Cooperative Work with Coeumbia University 413 



subject is amateur floriculture. This relates more especially to 

 home culture of garden flowers or house plants, which work is 

 usually done for pleasure, but occasionally is developed for its 

 remunerative value. 



This afternoon I shall speak more especially of the flower grow- 

 ing industry as it is practiced in iSTew York State, and shall show 

 a few slides to illustrate the various factors in culture. 



THE uplifting EFFECT OF FLOWERS ON ALL CLASSES 



For years, flowers have played an important part in the life of 

 our American people. They add a distinct charm to any home. 

 We are naturally influenced to a considerable degree by our 

 environment, and when we are placed in surroundings that are 

 destitute of the beautiful we become morbid and depressed ; when 

 we are in cheerful environments our mental mood responds in a 

 remarkable degree. So it is that flowers in the sickroom cheer, 

 and flowers on the breakfast table prepare us pleasantly for the 

 day's work. 



The development of ornamental features about the home — and 

 flower growing deals distinctly with that — follows step by step 

 the increasing wealth and prosperity of a people. I think you will 

 agree with me that our early colonists paid little attention to home 

 ornamentation. They were too busily engaged in establishing the 

 home and in getting the necessities of life to interest themselves 

 in these things, but with the increasing prosperity that has 

 followed the American people since the Revolutionary War, and 

 more particularly since the Civil War, there has developed an 

 increasing interest in these features ; and I think I am right in 

 saying that the present period shows the gTeatest interest in all 

 lines of ornamental work. To me, one of the most pleasant features 

 of the subject is that all classes of people are interested in flower 

 growing. The wealthy man has his country estate with its broad 

 acres, its greenhouses, f onnal gardens, and lawns ; in the so-called 

 middle class, the business man owns his suburban home with its 

 acre or half-acre surrounding it, which is often laid out with 

 shrubbery and flower gardens ; the working man has his backyard 

 plot; and we must not exclude the tenement dweller, with the 

 geranium in the old tin can. Plant life in some fonn appeals to 

 all classes of people. 



