History

HISTORY OF THE GREATER NORTH TEXAS ORCHID SOCIETY (GNTOS)

In Memory of Homer Baldwin

The history of the GNTOS goes wa-a-a-ay back. In the mid-40s there were only three orchid growers in town: Eli Sanger of Sanger Brothers, which was Dallas’ biggest department store at that time, Roy Munger, known for Munger Place and Munger Street, and Percy Larkin.

Margie Corn, a garden columnist, was the source of any orchid information we could find and she gave our names to a woman running Hardy’s Seed Company, Mrs. Moses. We gathered at her house one day in 1946 and it was Mr. and Mrs. Polhemus, Mr. and Mrs. Roy Carter, Homer Baldwin, Percy Larkin, and a young man from Waxahatchie named Costalanus. We decided we would apply for AOS membership and started receiving the Bulletin and meeting monthly. More and more people started to show up and we elected Percy Larkin, Jr. our first president in 1947.

We held our first show in 1950 at the Marsh Kaiser Frasier automobile agency on Ross Avenue. Jack Morris was president of the society and Homer Baldwin sent out invitations to everyone who grew orchids in Dallas. Invitations also went to the big orchid firms who would send representatives from around the country to the show. We had everyone sign a book that came to that show.

Later, we decided to become affiliated with the American Orchid Society so we wrote a Constitution and By Laws for our society. On March 19, 1954, we were issued a charter by the AOS. There was an attempt in Dallas to form another society but they were never sanctioned by AOS.

We started judging in our society from Day One. None of us knew anything but we looked at pictures of flowers in catalogs. There was a good one — one of Armacost and Royston’s that we used a lot. We also had Hawkes’ big book and we could judge pretty good. We had judging sheets and the whole shemer — we copied the AOS judging sheets.

Later on, in California, there wasn’t a judge on the West Coast. Of course, after the war, there were more people growing orchids, and more big orchid firms on the West Coast than there were in the East. Everybody wore corsages then and we all learned how to make them for gifts, etc.