J. W.

Sears Profile
In the early days of cultivated ginseng in Kentucky, one man was contemporarily called
the “Ginseng King.” This man was J. W. Sears of Pulaski County. J. W. Sears began the
“Kentucky Ginseng Nursery” in 1891 on a plot of land in Somerset, Kentucky and became
known throughout the state for his ginseng business.
Sears sought out to begin a ginseng nursery because as he stated in the Adair County
News on March 2, 1904 “…I had been dealing with dry ginseng for quite a while, saw the price
advancing, the scarcity of it, etc., and I believed that it could be cultivated successfully.” Sears
initially bought dried roots but it “occurred to him that as the supply was always greater than the
demand” and he began farming his own ginseng. In 1891, he gathered ginseng from the woods
surrounding his home and moved them into a nursery.
As his nursery and business grew, he became more well known throughout the state. He
was nominated to the Kentucky State Committee on Exhibits of Agricultural and Horticulture in
1903. In 1904, Sears “optioned [his farm] to J. P. McCoy, of Shanghai, China, with American
headquarters at Chicago and a stock company with a capital of $200,000 will be organized at
once, with Mr. Sears as manager.” It was also stated that Pulaski County, Kentucky “produces
more ‘sang’ than any State in the Union” with Sears’ farm being one of the most successful.
Sears is featured prominently in Kentucky ginseng literature at the time and is the first
known cultivated ginseng farm in Kentucky. He was a known expert of ginseng and is featured
heavily in the 1898 Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station. This bulletin was titled “Ginseng,
Its Nature and Culture.” The author of that bulletin, H. Garman, almost exclusively questioned J.
W. Sears about ginseng. Sears continuously encouraged other farmers to grow ginseng as it was
a crop that required little labor but produced large profit margins.
Shockingly, in late 1910, Sears was sent to the Lakeland asylum in Louisville, Kentucky.
Pulaski County court claimed that it was religious matters but “some kind of an insect invaded
his field and destroyed thousands of dollars’ worth of the growth, and this is thought to have
been the origin of his mental troubles.” He did not stay at the asylum for long as he reappears in
newspapers with advertisements for golden seal in 1912.
Sears did not feature heavily in newspaper articles and agricultural bulletins after his time
at the asylum but continued to advertise ginseng farming and encouraged readers to sell their
ginseng to him.