Another season is past. On the whole, the 1940 season was an exceptionally good 
one for growers in this section because of the fact that, for the first time in years, 
we had the benefit of adequate rainfall - you may say what you wish about irrigation, 
but no system of artificial watering can produce results comparable to those achieved 
by Old Mother Nature’s. 
The season had a rather inauspicious start, due to a cold, dark, clammy spring, and 
the unfavorable weather continued well into early summer. As a result, all varieties 
ran far behind schedule in their blooming dates; at the Wisconsin Gladiolus Society 
State Show, staged August 9-10, the blooms shown were almost exclusively of the 
earlier kinds. However, generaly moderate temperatures throughout most of the 
summer, together with adequate rainfall, gave us exceptionally fine bloom throughout 
the later season. The Sheboygan County Chapter of the Wisconsin G.S. staged its 
show two weeks after the state show and the quality and quantity of bloom exhibited 
was unbeatable; visiting connoisseurs unanimously expressed the opinion that the 
quality of the blooms exhibited surpassed anything ever shown at any gladiolus 
show in the Middle West, the section noted for producing outstanding glads. 
By and large, the 1940 season gave us the opportunity to see all varieties, standards 
as well as seedlings, at their very best. 
Among my seedlings, a number looked very promising and they will be grown on 
for further critical observation. Three seedlings which were tested for a number of 
years gave such fine performance that I consider that they have earned their spurs 
and are well worthy of being introduced the coming season. All three have been 
thoroughly tested, two of them by others beside myself, and one, White Gold, has 
been grown and shown all the way from western Canada to Boston. Further details 
on those three will be given in the descriptions under their respective names. 
In describing these varieties I shall refrain from making use of any powers of 
imagination I may have to write ornate, high-sounding stories - rather, I will set 
down only the honest and plain facts about them. In other words, I shall endeavor to 
give YOU the sort of description that I should like to see when I am considering the 
purchasing of new varieties. 
It may be of interest here to recount an incident in connection with my seedlings. 
During a number of years I have been growing an ever increasing number of seed- 
lings - and growing seedlings on a large scale is a good deal like rolling a snow-ball, 
the longer you are at it, the bigger it gets, - until I arrived at a stage where I was 
confronted with the necessity of putting into effect a very drastic discarding program. 
So, last fall, I dug only such seedlings as had made a noteworthy showing during the 
summer of 1939. For several years two friends had given me sorely needed, and 
much appreciated, help at digging time and they were moved almost to tears when 
they saw how many of my seedlings were destined for the bonfire. They pleaded for 
a chance to try some of the seedlings which I had decided to discard, with the 
understanding that I would retain title to any varieties that performed unusually 
well for them, and so I consented to let them try their luck. And here is the joke: 
one of them exhibited some blooms of the varieties that he had salvaged, at the state 
show of the Wisconsin Gladiolus Society this past summer, and one of them emerged 
as the champion exhibition seedling of the show and just missed being picked for 
grand champion spike of the show; in addition, he won enough other awards on those 
seedlings to give him some 25 points on them alone. 
SCHEER 1941 Releases 
WHITE GOLD-Sdlg. 35 C 185-64 (Maid of Orleans x Picardy) 
A mammoth cream, blending to gold in throat. Season, early-62-75 days. Petals of 
heavy substance, somewhat ruffled, florets wide open, regularly spaced and well 
placed on tall, straight spike; florets have been measured up to 7! inches and they 
average usually well over 6 inches; 5-6 open, with five showing color, on an 18-19 
bud spike, 60 in. in the field. Plant and foliage strong and healthy, and an excellent 
