Surreal and Creepy, Charming and Sappy Pansy Art - Plus Other Weird Stuff

Pansies are heavily used in cards since they mean, in the language of flowers, "thinking of you" more or less depending on what author and from what period you are looking at.

While most are like the first card here, this one is nicely done.  The others  are a selection of cards I found interesting...from perfectly sappy to perfectly weird; the strange womens' heads on the dark pansy down below is evil looking!

Was the muscle man picture glued on a pansy a message?

I think my best find for odd is right below, Baby For Sale,  with the huge pansy below signifying thinking of you? What is this saying!?

The next one might creep you out...it did me.  The top lady is demented.

Why would the publisher flip the image on this fair maiden pansy?  The card above the creepy one faces the other way.

I hoped to find the whole alphabet, but only found multiple S and P.

Nicely painted though.

Know your signaling flags?  (These are pretty looking nonsense.)

The next one was illustrated by Francis Brundage.
Interesting life!

Anyone old enough to remember Andy Devine and his weird piano playing cat, Midnight? Midnight was in a dress (as I remember) and I assumed some sort of device  to keep it upright and trapped so it pounded the piano and made cat faces. It all came back to me as I looked at the next card!! 

When I Googled it  some clips on YouTube turned up from Andy's Gang, the TV show that are very odd.

They were as strange as I remember.  I used to have to turn the channel sometimes.

Oldest Seed Packet I Have Found!

Seed packets are not something you save...unless there are a few seeds left and it gets tucked away and buried.  This one seems to have miraculously survived since the 1860s. However I must confess it was an ebay ad that gave that date, so some work is needed to confirm it.

1922 - Pansy Seed Worth More Than Gold!

"Men have fought, have suffered, have betrayed friends, have undergone untold hardship, have perished in the pursuit of gold worth but $20 an ounce and all unawares have made a football of fortune that lay  close to their homes. It seems a far cry from gold to pansies, but pansy seed is worth from $30 to $50 an ounce, more valuable than gold. Why not dare all to gather pansy seed?

How many acres of placer ground will yield $5000 net a year, year in and year out? Not many, possibly, even in the best of ground, for gold is exhaustible. Yet within Portland's city limits is a pansy farm that pays its owner $5000 and more a year net, and he farms six .acres. His seed cleanup on each acre averages about 16 pounds each year, and this 16 pounds of seed sells for $3000. "

From the article at the end of this post.

GROWING PANSY SEED

In the September issue I published a brief account of the pansy seed enterprise of E. J. Steele, Portland, Ore.    

AMERICAN SEEDSMAN has been fortunate in securing several pictures of this form and its products and these are reproduced on this page.

The three small views show workers harvesting seed in one of the gardens, beds covered with canvas to hold moisture for germination, method of curing seed. The largest picture shows a basket display of Mr. Steele’s choicest blooms, and the other a close-up of the plants in bloom.

Mr. Steele's finest pansy is the “Irene", a henna-hued bloom. He has also perfected a ruflled pansy, the “Masterpiece”, and hopes soon to present a bloom rose-pink in color.

"Concentrate your efforts on the extra fancy stock", advises Mr. Steelc. "Anybody can grow pansies, but not everyone can create something newer, finer, diflerent. In the creative field lies the greatest profit in the growing of pansies.”

Mr. Steele has in his file the names of a large number of “live" customers for his seed. The demands for seed have become so great that he is unable to fill orders for certain varieties.

He has been in this business for nearly 30 years and is conceded to have the largest pansy farm in the world. There are about two million plants set out at one time. The seed is picked by hand  with one acre yielding about 16 pounds of seed.

Here is the link to the full, large PDF of the Sunday Oregonian article below.

The Unitarian Register, Volume 101,  had this news that mentions Steele.  

I just found this 1918 ad.  Seed prices certainly fall once they are no longer "new"!!!!!

 Links:

• Article in the Florist's Exchange
• 
  

Now, this trade card is for Broom's Soap...but it is a Pansy Girl!! 

 Might as well stick it here for you to  enjoy.

The New Pansies of 1835

I have begun to poke around looking for pansy art and gossip and I found this wonderful series of publications with these to-die-for tinted engravings.  You should go to the Biodiversity Heritage Lab to view the 19 volumes of  The Floricultural Cabinet and Florist's Magazine.  I noticed while dipping into many of them that the calceolaria was a very popular flower in the 1830s.  Are calceolaria at garden centers now?  You know how you don't see what you aren't looking for often?...maybe I just haven't noticed them.  They are fascinating in engravings!

That carnation below is something, too!!  I have only seen wimpier streaked carnations in real life.  Why do I only see blah carnations in stores? Perhaps I do not go to the sort of stores that have them.

I like the white ones that are everywhere and adore the smell, but I could fall in love with flowers like this boldly marked Princess Clementine!! Who was she?

Later:

I believe this is she.

Pansy Time

This is pansy season in New England.    I am very fond of them.  It seems they are one of the most beloved flowers, advertised by everyone for as long as you can find catalogs if you count the original Viola tricolor!  

Here is a small sample of pansy items.  An active day at school has left me ready for bed!

The following is from Wikipedia, it gives a lot of starter points to sift through!

In the early years of the 19th century, Lady Mary Elizabeth Bennet (1785–1861), daughter of the Lord of Tankerville, collected and cultivated every sort of Viola tricolor (commonly, heartsease) she could procure in her father's garden at Walton-upon-Thames, Surrey. Under the supervision of her gardener, William Richardson, a large variety of plants was produced via cross-breeding. In 1812, she introduced her pansies to the horticultural world, and, in 1813, Mr. Lee, a well-known florist and nurseryman, further cultivated the flower. Other nurserymen followed Lee's example, and the pansy became a favorite among the public.

About the same time that Lady Bennett was busy cultivating heartsease, James, Lord Gambier was doing the same in his garden at Iver under the advice and guidance of his gardener Thomson. A yellow viola, Viola lutea, and a wide-petalled pale yellow species of Russian origin, Viola altaica were among the crosses that laid the foundation for the new hybrids classed asViola × wittrockiana, named for the Swedish botanist Veit Brecher Wittrock (1839-1914). A round flower of overlapping petals was the aim of early trials; in the late 1830s a chance sport that no longer had narrow nectar guides of dark color on the petals but a broad dark blotch on the petals (which came to be called the "face"), was found. It was developed in Gambier's garden and released to the public in 1839 with the name "Medora".

By 1833, there were 400 named pansies available to gardeners who once considered its progenitor, heartsease, a weed. Specific guidelines were formulated for show pansies but amateur gardeners preferred the less demanding fancy pansies. About this time, James Grieve developed the viola and Dr. Charles Stuart developed the violetta, both smaller, more compact plants than the pansy.

Below...a trade card.

1912 Magic Lantern Slides of Seed Nursery Work

New York State has always impressed me with the freely distributed educational materials made available to teachers in the early 20th century.   And Cornell published fantastic books of nature lesson ideas with background information that I collect.  These glass slides were found on ebay in 2014.