1908 Stokes Standard Seeds tomato section - for the Bonny Best discussion...

[nctomatoman]

Cover says "Walter P Stokes of the late firm of Johnson and Stokes (so clearly today's Stokes seeds had its start with Johnson and Stokes...)

Bonny Best is the cover tomato and shows medium sized, round fruit (4 oz or so) - I will try to get a digital pic loaded here later today.

Bonny Best is listed on a page called Novelties and Specialties for 1908. The list of attributes: very early, enormously prolific, strong vine, plenty of foliage, uniform size, beautiful scarlet, splendid shape for slicing. States that it is a full 10 days to two weeks earlier than Chalks Early Jewel.

Here are the tomatoes they list:

Bonny Best (see above)
Sparks' Earliana
Chalk's Early Jewel ("this fine tomato originated in Montgomery County, PA")
Santa Rosa (called a mammoth sort, 5-6 inches across - suspect related to Diener and Santa Clara Canner types, originated in CA)
Livingston's Hummer (red version of Livingston's Globe, essentially)
Superb Salad
New Stone
Matchless
Great Brinton's Best
Success
Lorillard
Brandywine (described as "bright red, prolific" - so again, more evidence for what we know of today as Red Brandywine, Landis Valley).
Ponderosa
Ignotum
Early Paragon
Livingston's Perfection
Livingston's Favorite
June Pink (introduced in 1906 by Johnson and Stokes - they describe it as a pink fruited Earliana)
Giant fruited Acme (they claim to have crossed and recrossed it to get the fruit size increased!)
Stokes' Pink Florida Special
Duke of York (they describe as a pink)
Livingston's Globe
Trucker's Favorite (which I think Maule often refers to as Imperial)
Livingston's Beauty
Early Acme
Dwarf Champion
Early Market Champion
Golden Queen
Yellow Plum
Clusterosa Yellow Egg
Red Cherry

Certainly a few surprises in that list. 31 varieties, with a good selection of pinks, and only a very few yellows.

But it does answer the Bonny Best question, and sheds a bit more light on Brandywine.

Pics to follow later.