Mapleton, Iowa 
3 
Introducing Spring Prom 
ILLUSTRATED ON FRONT COVER—H. M., A. I. S. 1937. Rating 92. We are 
very proud to present this lovely new yellow iris from the garden of Mr. David F. 
Hall. To many of you it needs no introduction as it has been greatly admired by iris 
visitors in the originator’s garden. Mr. E G. Lapham saw its first bloom in 1936 
under No. 36-6, and wrote thus highly of it in Bui. 63, p. 29—“A grand, pale yellow, 
very large, tall, well branched and of splendid substance. No. 36-6 will bear watch¬ 
ing as an outstanding star.” Mr. Bruce Maples wrote the following in the same 
Bulletin on p. 44: “No. 36-6 goes in with my list of biest yellows. It is somewhat 
lighter than the deepest yellows I have seen and it is lighted up with an orange 
beard. The falls are flaring. The blooms are large and plentiful. The stalk branches 
low an I three ways and it is about forty inches tall. The flowers have substance 
like parchment; they do not seem to wilt; they just gradually dry up while keeping 
their original shape. It was the hardest iris to cut in rating.” 
The color reproduction of Spring Prom used on our cover was made from a koda- 
chrome transparency, a natural color picture taken by Mr. Hall in his garden. Nat¬ 
ural color photography has opened a new realm to garden enthusiasts—now it is pos¬ 
sible to keep an accurate color record of our garden scenes and of individual flowers. 
No longer need we rely on our own or some one else’s memory or imagination. Like 
magic, the sensitive film catches and holds the color for us, to be projected on the 
screen or reproduced in lovely color prints. 
The name—Spring Prom—was suggested by Mr. and Mrs. Hall’s son, a recent 
graduate of Northwestern. The flower is truly suggestive of a fresh and lovely 
formal gown. Mrs. Fred H. Clutton, who visits the Hall gardens often, wrote the 
following in Bulletin 66, p. 46: “Spring Prom (36-6) is one of the beautiful yellow 
seedlings that bloomed for the first time in Mr. Hall’s garden last year. It carries 
Dykes blood and its large size, but is of entirely different form; no streaks or spots 
and a height of forty-four inches. Light primrose yellow with deeper reticulations 
at the haft, and very slight ruffling it is a daintily crisp, clean colored flower. One 
can easily imagine a young girl going to Spring Prom in just such a dainty frock, 
possibly with a sash of the color of the rich orange beard. The standards arch and 
the falls flare, the haft is wide and the falls have a delicate picot edge of deeper 
yellow. Last year we measured a flower and found it to be seven and a half inches 
across. Four branches, beginning very low, carry nine flowers, well spaced.” 
These comments were all sent in to the Bulletin without our knowledge and 
from people, with the exception of Mr. Lapham, whom we have never met. They 
leave us little more to tell, except that Spring Prom is positively the most vigorous, 
hardy and prolific iris in our whole garden. Its growth and bloom are simply amaz¬ 
ing. It is in keeping then with our aim of bringing fine, hardy, robust irises to the 
middle west, that we introduce Spring Prom. And it is in line with our policy of 
moderate prices that we offer it at $ 15 . 00 . 
