QBARS - v12n2 Proposed Garden Tour of the Middle Atlantic

Proposed Garden Tour of the Middle Atlantic Chapter
Thomas Wheeldon, M.D.

The Spring meeting of the Chapter has now become one of great tradition. It will be necessary, therefore, to have a very unusual meeting this year and in the future years that we may not violate that tradition. For 1958, 1 believe we are safe, for those who arranged the party have worked very hard and very much in unison to come up with something heartwarming.

The program is herewith enclosed and it speaks for itself. I know that the first question which will arise in your mind is, "Is it really true that $32 will cover all expenses from the time we arrive at Ken McDonald's nursery for lunch until we leave the Chamberlin Hotel Sunday afternoon." I wish to assure you that all expenses associated with the meeting will be covered in this package, even to the payment of gratuities, the lunch at Ken's, the party at the Chamberlin Club, the dinner, your hotel reservations, (remember waterfront rooms), breakfast at the Chamberlin, transportation to Norfolk and Fort Henry, lunch on Sunday and of course, transportation back to the Chamberlin Sunday afternoon. I would like to add that nothing included is ordinary. Everything will be unusual or extraordinary.

We have a new adventure this year, for we are inviting the members of the other Chapters of the American Rhododendron Society located in the East, a number of noted horticulturists and the staffs of several arboreta.

We implore you to send in your reservation as promptly as possible, because the Chamberlin Hotel management has promised us all rooms overlooking the busy Hampton Roads and the new Tunnel-Bridge and naturally, it would like to have some criterion as to how many people it is going to have to accommodate. The hotel houses 350 and has promised to take care of the whole group. I believe there are only 100 rooms on the waterfront, but we shall have first option in filling these.

From every angle, I have received reports that this is the most propitious time of the Spring here. Every horticulturist that I have talked to, as of now, has the feeling that Spring will be in all her glory on this week-end. We were very fortunate to have hit upon this week-end in time to get the Chamberlin to let us reserve it, since the hotel processes over 200 conventions a year.

I am quite sure, therefore, that you will help the group which has worked so hard to make this a success by coming to the meeting and by lending every effort to make it an eventful one. I hope that I shall not disappoint you when I say that it is my firm belief that you are more than likely to run into your best horticultural friends at the meeting.