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By – Agnes Whiting

Hans Peter Sass, one of the most successful plant breeders in America, has laid down his work. He was born in Alt Duvestedt, Germany, in 1868 and died in Bennington, Nebraska, on September 18, 1949. He studied botany and was interested in propagation from seed before he came to America with his parents in 1884. He bought a small farm near Omaha in 1903 and gave much of his time to growing all kinds of flowers, many of them from seed. By 1912 he had bloomed gladiolus, iris and peony seedlings from his own breeding and a few years later, hemerocallis, lilies and lilacs.

He was a charter member of the American Iris Society and introduced his first iris, MIDWEST, in 1923. He was one of the first to cross pumila with tall bearded iris, producing the true intermediates, for which he was best known for the next few years. In 1925 he introduced KING TUT, which he later considered his most important iris for breeding, but it never received any awards.

[Rameses, Sass 1929, from Cooley’s Gardens catalog for 1937]

A seedling from it, RAMESES, became very famous and was awarded the Dykes Medal in 1932. He was not discouraged by the lack of awards for his earlier introductions, nor was he spoiled by the steady stream of them which came later. He brought out each new iris in his modest folder with only a line or two of description. Each year brought more H.M. and A.M.awards, and in 1943 his PRAIRIE SUNSET was given the Dykes Medal.

In 1941 he received the Gold Medal for Hybridizing from the American Iris Society. In 1947 he was awarded the Foster Memorial Plaque by The Iris Society of England. President Geoffrey L. Pinkington visited America that year and told him of this award in his garden in Bennington, and it was a great privilege to see the pleasure it gave to both of them. Later he formally presented it to him at the AIS Annual Meeting in Evanston, amid the cheers of all present.

Mr. Sass was very active in his work until a few weeks before his death. He enjoyed the 1949 iris season and made many crosses. His nephew, Henry E. Sass, brought him for his yearly visit to Maple Valley, where he was as keenly interested as ever in the new seedlings, many of which are descendants from his own varieties. With a twinkle in his eye, he carried home a stalk of a new pink one to use the pollen.

How fortunate for him, and for the world, that he was allowed so long and so fruitful a life. His work will never be finished, it will live on in millions of flowers, forever.