TB, HYB, HIST mystery of my grandfather

There is a story that has been passed down in the family regarding my
grandfather. I am hoping to somehow verify whether or not any of this story
is or could be true. Unfortunately both grandparents are now deceased
leaving just my father to tell the story. My fathers version of the story is
in question for reasons of the passing of time (he would have been very
young) and the fact that he has no interest now, nor never had had any
interest in anything green. I was too young when he died to have understood
the significance of his explanations of how he made the crosses in his
garden, though I do have memories of him telling me their names and which
plants parented which offspring.

The story goes that my grandfather was a hybridizer of TB, gladiolas, and a
few other flowers. He never officially named or introduced any TB to my
knowledge, just did it for himself and the local flower shows where he
regularly won recognition and top honors. The part in question is that he
developed a dark orange before others. News of this particular iris made it
to Burpee who offered him a nice sum of money for for the plant. He refused.
A few years later Burpee offered a similar plant from another source. He
never let this particular iris go except to the family. When my grandparents
died we removed all the "family orange" iris before selling the house.

This would have been back in the 1950's. The part I am looking to verify is
the existence of or how common or rare orange tb were back then. I would not
know where to start. I am wondering if there are any experts out there on
the history of TB hybrids who could offer any information about the
plausibility of this story. There is no doubt that Grandpa's orange iris is
very beautiful, my question is just how unique was it, or is my Dad full of
100% organic bovine produced compost. It is a standard TB self about the
color of canned peaches with a beard of the same color.

If orange was a common color back then it won't change how I feel about this
iris. I will just have to adjust the story when I pass the flower on to my
son to be that Burpee wanted it just because they thought it was uniquely
beautiful not uniquely colored.

Word to the wise to all this hobby hybridizers Keep a garden journal and
give it to your grandchildren. From what I dad tells me, the green thumb
skips a generation. 

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