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INTRODUCTORY 
GAIN, this booklet is planned for 
Ag It adopts your point of view. 
It gives you hitherto unpublished 
facts upon which to base your own con- 
clusions. It is not cluttered up with 
fictitious values. 
This is our 24th annual catalog. 
Undoubtedly you want others to admire 
your flowers, since appreciation of the 
general quality of your glads by your 
friends is gratifying. Our greatest effort 
is expended to eliminate your spending 
time on inferior sorts. To accomplish this ° 
we do not restrict our data to our own 
offerings and the more you read in this 
Guidebook the more you will be convinced 
that here is a little “instruction course”’ 
on Gladiolus with an irreducible mini- 
mum of bias. 
We pack our booklet with many pages 
of answers to many questions we get 
nevertheless. Every question vital to the 
selection and growing of good glads we 
think we have already answered some- 
where in this booklet. 
However, we will not allow the business 
to reach the stage, all too common, where 
the proprietor no longer is able to per- 
sonally inspect the outgoing stocks for 
complete freedom from injurious insects 
and bulb diseases. Our past customers 
know what quality of bulbs they will get. 
Our reputation for sound bulbs is more 
than national. Our reputation for offer- 
ing only the very best varieties to be 
found around the world is equally broad. 
We plan to keep it that way. 
Horticultural costs Have gone up and 
will go higher. Paper and printing and 
cartons, too. Likewise postage and ex- 
press costs. 
A grower-cataloger of bulbs has cer- 
tain inescapable costs: planting stock, use 
of land, its preparation, planting, culti- 
vating, digging, hauling, curing, clean- 
ing, grading, storage quarters, fumigat- 
ing or other processes to combat insects 
and bulb diseases, advertising of one 
form or another, catalogs, postage, pack- 
ing and shipping. There may be additional 
items of overhead such as clerical, irri- 
gation, spraying, etc. 
We do not issue a fall list and we do 
not solicit “pre-catalog” orders. Most of 
them require later revision because of 
abandoned varieties and price reductions. 
We do recommend that you place your 
order soon after receipt of this Guidebook 
to avoid, in so far as it is possible, the 
disappointment of sold out items. 
THE GLADIOLUS FANCIER’S 
Variety descriptions are vital to a cata- 
loger’s reputation. Yet the average cata- 
loger, for the most part, copies the origi- 
nator’s description and trusts to luck. 
We think we try out but “junk” without 
listing more varieties than any cataloger 
in America. Some catalogers use their 
selling facilities to get rid of their “bad 
investments.” The more varieties a cata- 
loger lists, the easier it is to “cash out” 
a variety that has proved a disappoint- 
ment to him. A variety has around thirty 
different characteristics to consider, re- 
lating to form, color, size, height, 
strength, substance, season, bulb health, 
propagation, etc. No cataloger can spare 
the time and space to describe them all, 
but we can and do report a glad’s most 
interesting features and you may defi- 
nitely assume, in the absence of specific 
mention of some undesirable traits, to the 
best of our knowledge and belief, the 
traits or habits not specifically mentioned 
are above the “satisfactory” level. 
A large part of the information sup- 
plied annually in our Guide Book is pri- 
marily directed to other commercial 
growers and catalogers, who constitute 
about 70% of our total customers who 
obtain grower units of the newest varie- 
ties in sizes, amounts and price outlay 
of their own choosing. From such we 
meet no arguments about wholesale rates 
because they understand that either the 
new item has no lower wholesale rate 
or know we satisfactorily plus value the 
item to extent our stocks permit. 
Over the years we have built up an 
enviable reputation for generous filling 
of orders by medium of overcount, over- 
size, samples of new sorts to try. 
We appreciate receiving a portion of 
your bulb purchases. We do not neces- 
sarily solicit it all. 
Our proximity to the large planting 
of new gladiolus material from world 
wide sources at Valleevue has been of 
vast assistance to us in our constant 
search for the best varieties in which 
to invest, propagate and offer to our 
customers. Catalogers visiting the Trial 
Gardens at Valleevue can obtain more 
valuable information on new varieties 
than by visiting 12 shows. For several 
years we have refrained from copyright 
of our Guide Book in order that pub- 
lishers, catalogers and others may avail 
themselves, both our own data and the 
official report of the Valleevue Test 
Garden, which we have been publishing 
for the general benefit of the gladiolus 
industry. ea 
HERBERT O. EVANS arm, State Route 91 SOLON, OHIO 
