Sir Thomas Herriot
The Roanoke Astronomer
On this Day in 1586, Sir Thomas Herriot introduced Colombian potatoes to England. Over fifty years earlier, the Spanish had been the first to discover potatoes - but Herriot's potatoes were the first to reach England.
Harriot had spent time in Sir Walter Raleigh’s English colony on Roanoke Island in modern-day North Carolina. There, he studied not only wildlife but also potatoes from Columbia.
Herriot was also an astronomer. In July of 1609, he created a drawing of the moon through a telescope over four months before Galileo.
This post was featured onThe Daily Gardener podcast:
helping gardeners find their roots,
one story at a time
Sir Thomas Herriot
