This following is from Seneca, a contemporary of Jesus. “A good mind _ possesses 
a kingdom.” 
And this from Arthur Guiterman, 
“Education is Making Men; 
So is it now, so was it when 
Mark Hopkins sat on one end of a log 
And James Garfield sat on the other.” 
Important tho they be, the philosophers say nothing about College courses or 
University degrees. Many who have had them could not qualify under the above 
definitions. But the saving truth is that many others could and these are likely to be 
true benefactors of humanity together with many who have had little formal education. 
If formal education loses sight of the true aims of education as touched upon by 
these definitions, then it is the fault of the public in that they do not demand it. Nor 
do they demand that instructors meet Huxley’s definition. 
It is time for us to consider our garden. I commend this catalog to you. I know 
it will not quite merit Anatole France’s praise, “I do not know any reading more easy, 
more fascinating, more delightful than a catalog,” but it will make a lot of valuable 
suggestions about what to plant. 
Altho we have tried to say more in fewer pages in this catalog, there are more 
pages about African Violets and more varieties listed than ever before. More questions 
that you have wanted to know about have been answered. 
Please note our own introductions, Los Angeles and Inamorata (meaning “‘inviting 
to love’). Also note many other California introductions by Mrs. Rector, Edith Hendrix 
and others. 
We believe we grow the finest list of varieties on this coast and we ship them 
from Hawaii to Denmark and West Germany and from Kodiak, Alaska, to Argentina. 
Our plants are even growing in South Arabia, tho it’s impossible to ship them there. 
They must be carried by hand. 
Mrs. Houdyshel has charge of growing them, selecting plants for orders and she 
gives many lectures illustrated by slides on the subject of these and other plants. She also 
rents slides in sets of 50 and 100 on various types of plants. 
Our offerings of Amaryllis this year should please every one who loves them. From 
one whose ambition extends only to the possession of one bulb of the easiest of all to 
grow, a “Hardy Hybrid,” on up to the collector who wants 15 of the world’s very best, 
from Holland. 
We have been importing Amaryllis from Europe for 42 years. Our first orders 
for bulbs and seed went to England in 1912, when the best hybrids were being produced 
by the Aigberth Nurseries, (Ker) of Liverpool and by Veitch’s. 
I had already seen the complete collection of Luther Burbank at Santa Rosa several 
times and had bought many from him. For that day, they were wonderfully fine but 
the English hybrids surpassed them because the species of Leopoldi and pardina were 
in their ancestry and thus a new type, Leopoldi hybrids, had been introduced. 
Leopoldi hybrids have a shorter trumpet and an improved, rounded contour. The 
petals are broader, the colors improved and refined. 
We flowered our imported bulbs and the bulbs raised from 1000 or more imported 
seed here on our “Rancho de Las Flores” in La Verne. They were a revelation of beauty. 
But they did well in the open ground only as long as we were able to give constant, 
close and personal attention. They were gradually diminishing in number. 
In the following years we imported many times from Holland. In one instance we 
bought 1000 bulbs, classified by colors only, and in another we had some Royal Dutch 
Hybrids. The latter did better than any we had previously tried and they were finer. 
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