The origin story of Marathon Ginseng Gardens — and the cardiologist who built it.
By Dr. Ming Tao Jiang, MD, PhD | Founder, Marathon Ginseng Gardens | Marathon County, Wisconsin
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“I bought a 30-year-old wild American ginseng root, made two bowls of soup. On the third day I woke up feeling light as a swallow. I ran a mile. Ginseng saved my life.” — Dr. Jiang, recounting 2009 |
In 2009, I was the one who was sick.
After twenty years of intensive cardiac research — studying how the heart protects itself at the molecular level, publishing papers that have since been cited over 1,200 times — my own body gave out. I was fatigued beyond function. I was suffering from hypoglycemic episodes after breakfast and fainted each time . I could not go to work. I was on medical leave in a town I had only just moved to: Wausau, Wisconsin, in Marathon County.
My wife, Dr. Lu, had just joined a hospital there as a spine specialist. I was at home, trying to recover, surrounded by the very plant that would change everything.
Marathon County produces 95% of all American ginseng grown in the United States. I was living, quite literally, in the Ginseng Capital of America — and I had never seriously tried it.
A 30-Year-Old Root and Three Days That Changed Everything
I decided to try a wild American ginseng root, aged about 30 years, slow-cooked into two bowls of silky chicken soup. On the first morning, I drank one bowl. I felt warmth move through my body. On the second morning , I drank the second bowl. On the third morning, I woke up early morning and felt — there is no other word for it — light. Like something had been lifted. I went outside and ran a mile.
I had been homebound for weeks.
I still talk about that morning. I will probably talk about it for the rest of my life. “Ginseng saved my life” is not a marketing phrase for me. It is a fact I experienced in my own body, as a physiologist who knows exactly what was happening at the cellular level.
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Who Dr. Jiang aka Dr. Ming Is Ming Tao Jiang, MD, PhD, grew up in Shandong, China. He trained in General Medicine and Pediatric Cardiology at Shandong Medical University (1979–1988) and earned his PhD in Cardiac Physiology in Ontario, Canada in 1995. He worked as a research professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin. His research on heart protection mechanisms was called “an important milestone” by the American Journal of Physiology in 2006. His papers have been cited over 1,200 times worldwide. |
From Patient to Farmer
That experience did not just restore my health. It redirected my life.
I began studying ginseng with the same rigor I had applied to cardiac research. I met David Monk — third-generation heir to the Monk Garden, a family that had been involved in farming ginseng in Northwoods of Wisconsin for over a century. David had graduated from West Point, served three tours in the Middle East, and had the directness of a soldier and the generosity of a genuine friend. He became my guide into the world of ginseng cultivation.
Dr Jiang with Col. (ret.) David Monk at Marathon Ginseng. Wausau, WI， 2014
In 2010, I founded Marathon Ginseng Gardens, LLC.
What began as a personal mission — to understand and share the plant that had healed me — grew into something larger. Today, Marathon Ginseng Gardens is one of the leading ginseng producers in the United States, with a premium brand (Monk Garden®) that has been presented to dignitaries including the President of the United States, and partnerships with some of the most prestigious institutions in China and Korea.
Why American Ginseng. Why Wisconsin. Why Now.
American ginseng — Panax Quinquefolius — is native to North America. It is not an import, not a trend. Native American peoples used it for centuries: the Ojibwe for digestive troubles, the Muscogee for respiratory conditions, the Meskwaki as a universal remedy. George Washington wrote about it in his diary in 1784, when he encountered traders carrying it over the mountains.
In 1784 Robert Morris, the Pennsylvania senator and later US Treasurer launched the Ginseng and Fur trade to China via a ship named “Empress of China”
It is America’s own superfood. And 95% of it grows right here, in the glacial soil of Marathon County, Wisconsin — soil that gives our roots an exceptional potency, aroma, and concentration of the active compounds called ginsenosides (Saponins ) and polysaccharides.
As a Physiologist/Cardiologist, I understand exactly why it works. Ginsenosides trigger the production of Nitric Oxide — the same molecule at the heart of modern cardiovascular medicine. Together with ginseng-polysaccharides, they modulate immune function, protect neurons, regulate blood sugar, and reduce systemic inflammation.
This is not folklore. This is biochemistry I spent twenty years studying.
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“The Panax genus — from the Greek “pan” (all) and “anox” (treat) — was named by Carl Meyer in the 19th century. It means: treats all diseases. Modern science is beginning to understand why.” |
Dr Jiang passed the ginseng plants with roots to visiting guests from Penn State University in August 2023.
The Mission Behind the Farm
Every root we grow in Marathon County is grown with a purpose that goes beyond commerce. Since 2017, Marathon Ginseng Gardens aka DrMing has distributed 20 millions of free ginseng seeds to hundreds of forest farmers across the eastern United States — from the Mississippi River to the Appalachian Mountains — to support the conservation of wild American ginseng.
We have been featured in China’s PBS CCTV’s documentary series “Ginseng, The Legends.” We have been covered by the New York Times, TV Tokyo, South China Morning Post, and Nikkei Asia. We won the US-China Business Leadership Award in 2017.
But none of that is why I come to work.
I come to work because of what ginseng did for me in 2009. Because of what it did for Anja Alvord in 2018 and 2022 in Minneapolis, and what it did to help save my own 93 year old mother in 2025. Because of what it does, quietly, for the thousands of people who trust us with their health every year.
That is the mission: Make America — and the world — Healthy, Happy, and Harmonious Again with American Ginseng.
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Begin Your Ginseng Journey Use code HEALTHY15 for 15% off your first order Visit: marathonginseng.com | Grown in Marathon County, Wisconsin |
Next in the Series:
Article 2: A Cardiologist Explains — What American Ginseng Actually Does Inside Your Body
Questions? Contact Dr. Jiang: Drjiang@marathonginseng.com
Marathon Ginseng Gardens | Maine, Wisconsin | Est. 2010
Disclaimer: Our products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.