Announcements:
Upcoming Meetings:Mark your calendars! Reminders of these meetings will be sent out via fantasyvioleteers list groups 1 week and 2 days before the meeting date. These dates will also be listed on the Fantasy Violeteers website under Meetings.
Minutes of Fantasy Violeteers General Meeting On November 7, 2001 The meeting was called to order at 4:10 P.M. at the home of Marie Rilea in Chico, California.
Attending were Briony Gniechwitz, Marilyn Larrance, Marie Rilea, Jan Bernhard and Betty Garcia. Guest attending was Tanya Sorenson.
The Minutes of the October 10, 2001 meeting were approved as published.
CORRESPONDENCE
A letter was read form the African Violet Society of America, Inc. regarding insurance that was available to Clubs. A summary of the letter is that Clubs who hold meetings in places not owned by them, put on shows or have fund raisers may be subject to a lawsuit due to negligence that results in bodily injury or property damage. The African Violet Club is making a policy available that will pay up to $l,000,000.00 per occurrence at a very reasonable price.
A notice was received from the Boyce Edens Research Fund asking for contributions to fund studies on the growing of African Violets.
TREASURER'S REPORT
October Balance ------------------ $55.75
Seeds ---------------------------------- (15.00)
Raffle ----------------------------------- 2.50
November Balance ---------------- $43.25
UNFINISHED BALANCE
Our application to the African Violet Society of America was approved.
The Library has been booked for the following meetings:
Third Monday in January from 4:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M.
Third Monday in February from 4:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M.
A pot luck meeting will be held on December 12th, in Corning, at Marilyn's home starting at 1:00 P.M.
NEW BUSINESS
A motion was made by President Briony to accept the insurance offer from the AVSA. Marilyn seconded the motion and it was passed. The price was $2.50 per member for a total of $20.00.
The meeting was adjourned at 4:35 P.M.
Respectfully submitted by Betty L. Garcia, Secretary
Members: Recipes/ Hints The Beginnings of the African Violet I have had a request for an article about the beginnings of African Violets - how they were found etc. I found this in a magazine I recently purchased. As an affiliate of the AVSA, we have permission to reprint articles.
The following is an article printed in the African Violet Magazine, Volume 21, Number 3, March 1968, Page 46-48
1104 Sangster Road
Gadsden, Alabama 35901
Saintpaulias lived near the mountain side,
Till found and admired by Saint Paul-Illaire
Then from their homeland to far-lands,
From their wild life to our hands,
They came bringing beauty, hope and courage,
Now our hearts are gladdened with the urge
To collect them from you and you and you
The Saintpaulias of many, many hues
-- Mary Margaret Odom in
Baron Adalbert Emil Walter Redcliffe Le Tanneaux von Saint Paul-Illaire is credited with the discovery of the African violet in summer of 1892. A plantation owner in Tanga, East Africa, Walter von Saint Paul, as he preferred to be called, found his wild specimens in two locations; one not far from Tanga and the other in the primeval forests of the Usambara Mountains. Being a young man of about 30, romanticists like to think that he and the girl he later married discovered these plants with their violet-shaped, violet-colored blossoms, while strolling through the beautiful tropical forests.
Walter von Saint Paul sent specimens to his father, Ulrich Saint Paul-Illarie in Germany. Because these specimens had to travel by steamship and railroad the great distance from East Africa to Fischbach, Silesia, Germany, it is doubtful that live plants could have survived such a journey. It is most likely that mature plants with seed pods were sent as dried herbarium specimens. Some seed may have been sent in a container of some sort because there is a later mention in a horticultural journal that Saintpaulia plants exhibited in Ghent came from seed sent by Walter to his father. These unpretentious plants were named the most botanically interesting plants in the exhibition.
Mr. Wendland named the genus Saintpaulia in honor of the Ulrich Saint Paul-Illaire family. He gave it the species name of Ionantha, a Greek word meaning "with flowers like a violet. "Thus emerged the plant which today is known the world over as the African violet.
Frederich Benary of Erfurt, Germany, was the first to offer Saintpaulia seeds to the world. In his catalogue of 1893 he describes the Saintpaulia as follows: "An object of great interest at the Ghent International Exhibition last Spring was this charming little plant, shown by Mr. Hermann Wendland, and of which I have obtained the exclusive property . . . It is already evident that variations in color may be expected under cultivation." He describes the Saintpualia as a very free-flowering plant which introduced a red-violet-flowered variety in 1898 and a white variety called "Alba." Varieties of Saintpaulias were offered by this concern until 1951 when the control of the firm fell into the hands of communists.
One American grower, Walter L. Armacost of Armacost & Royston Nursery, Los Angeles, California, was impressed by the fact that horticulturists in Europe foresaw that the African violet would one day be considered a most valuable house plant. In 1927 he obtained seeds of th African violet from Ernest Benary of Erfurt, Germany, and from Sutton's of England.
From the seed obtained from Germany, only two plants were retained: First, "Blue Boy", which through the years has lived up to its first expectations , and second, "Sailor Boy", a particulary free-flowering plant with a bright-sea-blue blossom with a glassy green foliage. The English seed produced eight plants - "Admiral", "Amethyst", "Viking", "Mermaid", "Norseman", "Neptune", "Commodore", and "No.32".
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