World’s Northernmost Garden

In 1954 Dr. Royal E. Shanks (botany) planted and harvested the crop of the world’s northernmost garden in a location more than three hundred miles north of the Arctic Circle at the Arctic Research Laboratory of the Office of Naval Research. Telephone peas, which grow about six-feet tall in Tennessee, were planted on June 30 and harvested on September 3. They grew to a two-inch height in the climate in which the sun never set, the temperature was about 60 degrees only twice during the period, and there was no period as long as a week that was frost-free. The Office of Naval Research and the Arctic Institute of North America sponsored the research.

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  • Title World’s Northernmost Garden
  • Author
  • Keywords World’s Northernmost Garden
  • Website Name Volopedia
  • Publisher University of Tennessee Libraries
  • URL
  • Access Date August 12, 2026
  • Original Published Date
  • Date of Last Update October 20, 2018