Rosedale Nurseries history

By 1875, when Frank joined him, they had a stock of 5,000 trees to sell.

Frank married in 1884 to Annabelle Sinclair, daughter of two Scottish-born immigrants from Canada.

1887: Wight Nurseries is founded.

A favorite destination since 1898, for the area’s best selection of hardy trees, shrubs and perennials.

By 1904, they were growing and selling a million peach, plum, and apricot trees a year, but as farms decreased and cities grew, ornamentals also became a high volume business.

He joined the family business in 1908, the same year he married Mercy Briggs Perkins.

In 1913, Frank subdivided a piece of land in Rosedale on which he had grown fruit trees and called it Lee’s Hill.

According to the essay on Frank Taylor Ramsey in the 1914 encyclopedia, Texas and Texans, the sheep business and general farming had been A. M.’s principal occupation for some years.

1915: Berryhill Nursery is founded.

Powers Taylor recalled: "My father came to work for the founder in the early 1920's, to drive a team of horses.

Ramsey family about 1922

1926 | A young, aspiring immigrant from Denmark, Harry E. Rosedale Sr., opens Monrovia Nursery Co. on a modest 10-acre plot in Monrovia, California.

Heading the nursery at this stage was Martin Usrey, who had been with Monrovia since 1931 when he started out as a water boy.

They could grow a great abundance of vegetables. berries, etc. for the Blind.” In 1932, Frank died and his son, John Murray Ramsey, took over the business.

Murray P., the fourth generation, received a B.A. degree with honors in business administration from the University of Texas in 1933 and immediately became part of the nursery business.

1941 | Monrovia becomes one of the first growers in the United States to trademark a more robust plant (Rosedale Pyracantha).

Murray was also a partner in the Ramsey and Adams Irrigation Equipment Company organized in 1948.

1953 | In a major expansion, Harry relocates Monrovia’s growing grounds to Azusa, CA, adding several hundred acres into cultivation.

In 1956, he transferred his operations to Azusa in the lush San Gabriel Valley, although he retained the Monrovia name.

He first started working for the nursery in 1965 when he was just 14 years old.

By 1970, Monrovia had to face up to the environmental impact of its operations.

Also of note, Monrovia shut down its Rosedale Garden Centers in 1971 to concentrate on its thriving wholesale business.

After attending Georgia Tech University, dropping out, and moving to California, he returned to Wight in 1972.

Murray P. died in 1975 thus ending a four-generation, 115-year old Texas nursery business.

In 1981, Harry Rosedale's son, Miles, joined the company on a full-time basis.

It was run by two succeeding generations, then in 1982 was sold to Weyerhaeuser Co.

He became president of Wight Nurseries in 1990 and a year later put together a management-led buyout of the business.

Rosedale's plans for this year's show, the second yearly, began in accord with Rockefeller Center's wishes as early as mid-1993.

In 2001, it merged with Wight Nurseries, a 113-year-old nursery based in Cairo, Georgia, with additional operations in La Grange, North Carolina.

2003: Richard VanLandingham is named CEO.

As the matter came to a vote in a special election held in May 2004, VanLandingham had to deal with a problem of a different sort, one that potentially threatened the very existence of the company.