Report to our Customers: 
As I write this foreword to our twenty-sixth 
catalog, orders for lilies are still being packed. They 
are leaving our watehouse daily in considerable 
numbers. Other lilies are being put into storage for 
spring delivery and every dry spell is used to harvest 
and transplant the new seedlings from our green- 
house and sheltered beds to the growing fields. 
From a business that had a very definite and short 
harvest and shipping season, we are gradually chang- 
ing to one that is active in every direction the year 
around. This applies to the office work too, for 
orders seem to be coming in now every month of 
the year; it applies to our promotional and pub- 
licity activities and to the endless requests for in- 
formation and advice. 
During the summer of 1954, on July 16th and 
17th, the North American Lily Society will hold its 
annual show in Seattle, Washington. We hope that 
many of our friends and customers will take advan- 
tage of this unique opportunity to see lilies displayed 
at their best. At the same time, take the opportunity 
to visit some of the Pacific Coast production centers. 
We and all other growers shall be only too glad to 
show you the extensive plantings and to assist you 
in planning your trip. 
The year 1954 will mark the tenth anniversary 
of the first flowering of our Mid-Century lilies. 
Exciting as these hybrids have been, there are still 
great advances to be made and the novelties offered 
for introduction this year are an enormous stride 
forward. Detailed descriptions will be found in the 
lily section of this catalog. Not only in lilies, but 
also in daffodils and iris are we making good 
progress. In fact, many of them are so pretty that 
we hesitate even to put a price on them and we 
offer only a small selection in this catalog. We hope 
that daffodil fanciers will find time to visit our 
planting during the flowering season. There is a 
real treat in store for them. In iris we also have 
some novelties that may eventually rival Wedgwood 
in popularity and economic importance. Forcing 
tests have given us every indication that we have 
some worthwhile material among our many new 
hybrids. 
Lilies, being planted late and apparently more 
resistant to droughts, came through the dry spell 
in 1952 with flying colors. They picked up during 
the mild winter and wet spring and gave us a 
bumper crop in 1953. In fact, the crop was so heavy 
that small stock that had been planted down for two 
years had to be lifted and transplanted as the rank 
growth does not leave enough room for the bulbs 
to make the desired size next year. Needless to say, 
this unexpected transplanting of some twenty acres 
of small lilies added in no small measure to our 
costs. Because of that and because of the uncertainty 
as to the general economic outlook in our country, 
we decided to hold our total planting for 1954 down 
to a slightly smaller acreage. In part we have,done 
this by actually curtailing the stocks of named va- 
rieties, ‘> part by eliminating certain kinds alto- 
gether and in part by being more selective in the 
hybrids planted back. 
Thus our offering of named varieties of lilies, 
iris and daffodils is smaller than ever before. Our 
offerings of strains are of an infinitely higher qual- 
ity. Our fields of L. centifolium hybrids, for instance, 
are now of a quality that but two years ago would 
have been sold as individually selected plants. Now 
nearly all come up to those standards and our selec- 
tions of the past season give every indication that 
the process of improvement is still by no means at 
an end. For us, who have been so privileged to have 
the opportunity to work with these beautiful flow- 
ers, there is in this field of endeavor, an inspiration 
that makes the often hard and tedious work a real 
pleasure. There is, too, in these bounties that nature 
bestows on our flowers and on us a deep feeling of 
obligation. Regardless of cost, regardless of the hard- 
ships, all of us here are imbued with the spirit of 
carrying on, if only to learn what is in store for us 
the next year and the year after that. We are duly 
grateful to all of you in American horticulture who 
have made it possible for us to build up our farms, 
our stocks and our knowledge. 
Sincerely yours, 
January, 1954 
Gresham, Oregon 
wt 
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