Notes of the Past Season 
A season such as we had last summer when the rainfall was very heavy and came ati 
good intervals (in fact the rainfall in 1938 was the heaviest in 100 years in Massachusetts) 
made for grand bloom from even the small bulbs. In showing such good spikes from these 
small sizes we were given a grand opportunity to form opinions of many newer varieties of 
which we did not have large stocks of big bulbs, 1 hope that some of these notes, mostly 
made at random in the field, will be of interest and of some value to you in making yout^ 
selections for the coming season. 
I hope you will excuse me for mentioning our own introductions first—I guess it just 
gets to be a habit to do this—but if I did not honestly believe that every one of them is an 
advance over any named variety of similar color or season, or a new color to glads 1 would 
never introduce them. You will find detailed descriptions of them later in this catalogue*' 
and I hope you will try at least one or two of them this year. SURFSIDE and BUFFETTE are 
much lower in price as they are fine increasers and you can expect extra fine spikes of these 
two from medium bulbs and even the small sized bulbs give good commercial spikes. You 
will note that we are this year reducing our introductory prices on our 1939 releases. There 
are only three of them and they are the choice from many thousands of marked out seedlings 
that we have been growing long enough to know well their characteristics. 
The early varieties are very popular. WHITE ORCHID, POLAR ICE, MISS HARRIET, 
LIBELLE, ROI SOLEIL, EARLY DAWN, TANGERINE, GLADDIE BOY, KRIMHILDE, J. S. 
BACH, PELECRINA, YELLOW PERFECTION, MR. CUTHBERTSON, LAUSANNE, and PROFES¬ 
SOR VON SLOGTERN seem the best of the lower priced early group. 
Yellow varieties were very popular the past season and, while the Ideal is not yet at 
hand in this color, there are several that are improvements: ALCHEMIST is a good grower 
and seems to have a commercial future. FAHNENJUNKER we like as a later commercial; it is 
tall and an easy grower. GOLD DUST is a very dark early yellow which seems well worth 
considering for both the fan as well as the cut flower grower. GOLDEN GODDESS is very 
tall, opens a number of medium sized blooms at once, increases easily, and well worth a trial. 
ANNA MAY WONG I believe has the prettiest individual flower of all the yellows. The New 
Zealand DESERT GOLD (the only good yellow from “down under”) is a large ruffled bloom 
of medium color. GENERAL BALBOA is very ruffled and certainly a fine variety but is not as 
rapid an increaser as the yellows that have considerable prim blood. Joe Coleman thought 
GENERAL BALBOA and LAUSANNE his best bets for hybridizing yellows. The newer ROYAL 
GOLD appears to be the best of the yellows for exhibition as it makes long spikes with about 
eight open on good long flower heads; the color is medium yellow. ZAUBERIN is a Pfitzer 
variety that is not new but has been fine for us, especially early, and yet it does not seem 
to be well known; if it does as well in other locations this low priced variety will be a wel¬ 
come addition to this long list of yellow glads. We still grow much YELLOW PERFECTION 
for the cut flower market. 
Many good white varieties introduced the past few years have about overcome the short¬ 
age of the past in this class. We think our SURFSIDE is the most valuable of all the whites. 
VREDENBURC and KRYTBERC, from our short acquaintance, are both tall vigorous growers 
and seem to hold a commercial future. SNOW PRINCESS (Pfitzer) , just released in this 
country, has been very fine the past two seasons here; first, it makes a nice bulb with a good 
lot of bulblets that germinate easily, the color is good, and the ruffled flowers have goodj 
substance. While POLAR ICE makes rough bulbs, it is a “dead” white, every spike straight, 
very early, and much desired by the florists. STAR OF BETHLEHEM is very popular and 
rightly so. MATTERHORN was exceptionally fine the past year; a wonderful exhibition va¬ 
riety. CEHEIMRAT DUISBERC fills the want for a nice late ruffled white especially desir¬ 
able as most good whites are early. 
The cream MRS. G. G. ERREY I believe to be the finest introduction that has come from 
Errey Brothers, in Australia, and I well realize this covers a lot of great glads. SHIRLEY 
TEMPLE is a tall cream with large ruffled blooms and in spite of a tendency to crook some; 
at times, especially from large bulbs, is very popular. ROSEMARIE PFITZER is my favorite 
cream today although it is variable; the past wet season it showed almost no pink at the 
