Every Strawberry the USDA Painted, 1891–1916

66 heirloom varieties from the USDA Pomological Watercolor Collection, by variety, year and painter.

Between 1886 and 1942 the United States Department of Agriculture commissioned roughly 7,500 watercolours of fruit. Each was painted from a real specimen, usually one sent in by a grower or a USDA field station, so that a variety could be identified by eye before colour photography made that routine. The result, the Pomological Watercolor Collection, now sits in the National Agricultural Library in Beltsville, Maryland, and is one of the finest records of American fruit ever made.

Strawberries received unusual attention. The strawberry was the most heavily bred American fruit of the era — hundreds of named varieties were introduced between 1880 and 1920, most of them by small nurseries, most of them gone within a generation. The USDA's painters recorded them one by one. This page lists every strawberry plate in our restored set: the variety, the year it was painted, and where the record names one, the painter.

Many of these varieties no longer exist in cultivation. For some, this watercolour is the only surviving image.

The painters

Nearly all of the USDA’s fruit illustrators were women, hired as scientific staff at a time when few institutions employed women as artists at all. 23 of the 66 plates here carry no painter on the record.

Mary Daisy Arnold · 12 plates here

Joined in 1904 and painted for the USDA into the 1930s, roughly 1,000 plates; her strawberries from 1910–1916 form the largest named group on this page.

Amanda Newton · 10 plates here

The most prolific of the USDA painters — around 1,200 plates between 1896 and 1928 — and the one most often credited with the strawberries and small fruits of the 1910s.

Deborah Griscom Passmore · 8 plates here

The collection's lead illustrator (1892–1911) and its most celebrated: over 1,500 of the USDA's watercolours are hers. Trained in Philadelphia and Europe; her plates set the house style of a single fruit, true to size, on a bare ground.

Elsie Lower Pomeroy · 4 plates here

Painted for the USDA from 1911 to 1918, then had a long career as a California artist; her plates are among the most freely handled in the collection.

Royal Charles Steadman · 3 plates here

One of the few men on the staff, active 1915–1942, and the illustrator of many of the collection's later varieties.

William Henry Prestele · 2 plates here

Son of the lithographer Joseph Prestele; the USDA's first staff fruit illustrator, hired in 1887, whose early plates predate the collection's standard format.

Bertha Heiges · 2 plates here

A staff painter from 1896 to about 1907, credited with several hundred plates of berries and stone fruit.

Ellen Isham Schutt · 1 plate here

Frank Muller · 1 plate here

The varieties

Alphabetical. Each variety has its own anchor, so a single strawberry can be linked directly (for example #20th-century).

Variety	Year	Painter	Plate
20th Century	1911	Ellen Isham Schutt
Abingdon	1910	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Alabama	1891	not recorded
Alice	1891	not recorded
Almo	1909	Elsie Lower Pomeroy
Alpha	1891	Frank Muller
Amanda	1912	not recorded
Armstrong	1900	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Bartons Eclipse	1891	not recorded
Beauty	1891	not recorded
Bessie	1891	not recorded
California	1892	William Henry Prestele
Cohanzick	1891	not recorded
Columbia	1892	not recorded
Crystal City	1891	not recorded
Dew	1897	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Dr. Moran	1891	not recorded
Eagle	1916	Royal Charles Steadman
Earliest Of All	1914	Mary Daisy Arnold
Early Giant	1916	Mary Daisy Arnold
Early Harvest	1912	Amanda Newton
Early Jersey Giant	1916	Mary Daisy Arnold
Early Miller	1914	Mary Daisy Arnold
Early Ozark	1913	Amanda Newton
Ella	1894	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Enhance	1891	William Henry Prestele
Epsey	1911	Mary Daisy Arnold
Eureka	1900	Bertha Heiges
Excelsior	1914	Amanda Newton
George Washington	1913	Mary Daisy Arnold
Giant	1900	Bertha Heiges
Gibson	1915	Amanda Newton
Gill	1914	Mary Daisy Arnold
Glendale	1916	Royal Charles Steadman
Golden Gate	1910	Elsie Lower Pomeroy
Govenor Rollins	1910	Elsie Lower Pomeroy
Grey Dollar	1916	Amanda Newton
Hanback Beauty	1916	Royal Charles Steadman
Haverland	1916	Mary Daisy Arnold
Hazel	1913	Mary Daisy Arnold
Helen Davis	1913	Mary Daisy Arnold
Howard Early	1912	Amanda Newton
Improved Wilson	1891	not recorded
Ivanhoe	1891	not recorded
May King	1891	not recorded
Michel	1891	not recorded
Miller	1891	not recorded
Nicanor	1891	not recorded
Phillips No. 1	1891	not recorded
Princess Ena	1908	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Progressive	1914	Amanda Newton
Prosperity	1902	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Redstar	—	not recorded
Rewastico	1914	Mary Daisy Arnold
Ridgway	1915	Amanda Newton
Riehls Perfection	1915	Mary Daisy Arnold
Rockhills No. 16	1911	Amanda Newton
Rough Rider	1901	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Ruby	1900	Deborah Griscom Passmore
Runnerless	1907	Elsie Lower Pomeroy
Ryckman	1907	Amanda Newton
Salter	1891	not recorded
Sandoval	1891	not recorded
Stevens	1891	not recorded
Strickland	1891	not recorded
Warfield	1891	not recorded

By period

Plates per year

Sources & citation

• USDA Pomological Watercolor Collection — National Agricultural Library (the originals, with catalogue records)
• The collection on Wikimedia Commons

The original watercolours are in the public domain. The restorations shown here are Madten’s, at web resolution. To cite this page: Madten, “Every Strawberry the USDA Painted, 1891–1916,” https://www.madten.com/reference/usda-strawberry-watercolors, 2026-10-22.