350 
The Carden Magazine, August, 1920 
The Brand Peonies 
Originated by 0. F. Brand & Son, 
America’ s foremost hybridizers of the Peony 
It is with the greatest pleasure that I now look back over the performance of the Brand Peonies in the 
field, during the season now just gone. 
It has ever been my honest conviction that the only test of the true worth of a Peony is the perform- 
ance of that Peony in the field. 
And by this test the few Brand Varieties we have introduced have been judged in selecting them from 
the thousands upon thousands of seedlings we have grown during the last twenty years. 
After the blossoming season is gone, and the vivid impression made by daily contact with the flowers 
has gradually passed away, misgivings have sometimes come to me that my memory as to the worth of my 
own varieties has become defective, and that the mere fact that they are of my own creation, has caused me 
to overestimate their comparative worth. 
But this year's experience has but added to my opinion that these very varieties when put to the acid 
test, that is the field test taken as a whole, are the equal of any line of Peonies ever introduced. 
My selections have always been made for a flower of great beauty and of large size, a plant of good 
habit and great profusion of bloom. Moreover, I have demanded that these qualifications should come true 
every year. 
The following. I am convinced are such flowers: — 
Brand’s Magnificent, the great dark bluish red. A flower with 
great broad symmetrically arranged petals like those of a rose. 
Charles McKellip, another great bright red of a peculiar shade. 
A flower that as the plants become older, will often be found in 
the show room. 
Chestine Gowdy, the great cream white cone shaped flower for 
which we get so many unsought praises from the East. First 
Prize seedling at Cleveland National Show, 1918. 
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, said by many to be the most beau- 
tiful Peony ever grown. By vote of the members of the Amer- 
ican Peony Society pronounced “the finest Peony ever origi- 
nated in America." 
Frances Willard, The Peerless White classed by many as one 
of our very best bloomers, one of the world's best. 
Luetta Pfeiffer, an immense flower, with large pure glistening 
pinkish white petals with just stamens enough interspersed to 
make it fascinatingly beautiful. 
Judge Berry, the great show peony. A dainty flower of great 
size of a beauty fit for a "garden of the Gods.” 
Longfellow, the peerless red, pronounced by Peony experts at 
the Reading National Show “the greatest, brightest, most dis- 
tinct, first-class red Peony ever grown.” 
Mary Brand, fast becoming recognized as the greatest commer- 
cial bright dark red in the world. 
Richard Carvel. What Mons. Jules Elie is among pinks, 
Richard Carvel is among reds. A magnificent fragrant bright 
red, in bloom with Edulis Superba. Pronounced by one en- 
thusiastic admirer, the “Brand Superb.” 
Phoebe Carey, the soft delicate one color lavender pink. Slow- 
ly becoming recognized as our best flower. A great lovely 
pink, grown on long stiff stems so long that I saw a great plant 
in Mr. Boyd’s Movilla Garden collection, so tall that I hardly 
had to stoop that I might inhale its wonderful fragrance. 
And Martha Bullock, that wonderful flower that in our own 
opinion, based on an active experience of over 40 years as a 
professional Peony grower, we proclaim "The World’s most 
beautiful Peony.” 
We have an immense stock in all ages and sizes, from divi- 
sions to four year clumps, of our own productions and of more 
than 400 of the very best varieties of all the great growers of 
Europe and America. 
These roots are grown in the Virgin Soil of Minnesota, 
where one often has to dig through three feet of the very rich- 
est surface soil before striking subsoil. 
Growing the roots in such soil enables us to send our custom- 
ers stock that gives more than satisfaction, as evidenced by the 
many letters of praise received by us last season. 
Something New 
For the last nine years I have been continuously at work on an entirely 
new strain of Peonies. Some of these flowers, beautiful beyond my fondest 
hopes, come from an entirely different line of breeding from anything I have 
ever used before. 
The results have been marvelous. I have flowers of immense size, of the 
most perfect form, and of the daintiest and most wonderful coloring. The 
plants are of the most perfect habit, possess stiff stems, and are wonderfully 
profuse bloomers. 
And then I have a Ruffled Peony 
Ever since I first set eyes on the old ruffled Gladiolus “Eugene Scribe” I 
in Peonies 
have been determined that I would produce a ruffled Peony. The marvelous 
ruffled introductions of Mr. Kunderd, but added fuel to the desire. And now, 
at the end of this twentieth year as a breeder of new Peonies, I have what I 
believe the Peony loving public will welcome with extravagant joy, a ruffled 
Peony of Dainty Coloring and Wonderful Beauty. 
All of our varieties, both old and new, will be found described in my beau- 
tiful new catalogue now out, which is free to all true lovers of the Peony. 
A. M. BRAND, 
Faribault, Minnesota 
41 years a professional grower of Peonies 
