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Jdnk 5, 1919. 



The Florists^ Review 



17 



OBITUARY 



Stephen T. Hitz. 



Stephen T. Hitz, of Indianapolis, Ind., 

 died at the home of his son, Bert Hitz, 

 May 26. Mr. Hitz had always been a 

 very active business man of this city 

 and at the time of his death owned the 

 Hitz Storage Co. and the Florists' Sup- 

 ply House. He had been a partner in 

 she firm of George Hitz & Co. from 1903 

 .mtil two years ago, when, because of 



II health, he retired from the firm. He 

 tarted the firm now called S. T. Hitz & 



Son, operating a large greenhouse range 



III the eastern part of the city. 



Three months ago he met with an 

 iccident, in which a nail penetrated 

 ihe great toe of his right foot. Blood 

 poisoning set in. Three separate opera- 

 tions were performed, but, because of 

 his ill health, they were not successful. 



Mr. Hitz was born in Cincinnati, 

 lanuary 27, 1847. Later, his parents 

 moved to Madison, Ind. The greater 

 j>art of his life had been spent in Indi- 

 anapolis, where he was a successful and 

 respected business man. He is survived 

 1)V his wife, a son, Bert, and six brothers. 



E. E. T. 



James Hay. 



James Hay, one of the best known 

 florists of Ehode Island, died suddenly 

 May 31, at his honie in East Green- 

 wich. He suffered an attack of in- 

 fluenza last fall and was confined to 

 his home with a recurrence of the at- 

 tack this spring. His heart became 

 affected and while he was able to at- 

 tend partially to his work, his general 

 health did not permit him to engage 

 fully in business. 



Mr. Hay was born in Scotland fifty 

 years ago, his father being the late 

 Lawrence Hay. He came to this coun- 

 try while a young man. He came of a 

 family of floriculturists and horticul- 

 turists and obtained the first rudi- 

 mentary knowledge of the guild from 

 relatives and later with one of the best 

 known private gardeners in Scotland. 

 Before he attained his majority he de- 

 cided to follow his brothers who had 

 emigrated to America. Upon his arrival 

 here he settled in the vicinity of Bos- 

 ton and at one time was under gardener 

 for Mrs. "Jack" Gardner, whose 

 famous estate near Brookline, Mass., 

 Attracted world-wide attention for a 

 number of years. He remained there 

 for several years under the late Monty 

 Atkinson. 



On removing to Rhode Island he ac- 

 'I'pted a position as head gardener for 

 tlie Moses Goddard estate at Pottowo- 

 inut, in East Greenwich. For about 

 iliree years, he engaged in the florists' 

 I'Usiness in that town for himself, his 

 t,'rcenhouses being objects of special in- 

 terest to visitors. He is survived by 

 liis widow, one son, three daughters, 

 ■ nd two brothers. W. H. M. 



PITTSBUBGH. 



The Market. 



Memorial day from both the whole- 

 ale and retail point of view was the 

 ■est in the history of the local trade, 

 nfluenza, the toll of death from pneu- 

 lonia and other diseases in cities and 



camps, increased the amount of ceme- 

 tery decorations beyond anything here- 

 tofore dreamed of. The lack of outdoor 

 flowers, owing to the continuous cold 

 weather throughout the month, made the 

 public dependent upon the markets. 

 For these reasons Memorial day, 1919, 

 exceeded that of previous years. 



Peonies alone did not meet expecta- 

 tions as to quantity as practically 

 every other variety did. There were 

 not nearly enough peonies for even 

 home demands. The day before Deco- 

 ration day they sold at $6 to $12 per 

 hundred. 



Roses and carnations fared nicely, the 

 latter wholesaling at $10 per hundred. 

 There was little change in the prices of 

 roses. They brought from $6 to $15. 



Various Notes. 



Edward L. McGrath expects to leave 

 the first day of the week for a three 

 weeks' automobile tour of New Eng- 

 land and the White mountains. He will 

 be accompanied by Mrs. McGrath, the 

 younger son, Edward, and two or three 

 friends of the family. 



Anthony W. Smith, Jr., expects to at- 

 tend the annual convention of the Ro- 

 tary Club, which will be held in Salt 

 Lake City, Utah, June 16 to 21. Later he 

 will spend his vacation on Long Island. 



David Hill has spent the last ten 

 days in New York city. He went east 

 to meet his brother. Private James O. 

 Hill, who landed May 22. Private Hill 

 had some thrilling experiences in his 

 year overseas. He is one of the most 

 enthusiastic members of the Candle 

 Club, an organization of the younger 

 florists of the city. Miss Bess Hill, who 

 helps her brothers during the busier sea- 

 sons, was in the store all last week. 



Howard Andrews, of the landscape 

 department of the A. W. Smith Co., has 

 returned from France and is located in 

 Seattle, Wash. 



Harry Flicker has returned to his 

 home in Homestead after a year's over- 

 seas service with the 28th Ambulance 

 Division, and will shortly resume his 

 position with his brother-in-law, A. C. 

 Miller. Mr. Flicker is the son of the 

 late Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Flicker, veteran 

 florists of Allegheny county. 



Hiram A. Frischkorn has become iden- 

 tified with the supply department of the 

 Pittsburgh Cut Flower Co. and, follow- 

 ing three weeks' experimental work in 

 the city, he left June 2 for a busi- 

 ness trip through Indiana. He is the 

 only son of Manager Augustus Frisch- 

 korn, of Beckert's Seed Store, and re- 

 turned some weeks ago from overseas, 

 where he was a member of tlie 319th In- 

 fantry. Mr. Frischkorn has tiie t':'rri- 

 tory formerly traveled by William T. 

 Usinger, a stockholder of tlie Pitts 

 l)urgh Cut Flower Co., wlio has reen- 

 listed and will remain in France all 

 summer. 



The revised by-laws of tlie T'lt'sh'Tjili 

 Florists' and Gardeners' Club were u]i 

 for consideration and adoption at the 

 last meeting of the organization, .luiie 

 3. "Seasonable Flowers" was the sub- 

 ject of the program, in addition to which 

 there was a talk by "A Lover of Gar 

 dens. ' ' 



Louis B. F. West, who was seriously 

 injured nearly a year ago while step- 

 ping off an elevator in the Farmers' 

 Bank building, has gone east for treat- 

 ment in the hope of ultimately recover- 

 ing the use of his spine. 



Miss Sarah Pattee, who has been 



identified with the landscape depart- 

 ment of the A. W. Smith Co., has re- 

 signed and returned to her home in 

 State College. E. E. 8. 



OHIOAGO. 



The lAarket. 



It was one of the trade humoris^bs 

 who remarked, June 2, that the weeik 

 opens with the market full of sun flow- 

 ers — he referred especially to the large 

 quantities of roses popped open by the 

 heat. May 31 there were more flowers 

 than the market could use, but it was 

 not a serious oversupply until June 2, 

 when there was a deluge of all season- 

 able flowers. The first days of this 

 week have seen the buyers in control 

 of the market for practically the first 

 time since the latter part of last Sep- 

 tember. There is so much of every- 

 thing except cattleyas, valley, lilies and 

 one or two minor items that it is im- 

 possible to move the surplus. It would 

 not be 80 bad if the flowers were of 

 better quality, but the heat has nlade 

 everything open and soft. The condi- 

 tion is one that is met every spring, 

 usually in May, wken the first hot days 

 come. 



The market was as clean at closing 

 time May 29 as it ever is likely to be 

 on the eve of a holiday. Practically 

 everything except a few cold storage 

 peonies had sold out. Early in the 

 morning May 30 some of the city buy- 

 ers had trouble in finding badly needed 

 flowers, but toward closing time large 

 shipments again came in, so that most 

 of the wholesalers closed with a good 

 many flowers in the iceboxes, flowers 

 which came in too late to be of use. 

 This gave the market a bad start on 

 the after-Memorial-day business. While 

 at present the supply cannot be moved, 

 it is expected that a few days of spring 

 heat will run the crops down so that a 

 fair balance between supply and de- 

 mand will be established, probably by 

 the time this issue of The Review 

 reaches, its readers. In the meantime 

 the wholesalers are busy sorting stock 

 to get out the moderate quantities re- 

 quired for shipping orders. The rest 

 goes for what the local buyers will pay, 

 but the city stores are not buying much. 



From the wholesalers' end there are 

 nothing but highly satisfactory reports 

 of the Memorial day business and of 

 the May business. While the supply of 

 flowers was not so large as in most re- 

 cent years, receipts were heavier than 

 expected and the demand was strong 

 enough to take everything in sight, 

 with the exception of a few peonies, 

 which could easily have been sold if 

 the holders had been willing to take 

 lower figures while the shipping was 

 s^oing on. The shipping demand was 

 far stronger than the city business. The 

 local retailers report nothing more than 

 a <food average Memorial day. They do 

 not complain, because they had a really 

 !j;nod business, but it scarcely came up 

 to the sanguine expectations of a good 

 many of the downtown stores and quite 

 a few of them had enough stock left 

 over so that they bought little for 

 Sn'urday or Sunday. A visit to the 

 cemeteries in ,he afternoon showed that 

 1.1 r"e quantities of flowers had found 

 their way there, principally peonies. 

 There were few wreaths or other made- 

 up pieces. 



Both the M'^morial dav sales and the 



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