Mothervine Scuppernong Grape Arbor

Mothervine Scuppernong Grape Arbor. . , For more than 400 years, the Mother Vineyard Scuppernong (part of the Muscadine species) grape vine on Roanoke Island, North Carolina has been – and still is – producing drops of succulent-bronze-colored fruits., In 1584, English explorers Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe, the first explorers sent to the New World by Sir Walter Raleigh under the auspices of Queen Elizabeth, arrived on the Island of Roanoke. Barlowe noted in his journal that upon arriving on the Outer Banks of what is now North Carolina, the observed that "…the land was so full of grapes as the veribeating and surge of the sea overflowed them. We found such plenty as well there as in all places else – both on the sand and on the green soil of the hills, in the plains, on every little shrub and also climbing toward the tops of high cedars – that, I think in all the world the like abundance is not to be found.", Is the Mother Vine that flourishes on Roanoke Island today really a remnant of the 16th century? Tough question. Without damaging the vine by spring to is center to date it, all that can be said with certainty is the vine was known to exist in the late 1700's. William C. Etheridge, a man with family ties to The Mother Vine in the 18th century, mentions the date in his pamphlet The Mystery of Mother Vineyard, and contends it was probably planted around 1587 - 1589., Whatever the tale, a visitor to the grapevine arbor will surely come away with a deep sense of awe and respect for history at having seen and touched a living descendant of the oldest living fruit plant on the face of the earth. The Scuppernong is the official state fruit of North Carolina., Arbor and grapevile cuttings donated by Carmen and Foulumain Odom.