About Johnny Appleseed

Now for those of you who don't know about Johnny Appleseed (who was a real person) here are a few tidbits of information:
  

• born in Leominster, Massachusetts on September 26, 1774.
• real name:  John Chapman.
• He was a nurseryman who realized that there was a real need for service in supplying seeds and seedlings.
• In order to assure stability of the newly established homesteads, the law required each settler to plant fifty apple trees the first year.  Because of the poor transportation that existed in the interior in those days, apples were a practical necessity in the early settlers' diets.
• Johnny sold and gave away trees to the pioneers.
• Johnny was deeply religious and it is said that he carried the Bible with him everywhere.
• Johnny Appleseed died at the age of 74  after more than 50 years of travel.