlings in the state.
Achievements
Gideon produced a full-sized apple the introduction of which marked an epoch in American apple-growing. Trying to attain his ideal he originated several new varieties. He was in charge of the state experimental fruit farm.
He and the “Wealthy” are commemorated by a monument erected in 1912 by the Native Sons of Minnesota in the Gideon Memorial Park on his homestead at Lake Minnetonka.
Religion
The occult appealed to Gideon's imagination. In religion, he was a product of the Old and New Testaments, while he disclaimed doctrinal adherence to either.
In pioneer days his best friends and neighbors were the orthodox ministers with whom he exchanged opinions and farm implements.
Politics
A temperamental non-conformist, Gideon usually stood alone or with the unpopular minority.
Views
Gideon was an early advocate of abolition, prohibition, woman’s suffrage. Beards on men he detested and was outspoken to the wearers. Horse-racing at fairs he deemed vicious.
Prayers at the opening of secular meetings he objected to and was not content to let the majority prevail.
Personality
Gideon was a strong man with a clear brain and believed in keeping himself so. He used no liquor or tobacco, drank no tea or coffee, was temperate in eating - almost a vegetarian.
Generosity was one of his strong characteristics; he delighted to give away his fruit and heaped the measure when he sold it.
Connections
On January 2, 1849, Peter was married to Wealthy Hull. In 1858, with his wife and two children, he removed to Minnesota and took up a claim of 160 acres on “Gideon’s Bay, ” Lake Minnetonka.
