things puck was in favor of. sound money, being against silver and in favor of the gold and expansion, this was the time of the spanish-american war and other conquests, and the idea here being that mckinley was in favor of america keeping their conquests, and that's what we should be doing. >> watch this and other american history programs on our website, where all are video is archived. that is c-span.org/history. the tyler rose garden is one of the city's major attractions. from now we will se here one of the city's major growers about the industry and how it fares today. host: the rose industry and tyler began around at the turn-of-the-century in the 1900s.

and it came after there was a devastation of peaches that were raised in the area. farmers were looking for an alternative crop, and some of the beginnings began with people that had european roots, that knew about roses and had interest in roses. and they started bringing that industry into the tyler area. it caught on and grew into a multimillion dollar industry and encompasses a whole lot of growers in the region. our weather and soil are very conducive to growing roses. we have a sandy loam soil, slightly acidic, our normal winters have good cooling and chilling times which send the roses into dormancy which is good for them and we also have abundant rainfall which is good for growing not only roses, but other agricultural crops as well. so it was a perfect climate and perfect situation.

roses were grown in the field. abouterage field was 20,000 plants per acre. crops growing in the field were a two-your crop. to growe different ways roses, one is grafted and when is the on-root method. on-root is when you take a cutting from the plant. that is really popular today. it is more economical and the plant seems to do better on its own root system, but not all roses can be grown that way. but back in the beginning most everything was grown from the grafted method here in the tyler area. today the industry has changed. the processing plants are still here but there has been a lot of investment from local processors and growers in california and arizona. one of the reasons for that was the devastating freeze here in

the 80's. with roses being a two-your crop, we had a severe freeze in in the 1980's and it took out a lot of the growers and a lot of the crop reduction. it devastated it. it was hard for the growers to get back into production because interest rates at that time were about 18%, back in the 80's interest rates were not as low with current markets we have now. so some growers left. we started looking than at fields in bakersfield, --ifornia, phoenix arizona phoenix, arizona, and motor production is in those areas. those plants are shipped in this area i refrigerated truck and still go through our processing are shipped back out for retail sales in the u.s. and other countries. areaose festival in this

began with people interested in the industry and it kind of evolved. gardenn as small meetings and turned into a festival, and then the festival turned into a parade. eventbecame a really big in october, and it would bring people from all over the world to tyler for the rose festival. the rose festival still goes on we still celebrate the industry in the history of the roses in tyler, and we have our beautiful garden for display of the roses. it has went through evolution and changes over the years as well. at thea wpa project beginning when the garden was built, and today there are different varieties of roses on display for people to walk through and see, and see what varieties they may like to see in their yard or available from the different processors and retailers reside around.

garden not only has the garden, but we have a municipal building that has been refurbished over the years from its original construction. and there is a wonderful museum that people can learn the history of the heritage of the rose industry, not only from tyler but how it evolved and got here from its roots in europe and other parts of the world, how the rose industry evolved and came here to tyler, texas. >> our cities to her staff recently traveled to tyler, texas, to learn about its rich history. learn about tyler and other stops on our tour at c-span.org/citiestour. all weekend every weekend, on c-span3. >> on american history tv, thecation ceremony for the

and him helicopter pilot monument at arlington national cemetery. speakers include several former vietnam helicopter pilots. almost 5000 helicopter pilots and crew members were killed during the war. >> good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. nce again my name is bob please rise for the posting of the colors and the playing of the national anthem.