Two great stories.
I have been doing something with farming ever since I got out of the military in 1969, even in Vietnam several of us planted a garden because we wanted something to eat besides those sea rations that was packed back in the 1940s. I have had a hog farm, rabbit farm and was a bee keeper for several years. I have always had another job during these other non profit adventures to keep from starving. I meet Kathleen in 1978, I owned a auto repair shop in Pensacola and she was lucky enough to bring her car to me when it started giving her trouble. I never did fix that car but we have been taking care of each other ever since, we bought her another car. We sold the house and business in Pensacola in 1990 because I was working for Goodrich Aerospace in Foley Alabama by this time and wanted to be closer to my job. We found the place where we are now located after six months of looking. It's five acres and was completely cleared when we moved in, had a couple of trees near the house but nothing else but pasture.
Soon after moving I discovered daylilies from a person I worked with, he was in the business of selling so I went to look at what he had and I did buy a few to plant around the house. The following year this person became ill and ask if I wanted to buy all his daylilies, we did and planted 800 in rows like corn. We had never sold a daylily but soon realized we had to do something with these things. We put an add in the Pensacola news paper and the response was nothing short of a stampede. People really did like daylilies. Someone from that first weekend sale told us about the Pensacola daylily club, we joined and attended meeting and entered shows for several years. We left the Pensacola club along with a lot of others because the leadership had become a dictatorship. We joined the Mobile club and have been active members in club and Region 14 activities for many years. About four years ago I was asked to do a program for the Pensacola club and was shocked at the change the club had made. There were lots of people I had never seen, only a couple of the old timers. The club is about 95% ladies and all are ready to do what needs to be done without having to beg for volunteers. We rejoined the club a couple of years ago and couldn't ask for a better group of people to spend an evening with.
We have been members of the AHS since 1995, both of us are garden judges, I am also an exhibition judge and instructor. We are an AHS display garden and grow about 400 registered daylilies, down from 1200 in the early days. I registered my first daylily in 1999 and have registered less than 40 since. I was able to retire seven years and the daylilies keep me out of the recliner and out of Kathleen's hair.
Music is first love and I plan all daylily doings around my music dates. I may miss a daylily meeting but never miss a music date. When you have a band everyone has a job to do and you must be commited to do that job.
