34 



The Weekly Florists^ Review* 



Seitembke 2, 1900. 



twenty-seven years will be steady and not 

 too strenuous. 



The Kevikw always is glad to hear 

 Irom the trade with items of news for 

 publicfltJon in this column. 



FREE SEEDS. 



Tli<: <ji>voniment expenditures for the 

 last throe years on account of the cou- 

 t^ressional fiee seed distribution were 

 ;is follow:: : 



If'O? $242,920 



1}»08 . . 2SH.000 



IH09 258,000 



So now the government must tax the 

 incorporated seedsmen one per cent of 

 their riot earnings. 



DUTCH BULBS. 



Shipments of Dutch bulbs, while late 

 this y<iar, have now begun and the stock 

 will be arriving in every boat from Hol- 

 Jand for the next few weeks. 



On the Potsdam, that reached New 

 York August 1^5, there were the follow- 

 ing consignments: 



OonKiRneo Cases 



Aun-rman & Pattorson 5 



BartU', J. S .T 



Sifpt'l, CooptT & Cx) 22 



Vaugljan's Seed .Store 23 



Meadows. T., & Co 46 



.Maltu-' \- Ware 112 



IMPORTS. 



T)j.! :.mport3 of seed through the port 

 of 'Ncv/ York for the week ending Au- 

 gust 14 were as follows: 



Kind Pkgs. VaL Kind. Pkgs. Val. 



Annatto ... 1!> $ a24 Cummin 50 $ 780 



Canary 5109 12953 FenuRreek ...350 948 



Caraway . . . 550 37.53 Onion I(i8 8574 



Cardamom . 20 944 Poppv 962 4807 



<^lery 25 382 Other 4522 



Clover .... 00 07^ . ^. 



In the same period the imports of 

 bulbp, trees and plants were valued at 



.•*! 8,500. 



HONOR TO EDVARD L. COY. 



At the annual convention of the Amer- 

 ican Seed Trade Association, held at 

 Niagara Falls, Ont., in June, special 

 recof^nition wa.s made of the work of 

 Ed^\iird Ij. Coy, the veteran seed grower, 

 now of Melrose, Mass., but for most of 

 his active life a resident of New Y'ork 

 state, in electing him an honorary mem- 

 ber for life. The distinction is the more 

 notable in that it has been conferred but 

 once before, in 1907, in the case of Wm. 

 Meggat, of Wethersfield, Conn., a former 

 president of the association. An honor- 

 .iry member can only be elected on rec- 

 ommendation of the president, backed up 

 hy the unanimous vote of the members 

 pres'^nt, tliis amendment to the by-laws 

 having been adopted in 1907 to permit 

 tho election of Mr. Meggat. Ex-Presi- 

 dent S. K. WiJlard, of Wethersfield. 

 "^onn.. si>3ke of Mr. Coy's long and hon- 

 orable record in the seed growing busi- 

 ness and the fact that he has now re- 

 tired from active work, and President 

 Woodruff at once recommended his elec- 

 tion to honorary membership. 



This well deserved recognition for one 

 ■who has served so long and successfully 

 as a seed grower makes it particularly 

 appropriate tliat some of the facts in 

 his a<-tivo career .sliould be recalled at 

 Tliis time. 



Edward Ji. Coy was born April 4, 

 1S;^1, at Bernardston. Mass. His ances- 

 t^irs w.re among tiiose who came from 

 England in the early Colonial days, and 

 his grandlather on both sides, each with 

 TWO tij-'">tiirrs, fouglit through the Revo- 



Edward L. Coy. 



lutionary war. When 1(5 years old he 

 moved to Washington county, N. Y.. and 

 about a yi'ar later began growing seeds 

 for K. N. IJice, of Cambridge, N. Y. At 

 first in a small way, then on an increas- 

 ingly larger scale, for some of the big- 

 gest seed houses of New York, Philadel- 

 phia and elsewhere, he diligently kept at 

 the business of seed growing through all 

 these years, until now at 78 he has 

 rounded out sixty years in the business. 

 In his early manhood Mr. (!oy wrote a 

 great deal for tiie agricultural press, and 

 liuring tiiat period delivered many ad- 

 dresses before county and state agricul- 

 tural societies. It was at this time that 

 Horace Greeley, who had Itecome inter- 

 ested in his contril)utions to the press, 

 using many of them in the New York 

 Tril)une, urged him to take the editor- 

 ship of the agricultural department of 

 his jiaper. Mr. Coy has sometimes 

 tiiought that ])ossibly his declination was 

 the great mistake of his life. 



In 1S7.J he was elected f (resident of 

 the Washington County Agricultural So- 

 ciety and in 1881 and 188li was reehn-ted. 

 For eigliteen years he was on the l)oard 

 of dircctois of tliis organization and wns 

 four times jiresident of the Hebron Agri- 

 cultural Society. In 1903 he was selecttnl 

 by the U. S. Department of Agriculture 

 to make a full and complete test of 

 nearly LMO varieties of cucumbers, \\ith 

 the idea of establishing a type of each; 

 also to learn how many of the named 

 varieties were synonyms. No one better 

 qualified for the task could have been 

 selected, for he was for many years 

 possibly the largest grower of cucumber 

 seed in the world. He has stated that 

 his largest crop, harvested in 1902, was 

 over thirtv-fivc tons. Hut it will be as 



a breeder, or originator, of potatoes that 

 h(> will be most generally remembered in 

 years ta come by the horticultural world. 

 The numljer of varieties he originated 

 counts up to nearly a score, each of 

 which, in its day in some section of the 

 country, has been a standard market 

 variety. The following are a few of his 

 well known varieties: Beauty of Hebron, 

 White Elephant, Late Rose, Burpee's 

 Empire State, Henderson's Early Puri- 

 tan, The Thorburn, White Late Rose. 



September 21, 1858, Mr. Coy married 

 Miss Clara B. Cary, of Hebron, N. Y. 

 There are three children living, C. Her- 

 bert Coy, of Valley, Neb., who is also 

 well known in the seed growing busi- 

 ness; ])r. S. Willard Coy, of Boston, 

 Mass., and Mrs. Ida B. Sievwright, of 

 Hiooklvn, N. Y. 



GLADIOLL 



(A paper by Henry Field, of Sbonandoab, la.. 

 njiil before tlie Iowa Florists' Society at Des 

 Molne--, >>eptember 1, 1009.) 



I have often thought that if I were 

 confined to one single variety of flowers 

 I would choose the gladiolus. There is no 

 llower with so wicle a range of color, 

 none more easy to grow, and none that 

 will keep so well as a cut flower under 

 ordinary 1k)uso conditions. 



Roses are all right, and I love them, 

 but for the ordinary gardener they are so 

 hard to grow that they are a disappoint- 

 ment. The same is true. of lilies. But 

 the gladiolus will grow and bloom for 

 anyone. It will grow in any soil and in 

 any climate. 



Speaking as .i dealer, it is more of a 

 pleasure to me to sell gladiolus bulbs 

 than any other bulb or plant. The cus- 



