In Spring, A Young Woman's Fancy Turns To......

Now, in Spring, my fancy might still return to love, but it also returns to gratefulness that I am  experiencing the return to warm weather and another planting season, even if  I am only thinking about which flowers I'm going to put in which pots on the deck and patio.

A few years ago I was still receiving at least four or five seed catalogs. I had been introduced at an early age by my mother to the pleasures of planning the year's garden and ordering seeds in February when there was snow on the ground.

Earl May Nursery and Seed Catalog was one of the ones Mom always perused and ordered from, along with their Shenandoah rival company, Henry Field's. Gurney's, in Indiana, was another favorite. I think their prices were a little lower that May's and Field's.

For many years, Earl May Nursery and Seed operated a large test field which was open to the public. One of my Grandma Ridnour's favorite jaunts every spring was to Shenandoah to tour the plots and choose some new varieties for her garden.

One of the neighborhood clubs Grandma belonged to was the Kil-Kare-Klub. The Earl May trial gardens were often one of their 'skip day' destinations. Grandma is on the right above with another club member and friend, Myra Jackson.

An even older picture (circa 1936) from Earl May's Flower Center is this one of my mother, Ruth, right, with friends and neighbors, Roy and Evelyn Kapple. The couple has a boutonniere and a small bouquet which makes me think they may have just gotten married. Many couples of that era did get married in KMA's Mayfair Auditorium where the ceremonies were broadcast live to radio listeners.

I don't remember Mom telling me if she and dad were Roy and Evelyn's attendants, but I do know Roy and Evelyn were Mom and Dad's witnesses the following year when they wed in the Methodist Church Parsonage in Bedford.

Roy and his brother, Art were childhood friends of Dad's in Taylor County. Mom and Evelyn (Naven) were also childhood neighbors. Roy and family and Art and family were later Dad and Mom's closest neighbors to the west; Roy on the south side of the road, Art on the north.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Earl May Nursery and Seed Company. Their annual seed catalog was discontinued in 1991. The company operates garden centers in Iowa, Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska.