Quarterly Bulletin of the ARS - Vol 26 No 4, Knierim, Preview of 1973 Annual Meeting

The A.R.S. 1973 Annual Meeting - May 25-26
Hilton Hotel, Gateway Center, Pittsburgh, Pa.
Wells Knierim, Cleveland, Ohio

The Great Lakes Chapter will host the 1973 annual meeting May 25-26 at the Hilton Hotel in Pittsburgh's beautiful Gateway Center where the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers join to form the Ohio River. The Chapter's Rhododendron Show will be staged in the hotel lobby on Saturday and the Three Rivers Art Festival will be in full swing in the Gateway Center the same weekend.

An interesting program is being arranged. David Leach is inviting the speakers which include, at present, Dr. Clancy Lewis of the Department of Horticulture, Michigan State University and Dr. Peter Steponkus, Department of Horticulture, Cornell University. Others, including two from abroad, are being contacted.

The Friday program will schedule speakers in the morning, lunch at the Longvue Country Club where extensive plantings of azaleas and rhododendrons will be in bloom. From there we will go by bus to the nursery of Orlando S. Pride, originator of the Pride hardy azaleas. Here are growing over 50.000 rhododendron seedlings, many of which are R. yakushimanum crosses, in addition to the finest collection of holly in eastern U.S.

Then, we will enjoy a reception and cocktail party at the famous Hunt Botanical Library (officially The Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation), housed in the penthouse of Carnegie-Mellon University's Hunt Library. A special exhibit of large rhododendron folios will be on display including the rhododendron works of Hooker and Millais and selections of rhododendron art from the library's collection of over 16,000 original botanic prints and paintings. The library has over 20,000 botanic volumes, including all the books and papers written and published by the great Swedish naturalist Carl Linneaus (1707-1778).

Saturday morning, following one speaker at the Hilton, we will board the river steamer "The Gateway Clipper", have lunch on the boat and debark at Old Economy Village, a restored 19th Century communitarian venture of the Harmony Society that flourished from 1806 to 1905. We will return by bus to visit gardens in Sewickley and have cocktails at the home of Judson Brooks, the co-chairman of our meeting, whose house and garden dates back to the mid 1800s and has many old and new rhododendrons in addition to great oaks, maples and beeches.

Finally, back to the Hilton for the annual banquet where also we may enjoy the Great Lakes Rhododendron Show in the lobby.

As suggested at the 1972 Meeting in San Francisco, Dr. August Kehr is planning to organize a post meeting Rhododendron Breeders' Roundtable for Sunday, May 27. More detailed information on this and on the convention program will be included in the January 1973 Quarterly Bulletin.