J 226 



The Weekly Florists^ Review* 



Ai'iiii, 1."!, 1905. 



Establishment of S. B. Chester, East Liverpool, Ohio. 



tlioiii. do lliciii mil' butter ami tlie 

 ciDwd \vill cdiiu' your way and tlic jjt'ii- 

 oial slmc will liiid (lower salos of no 

 valiio to tlieni. A i;roat many llorists 

 are doinjr it. Notice the ilozens of ttmu- 

 sandlot orders tliat j^o out of Cliicaj^o 

 and other large cities every Friday.'' 



Said another house: "We lielieve 

 that wo ship as many flowers to Kansas 

 City as any firm in Chicajj;o. Wo ship 

 to the leadinff retailers, to the fellows 

 Avith less elaborate fi.xturcs, but who 

 iievei'theless do business, and we ship to 

 the department stores. And there is 

 one thiufr we can truthfully say, that 

 there is* no jdaec from Pittsburjr to Den- 

 ver, or from the Twin Cities to New 

 Orleans, where the florist's business is 

 increasing at the rate it is in Kansas 

 City, the city where the department 

 stores sell cut flowers by the wa<>()n load 

 at cost every Saturday in sprino. " 



THE USE OF CONCRETE. 



Can one of the leaders instruct me 

 which matei'ials and how much of them 

 it will take to make a i:ood mixture for 

 concr<'te? My boiler cellar will have to 

 be si.\ feet deej) in the -.'round. 



E. A. V. 



This is a (]Ui'stion that is of interest 

 and importance. For greenhouse bench- 

 es, walls of greenhouse, imitation blocks 

 of stone for house basements and many 

 other purposes, cement and sand are fast 

 displacing the natural stone or bricks. 

 As an instance of this, our locality is 

 blessed with an abundance of limcslone 

 for building pur^xises, and there are also 

 several large manufacturers of hydraulic 

 cement, sold here at 7.1 cents ])er barrel. 

 Yet the great Lackawanna Steel Co.. in 

 erecting their mammoth buildings on 

 the outJ'kirts of this city, used exclusive- 

 ly cement for foundations and walls, 

 and the foundations of their largest 

 building costing $80,000 for concrete 

 alone. 



We have used concrete for the floors 

 of stoke holes and for the walls of sajue. 

 For walls of stoke holes or any cellar 

 where little weight is carrie<l eight 

 inches is thick enough. T'se four r>nls 

 of sand to one part of cemejit. Now, 

 there are several kinds of this hydraulic 

 cement. There is our common cement, 

 which is probaldy manufactured in many 

 localities. Then there is the American 

 Portland, and there is also sold tlie 

 genuine Fnglish I'ortland, which is not 

 made frfim a rock at all and is alio- 

 pether too expensive for our use. The 

 common cement is all you want. In 

 mixing with sand for use. first thor- 

 oughly mix the sand and the dry 

 cenieiit. then add the wafer, mixing with 

 a hoe as vou add the water, and be sure 



not to make it too wet. It should ap- 

 ))eai- to you rather on the dry side. !l> 

 proper cousisfencv is this: When you 

 shovel it into iiie wall and tamp it 

 with a wooden ranuner, if moisture, or 

 p<nhaps I should say water, appeals on 

 the surface, then you have it right. l'"or 

 a dwelling house cellar floor or a cel- 

 lar where you are going to keep flowers, 

 this conciete will do very well, hut 

 should bo finished olf with a coat of 

 one-fourth inch of half cement and half 

 sand fm(dy sifted and made quite thin, 

 so that it will make a smooth, perlect- 

 ly even surface. 



Now, for a stoke hole or boiler house 

 floor, where heavy lumps of coal are 

 smashing around, and more especially 

 shoveling is continually going on. 1 

 much prefer a brick flooi'. Make the 

 surface quite even, but with a slight 

 grade to the sewer. Then spread half 

 an inch or so of dry sand over it, so 

 that your bricks make an even surface. 

 Let there be a half-inch space between 

 each brick, which, of couisc, should bo 

 laid flat. When your bricks are in 

 jilace. mix some cc!nent half and half 

 with sand and wet until very thin. 

 Spread it on the brick floor with a 

 scoop shovel or pail and sweep into the 

 spaces between the bricks with a corn 

 broom and you will have a floor that 

 will last longer than you will. 



You must excuse me. .Mr. Fditor, for 

 going into this cement business at much 

 greater length than the j>lain question 

 required, yet there may 1h' a hint for 

 sonie other beginner in cement construc- 

 tion, and I do feel slightly competent 

 to have an opinion, for during the first 

 few years o^' my American education it 

 was my ]»leasure {':) to mix and lay 

 seveial bundled barrels of cement for 



cellar floors and very recently I have 

 used the same material for cellar walls 

 and low walls for greenhouse beds. 

 While four parts of sand to one of 

 cement is the thing for a wall of, say, 

 six to eight feet in height, a little wall 

 for a rose or carnation bed, which is 

 seldom over a foot in height by four 

 inches thick, can be Ave parts of sand 

 to one of cement and will be amply 

 strong. William Scott. 



MECHANICAL WATERING. 



Since the sub-irrigation idea became 

 pretty thoroughly exploded, at least so 

 far as concerns commercial growers, au- 

 fciition has been turned toward mechani- 

 cal and semi-automatic devices for 

 watering the! plants on or in greenhou'ie 

 benches. The best invention of this char- 

 acter to date is that of C. W. Skinn6r, 

 Troy, O. This, as is quite well under- 

 stood, consists of a line of pipe with 

 small patent nozzles inserted at short in- 

 tervals, producing a rain-like spray. This 

 pipe is fitted to turn on a swivel, so 

 that the spray may be directed over a 

 large radius. The device has not yet 

 been thoroughly tested for use in plant 

 houses or cut flower houses, but its ap- 

 plication to vegetable houses, particu- 

 larly where lettuce is grown, was suc- 

 cessful from the first. 



One of the accompanying illustra- 

 tions shows the establishment of S. B. 

 Chester, the president of the Cleveland 

 Market Gardeners' Association, and one 

 of the most progressive of the younger 

 growers in that section. He has the 

 Skinner device in four connected houses 

 SOxL'JO feet, which are used exclusively 

 for lettuce. There are no benches in 

 these houses and the heating is by hot 

 water from two Furman boilers, the pip- 



S. B. Chester's Lettuce House with Irrigating System in Operation. 



