Seems like a good time to create a cyberspace to honor an era and a people in Los Angeles history that have been largely overlooked (Well, completely overlooked) by Los Angeles and Southern California historians. For 50 or more years, the flower growers of the Los Angeles area (we're talking hundreds of farm families) supplied the entire nation with its winter and off-season fresh, cut flowers. (How else could the in-love guys in Buffalo send fresh roses, tulips and dahlias to their sweethearts for Valentine's Day with all that snow on the ground?)
Sure, we've recently celebrated these hard-working immigrant farmers, and their contributions to the U.S. flower industry, in the book Sending Flowers to America (more about that later); but today, hurray! We have an online presence for them. And for all the folks who grew and processed the blooms from the fields that blanketed the land from Santa Barbara to San Diego for so many years.
I'm not going to do all the talkin' here, though. Yes, I have the stories from Sending Flowers to America at my fingertips, and I'll share them here just as I do in the fascinating slide show I'm currently giving to local groups. But I have a hunch you can contribute to this L.A. history and Southern California flower history blog in a big way. So I've set it up for posts and I am really, truly looking forward to hearing from you. Tell your memories, share your stories, send your photos. Who knows? Maybe we'll do a second book!
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