Talk:Vitis

From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository

I have heard the fox grape was cultivated by certain Indians (Shawnee)in the United States in a kind of hedgerow situation with other edible and medicinal shrubs and trees. Foxes and other animals ran the grape vines (which were hundreds of feet long and feet thick; the foxes of course ate grapes. A lot of the trees did not grow straight, which was anathema to many. The vines were watered and fertilized; snow was mounded up around them after snowfalls. Most (if not all) of the larger vines sagged and could be and were traversed. These large vines were given names. There was a lot of small game associated with these places as well.

The Ohio Company (being plantation based) had a vendetta against this kind of habitat. Dogs and horses were not much use there, as foxes (and escaped slaves) could not be treed, if they chose to run the vines. Dogs could run them also, but a slave there first, could give the dog a kick, which the dog generally knew. Both foxes and slaves were hunted by the plantation owners. The real hunters of both were not the plantation owners, who were generally considered dilettantes. This land gave both an unfair advantage, in the eyes of the planters and the professional hunters of slaves and foxes. These areas were burned for charcoal and farm land, which created blood hatreds. It affected the Indian dinner table directly. I am mostly quoting someone here with some paraphrasing.

Is there anything historically to back up such a story? Even letting grapevines get big is rarely done anymore, although grape vines are now treated as native species in at least some of our national forests. I heard this as a child by someone who liked to tell stories about natural history. It was supposed to have come from some lost business papers (completing with water colors done by a French drawing master, who functioned as a photgrapher of sorts) of Thomas Jefferson regarding the early years in Ohio. I am not sure this is a verifiable source; someone (with ties to both the Ohio Historical Society and Ohio State back in the 1950s) was preparing a new curriculum for school children - and I was one of those children. When I told these stories back at my elementary school (this was back in the 1950s), it did not work out that well at all. I am recalling after fifty years.

I am not allowed to have cookies, per my husband, so I am posting my name, location and e-mail address here.

Cindy Donahey The name was Cindy Drodouski at the time. Columbus, Ohio cjdonahey@yahoo.com