29.11. 2003 Ich habe noch einen weiteren Vortragstermin für 2004 angenommen, am 28. Februar in der Regionalgruppe der GdS im Botanischen Garten Dresden. Alle Termine 2004..

28.11.2003 Greta Kessenich, Treasurer & Secretary der APS ist heute im Alter von 98 Jahren gestorben. Dazu ein paar meldungen in der IPS:

Tim McCauley" <tmccauley@s...> Date: Tue Dec 2, 2003 4:31 pm Subject: Greta

Hello IPS members,

Enclosed is a copy of Greta's obituary published yesterday in the Minneapolis Star & Tribune. No matter how you felt about Greta, it's interesting reading.

Tim McCauley Chaska, MN

Greta Kessenich, 98, dies; was expert on peonies

Eric Hanson, Star Tribune

Published December 1, 2003

Greta Kessenich, of Hopkins, a nationally known expert on the care and nomenclature of peonies and the author of several books on the subject, died Wednesday at age 98.

For more than 30 years, she was secretary and treasurer of the American Peony Society, and for many of those years she edited the organization's quarterly journal, the Peony Bulletin. She had just put the year's last issue to bed before she died.

"She never missed a deadline" in more than 120 issues, said Brad Swanson, a psychologist who had known Kessenich since he was a child. "Talk to anyone who knows anything about peonies and they know about Greta."

Her expertise was largely self-taught. She brought financial stability to the society when she joined it in 1971. With her help it grew from a membership of about 100 to more than 1,500. Kessenich was registrar on an international basis for the naming of new varieties of peonies.

"She never accepted any money, pro bono the whole time," said Roy Klehm, a Chicago-area horticulturist who is a board member and past president of the society. "She was strong, tireless. I think she had seven city lots and she gardened it all by herself," he said. "At one time she had over 300 roses that she personally buried every year."

Kessenich was born in 1905 on a farm in Nebraska and graduated from high school at a time when it was unusual for farm kids to do so. "She begged her parents and finally they agreed to it," said Kessenich's niece, Kay Fischer, of Circleville, Ohio.

Kessenich taught briefly in a one-room country school, then opened quilt stores in Nebraska. She worked for the Singer sewing machine company, traveling the Southwest and teaching American Indians and others to sew. Eventually, she was a regional manager for the company. She met her husband, Al, when he walked into a Singer store and asked to have a button sewn back on. He died in 1975. "She was well-liked, strong-willed, honest, hard-working, intelligent, stubborn, fearless," said Klehm.

Kessenich believed peonies saved her life at one point, friends said.

A little more than 2 years ago, Kessenich suffered an attack that essentially stopped her intestinal functions. With surgery, the doctors gave her a slight chance to live a few more years. Otherwise, they gave her 24 to 48 hours. She refused surgery. Two days later, Swanson recalled, he walked into her room in the morning, expecting the worst. But Kessenich was sitting up in bed, eating breakfast.

"I'm still here," she said. She had drunk water the night before from a vase containing peonies. The nurse found her in the morning, peony petals on her face.

In her last letter to Klehm, Kessenich described finishing the year's final issue of the Peony Bulletin. "The bulletin ends our work," she wrote to him.

"She said 'our work,' but I think she meant 'my work,' " Klehm said. Kessenich is survived by two nieces, Fischer and Sue Lund of Dublin, Calif., and a nephew, Jack Macklin of Frostproof, Fla.

"Reiner Jakubowski" <reiner@n...> Date: Thu Dec 4, 2003 1:55 am Subject: Re: Greta

Some of you might be interested to know...........

Greta M. Kessenich joined the American Peony Society early in 1970. She became Secretary at the annual meeting in June of 1971, Treasurer in June of 1972, and Bulletin Editor in 1973. In June of 1974, Allan Harper's appointment to the Office of Registrar is rescinded based on a somewhat incomprehensible interpretation of the APS By-Laws by which it was concluded that the office was unconstitutional. Ms. Kessenich then assumes the duties of Registrar under the mantel of Secretary. On June 22, 1975, she is unanimously elected to the Board of Directors at the Board meeting following 1975's Annual General Meeting, which was held the previous day.

23.11.2003 Halda,J.J. (seeds 2003)

20.11. 2003 Zum ersten mal habe ich es gewagt, direkt aus China ein paar Strauchpfingstrosen zu importieren. 100 5-jährige Paeonia-rockii-Hybriden. Ziemlich ordentliche Sämlinge. Details auf www.pfingstrosen.com . Die meisten möchte ich zwar in meinem Garten blühen sehen, aber es können trotzdem jede Menge abgegeben werden. Ich weiß je jetzt, wie man Nachschub ranholt.