I am already knee deep in this year’s crop of garden catalogs. In fact, if I remember right the first one arrived in our mail box on January 2.
Our bright, sunny days raise my spirits as do the catalogs I’ve received. As I hibernate inside on the coldest days, I really enjoy sitting in my rocking chair beside our south facing windows and thumbing though each and every page.
However, my attention of late has been drawn to a 78 year old catalog I recently came across from the Good and Reese Company, Springfield, Ohio. By 1935, their nursery, which was founded in 1888 consisted of 56 greenhouses, a 200 acre nursery, and an offering of over 3,000 different plants.
Claiming “everyone can succeed with them,” they devoted six pages to their rose selections which included hybrid teas, polyantha (baby rambler roses), climbing, Cherokee or Laevigata, and banksias roses. The still popular scarlet climber “Blaze” (Plant Patent No. 10) was advertised at a $1.50 each; postpaid.
Cited as one of the most remarkable geraniums of the century, the “Irvington Beauty” geranium was described as rose salmon pink and available for 25 cents each or 3 for 65 cents.
Purple Coneflowers, displaying a “reddish-purple flower with a very large, brown cone-shaped center,” could be purchased for 20 cents each; or 3 for fifty cents.
The catalog also listed twenty one varieties of cannas for sale. They were described as a “poor man’s orchid” and all sold for 3 for 25 cents; 6 for 45 cents, or 12 for 80 cents. One selection, “Florence Vaughn,” was introduced at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair and can be seen growing each summer at the Benton House Historic Garden, 312 South Downey Avenue.
But that was yesteryear and “the good days.” Having read and reread Good and Reese’s 1935 catalog, I have now turned it aside, gathered up my recently received ones, a colored magic marker, and sat once again in my rocking chair.
NOTE: The University of Delaware Library, Newark, Delaware, has a significant collection of antique garden and nursery catalogs including those of Good and Reese from 1889, 1899, and 1900. Additionally, the Smithsonian’s collection of 10,000 catalogs date from 1830.
Ed Myers is an Advanced Master Gardener, a past President of the Irvington Garden Club, and the President of the Garfield Park Master Gardener Association. He is also the Steward of both the Historic Benton House and Kile Oak Habitat gardens. His e-mail address is EMyers3670@aol.com