I'll write this from memory of information I've learned over many years of collecting and reading articles in trade magazines, trade monthly and quarterly bulletins, newspaper articles, financial publications, court documents and more, including a book authored by Amy Stewart called: Flower Confidential, The Good, The Bad and the Beautiful. Since this is derived from the written accounts of others, there may be inaccuracies and different perspectives.
PART I
This is a story about two men and a lily. The story centers around two men: Ted Kirsch and George Leslie Woodriff and goes a little something like this.
Ted Kirsch began his career in a small Oregon town as an agricultural teacher at a local high school. He grew daffodils and other bulbous plants as a hobby which grew steadily larger and more profitable. Eventually, with a little financial backing he moved his hobby work a short distance south in northern California to a small town called Arcata. There he started a business called Sun Valley Bulb Farm. Ted Kirsch was an astute businessman who kept excellent records and believed that time plus production was money. He ran a clean and sanitary operation and was profitable. By contrast Leslie Woodriff's (of Harbor, Oregon) top priority was cross pollenating and hybridizing, and keeping good records, whether with lilies or personal finance--it was way down the list. His obsession with pollenating and seeding and to see the results became so overwhelming that many other things were 'let go'. His house needed repair and his greenhouses were a mess. A fellow tradesman once said 'if it was a Woodriff lily, it had to be hardy because it survived his greenhouse'.
Along about 1969, whether book keeping lead to it or not, Leslie Woodriff ran into financial trouble and faced foreclosure. It was common talk within the trade and when Ted Kirsch got wind of it, he decided to approach the Woodriffs about working out a deal which would benefit both.
They did. The two had known each other for many years through the flower trade. The terms of the deal were that Kirsch would pay the $12,000 default on Woodriff's place called Fairyland Lily and Flower Garden, plus $1000 for all of Woodriff's lilies which were to be moved to Arcata. In addition, Kirsch would provide the Woodriff family a house to live in with reduced rent. Leslie was to become the chief hybridizer/scientist at Sun Valley at about $2.00 an hour. His wife and one daughter were given jobs at $1.60 per hour. In addition Woodriff was to receive a 5% royalty on all profits. This would at least give the Woodriffs a new start. So, in Early 1970, a 7 year work contract was drawn up and filed. The Woodriff's moved to Arcata along with 1000 plus of Woodriffs hybrids (which Kirsch now owned).
Little by little, but steadily, the deal began to sour. Leslie, who felt he was supposed to be the head hybridizer, found himself assigned to heavy carpentry work around the greenhouses, a job he could not do because of a bad back due to an injury when he was young, and the Woodriffs felt they had been deceived. Further, the Woodriffs had been farm people all their lives and just could not adjust to a set work schedule of 8 to 5 hourly type jobs. Meantime, the 1000 or more Woodriff hybrids were coming into bloom and one morning when Kirsch was taking his walk through, he suddenly noticed a burgundy red lily with a white border pointing skyward. Kirsch instantly knew he now owned a ready made million dollar lily of the century. It would be called Stargazer which Kirsch quickly patented with no recognition of Woodriff. Tensions grew much worse and there was strong evidence that the woodriffs were hiding and hoarding bulbs under their bed to smuggle back to Fairyland.
More to come in PART II.
