The Beauty of Old Seed Catalogs...and New

We LOVE seed catalogs at Laurel Urban Farms. We feel like kids when they begin arriving in late November/early December, flipping through the colorful, information heavy pages. It begins our dreams of what the next season's harvests might look like.

When we moved to Mississippi, we began to retrace the history of local heirloom varieties through old seed catalogs (Image: Vicksburg Seed Company) from the 1920's and incorporated older region-specific varieties into our veggie trial rotation. When we came upon the Livingston's Gulf State Market, we were intrigued.  

Alexander Livingston is long considered the founder of the modern tomato in that he was able to take wild tomatoes and begin to stabilize them for commercial growing based on desirable traits such as uniformity, disease resistance, ability to resist cracking with inconsistent water, longevity of fruit and, of course, flavor. 

Indeed, the Gulf State Market is a heavy producer of pure pink fruits, incredibly uniform and quite acidic, which makes this variety perfect for canning. 

Seed catalogs have come a long way. Most seed companies ship their colorful publications for free, so don't be afraid to sign up and receive a copy in the mail. Should you want to look at some of the old seed catalogs, check out biodiversitylibrary.org. It is so cool to see the shift in what was offered way back when compared to what people are shopping today. There is so much valuable information and insights on farming, food and culture that you can take away! For us, we shop a combination of current seed vendors including Baker Creek Seeds, Victory Seeds, Seed Savers Exchange, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, and Johnny's Seeds (to name a few) when looking for our next heirloom selection.