Historic Hood River
Sears & Porter
12-19-2025
Notes
Sears & Porter was a prominent east side orchard and packing house winning many prizes at local fruit fairs between about 1895 and 1919. You can read a good description of their operations here. They had 31 acres under cultivation with peaches, tenant prunes, and many apple varieties.
We’ve seen many boxes of the older varieties of apples, but this list of forty varieties from The Hood River News in 1912 is pretty impressive:
- Arkansas Black
Bailey Sweet
Baldwin
Ben Davis
Black Twig
Blue Pearmain
Delicious
Duchess
Fallawater
Fall Pippin
Fameuse
Gano
Golden Russett
Gravensteln
Grimes Golden
Hoover
Hyde’s King
Jonathan
King David
King Tompkins
Lawyer
Mcintosh Red
Missouri Pippin
Northern Spy
Red Cheek
R. I. Greening
Rome Beauty
Senator
Spitzenberg
Stayman
Twenty-ounce Pippin
Vanderpool Red
Wagener
White Winter Pearmain
Winesap
Winter Banana
Wolf River
Yellow Bellflower
Yellow Newtown
York Imperial
L. E.
Arkansas Black and King David two of my favorite.
L. E.
For a long time I could get King David’s at Dickeys. A couple of years ago I asked why they weren’t available? The clerk said the owner of the tree had passed and the property was being developed.
Arthur Babitz
LE, we need descriptions!