BANCROFT WINSOR 
1889-1939 
Hundreds of customers have visited Flying Cloud Farms during the past few years and 
talked varieties and seedlings with Mr. Winsor. Many were amazed to find that the man 
they had done business with was very much handicapped, the after effect of infantile paralysis 
in 1924, and, although always in his car at the fields to supervise planting, cultivation, hybrid¬ 
izing and harvesting, he was only able to get around with the aid of crutches. He was so full 
of life and so interested in everything that went on, that his incapacities were never men¬ 
tioned by anyone with him, nor were they realized by many. 
I felt that many of his friends and customers would appreciate having his picture this 
year together with a few words about him. They, Mrs. Winsor and Mrs. Moseley,—or Sylvia, 
as most of us know her,—are carrying on the gladiolus business under the standards and' 
working ideals which he set up for it. 
A few words of explanation may serve to explain why Flying Cloud Farms has been so 
interested in Exhibition and Large Decorative varieties from the leading foreign and domestic 
hybridizers. 
Mr. Winsor was essentially an exhibitor. He had a background of prize homing pigeons, 
champion pedigreed Great Danes and Fox Hounds and, of course, prize peonies and glads. 
Limited activity cut off some of the more vigorous sports as a hobby and he became even 
more interested in flowers—a natural family hobby as his father had been a well known raiser 
of carnations and an orchid collector. Bancroft was interested in acquiring a stock of glads 
with which his customers could win. Keen competition and hard-fought-for trophies and 
ribbons brought zest to life. He felt, as we all do, a real responsibility in trying to develop 
winners, keeping in mind that, eventually, a good glad should be a good commercial, as well 
as a winner at the shows. 
JAMES ODELL, 
Chairman of the Board of 
Trustees of the N. E. C. S. 
