The WLP walkers met up at Underwood Park to take a walk in the historic Jewel Nursery site. This is a walk WLP has taken almost every year in different locations of the nursery property.
Jim Schreck, who worked at the Jewel Nursery during the late 1950s and early 1960s has spoken to the WLP group about his experience working there as a laborer several times. This year after doing some extra research he shared the history of the business side of the nursery.
The Jewel Nursery was started by Phineas Jewell with just 10 acres of land that grew to 1500 acres by 1923.
After Jewell's death in 1878, J.M. Underwood led the nursery to be the largest landscape nursery in the nation and he a leading horticulturist in Minnesota.
Some of the most amazing facts about this enterprise was the volume of trees, shrubs, fruits and vegetables that grew there; 1,870,000 deciduous windbreak stock, 91,000 flowering scrubs, 42,000 ornamental evergreens and 310,00 apple trees were recorded in 1923.
The nursery employed 200 workers and had a bunkhouse and dining hall for 125 seasonal workers. The payroll in 1897 was $25,000 which is nearly a million dollars today.
The nursery was sold to Wm Lindmeier in 1944 and manager by his sister Agness until 1996 when it was sold to developers of the Mississippi Jewel.
Thanks to Jim Schreck for sharing the incredible success of the Jewel Nursery
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