Our Labour of Love - offered by Crenagh and David Elliott

In 1985 we were given copies of the Royal National Rose Society's 'The Rose Annual' and through our membership in the Royal National Rose Society and with further donated copies of 'The Rose' had copies from 1954 to the most recent by 2000. In 2001 we realized that indexing of these was required so we could more easily access information, most especially illustrations. This started the project. Later though the assistance of Heiko Miles of Calendula Books, Vancouver, Washington, USA; we were able to acquire copies of 'The Rose Annual from 1910 to 1953. This has given us a complete set from 1910 to the present time; we are only missing copies for 1907, 1908, and 1909 which were not produced as bound volumes.

We decided to create 2 computer databases in Microsoft Excel, one covering the articles and the other the Illustrations. After nearly two years of work we now have the results available to 2002 and have realized that this information is of value to more rose enthusiasts than ourselves. We are publishing in two forms.

Two printed reports are available. The 'Index of Articles' is a simple listing of all articles in the order that they were published in the original copy. They have been classified in a somewhat arbitrary manner, which could be improved and expanded. The 'Index of Illustrations' has been sorted alphabetically in sections dependant on subject. The first section is by Rose name, the next section is a sort referred to as 'people'; here the sort is by last name. The third section is entitled 'Other', within this section a further sort was done as follows; Advertisements, Arrangements, Examples, Flowers (other than Roses), Gardens, Miscellaneous and Plants (again other than Roses).

The second format is a Computer Disk. This contains all the data, approximately 9,000 records, a search capability, explanatory notes, and a printable order form. The search enables a user to enter a range of requests and obtain the results without having to search through each individual data base line by line. One further database is in preparation. In many volumes there are descriptions of Roses. These may be summarized into a tabular format similar to that used on our local Rose web site 'www.everyrose.com'. The Webmaster for this website is Trevor Inkpen of Quill Enterprises who also prepared the CD. Updates to both data bases are underway with a target of completion to include this year's 'The Rose'. Further updates to this information will occur dependant on demand. Revisions will occur simultaneous with the updates to correct any errors which may be detected, either by ourselves or other users.

Initial publication costs in Canadian Dollars are:
'Index of Articles' printed form: CA$15 each, CA$20 outside North America.
'Index of illustrations' printed form: CA$15 each, CA$20 outside North America.
CD ('Index of Articles and Illustrations') CA$20 each, CA$25 outside North America.

Copies may be ordered, by mail, from the authors.

PAYMENT BY MONEY ORDERS ONLY IN CANADIAN DOLLARS, PLEASE.
MAKE MONEY ORDERS PAYABLE TO: DAVID ELLIOTT

Contact Email:
theelliotts@shaw.ca

Postal Mail:
The Elliotts
3125 Qu'Appelle Street
Victoria BC V9A 1V5
CANADA