Ephraim Wales Bull (March 4, 1806 – September 26, 1895) was an American

farmer A farmer is a person engaged in agriculture, raising living organisms for food or raw materials. The term usually applies to people who do some combination of raising field crops, orchards, vineyards, poultry, or other livestock. A farmer ...

, best known for the creation of the

Concord grape The Concord grape is a cultivar derived from the grape species ''Vitis labrusca'' (also known as fox grape) that are used as table grapes, wine grapes and juice grapes. They are often used to make grape jelly, grape juice, grape pies, grape- ...

Biography

Ephraim Wales Bull was born on March 4, 1806, in

Boston, Massachusetts Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

.''"He Sowed; Others Reaped": Ephraim Wales Bull and the Origins of the 'Concord' Grape''
, Edmund A. Schofield,

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

(1988), p. 7 He was an apprentice for a

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at a young age, and on September 10, 1826, he married Mary Ellen Walker of Dorchester. Complaining of lung problems, Bull moved to Concord, in 1836, settling with his wife on a farm next door to

Amos Bronson Alcott Amos Bronson Alcott (; November 29, 1799 – March 4, 1888) was an American teacher, writer, philosopher, and reformer. As an educator, Alcott pioneered new ways of interacting with young students, focusing on a conversational style, and av ...

. In 1843, Bull began the deliberate process of breeding a

grape A grape is a fruit, botanically a berry, of the deciduous woody vines of the flowering plant genus ''Vitis''. Grapes are a non- climacteric type of fruit, generally occurring in clusters. The cultivation of grapes began approximately 8,0 ...

that could thrive in the cold

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

climate. By 1849, having planted 22,000

seedlings A seedling is a young sporophyte developing out of a plant embryo from a seed. Seedling development starts with germination of the seed. A typical young seedling consists of three main parts: the radicle (embryonic root), the hypocotyl (embry ...

, he had created a large, sweet variety from the native species fox grape, which he called 'Concord', and by 1853 the grapes were for sale. However, within several years, competing growers had begun raising their own crops of Concord grapes, purchased from Bull for $5 per vine, and Bull saw little profit from the strain after the initial sales. Bull was elected to the

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

House of Representatives House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entities. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often ...

in 1855. In 1893, after a fall, he went to live in the Concord Home for the Aged, and died on September 26, 1895, aged 89. He was buried in the

Sleepy Hollow Cemetery Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Sleepy Hollow, New York, is the cemetery, final resting place of numerous famous figures, including Washington Irving, whose 1820 short story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" is set in the adjacent burying ground of the ...

in Concord, with an

epitaph An epitaph (; ) is a short text honoring a deceased person. Strictly speaking, it refers to text that is inscribed on a tombstone or plaque, but it may also be used in a figurative sense. Some epitaphs are specified by the person themselves be ...

reading, "He Sowed Others Reaped" a biblical reference to John 4 verse 38." File:PSM V82 D349 Bull house home of the concord grape.png, Bull's home in Concord, Massachusetts Image:Ephraim-bull-039.jpg, Epitaph of Ephraim Bull, Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord

References

;Specific ;General
EPHRAIM WALES BULL PAPERS, 1825-1889 (BULK 1825-1864)
– Concord Library * Collins, Paul. ''Banvard's Folly: Thirteen Tales of People Who Didn't Change The World''. Picador USA, 2001.

External links

Ephraim Wales Bull article
on page 37 of the book ''Ancient Middlesex with Brief Biographical Sketches'' 1806 births 1895 deaths Burials at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery (Concord, Massachusetts) Farmers from Massachusetts Members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives Politicians from Concord, Massachusetts 19th-century members of the Massachusetts General Court {{wine-bio-stub