Code = SAV
SAVILLE, F. Harmon
[This tribute was written about his father by John Saville:]F. Harmon Saville (1924-1997) founded Nor'East Miniature Roses, Inc. in 1971 in his backyard. He liked to describe his business as a "hobby gone wild", as his interests increased from growing minis to marketing them and ultimately to hybridizing.
Harm Saville will be remembered as a tireless promoter who introduced many "first-timers" to the joys of growing roses and who helped make miniature roses one of the fastest growing segments of the rose market. He patented over 60 new varieties of miniature roses. Among his many accomplishments as a hybridizer are: 'Rainbow's End', a brilliant red/yellow bicolor, 'Teddy Bear', a unique terra cotta color ("Do you think people will really buy a BROWN rose?") and finally his super fragrant Scentsation series minis.
Harm lived to see the introduction of his 'Scentsational'and 'Seattle Scentsation', however he would have loved to have known that his 'Overnight Scentsation' was the first rose in space, accompanying John Glenn and company as an experiment on fragrance in microgravity.
[From Modern Roses 10, p. 731:] F. Harmon Saville, Rowley, Massachusetts
Harm left behind roses that are still being introduced by Nor'East Miniature Roses (now out of California). Other's roses hybridized at Nor'East Miniature Roses are still being introduced under the code "SAV", representing the program that Harm had begun.
The Saville family grew roses at Nor'East Miniature Roses in Rowley, Massachusetts, for over thirty years. Harm Saville started the ball rolling as his hobby of growing Miniature Roses grew into a business of not only growing roses but selling them as well. His son, John, assumed the growing of a quarter million Miniature Roses each year, until he sold the business and retired in 2003. With that many roses at work, "you'd think the last thing I'd like to do is go home and take care of more roses," John says. With the children grown and out of the house, John and his wife, Holly, have moved to a very nice but smaller home on a "postage stamp' lot. John has still found space to grow all his favorite miniature roses.
