Jacob Link was proud of his home in Highland Park. He had added several rooms to the existing structure, built a smokehouse, and added a workshop to his backyard.
In the passing years, his children would play on a swing hanging from the pear tree that he had planted in the south side yard and they would tell stories in the shade of his plum trees growing there. He took special pride in the iris bed located in the north side yard.
The flowers were started with bulbs brought from his childhood home located farther out Crittenden Drive.
In time the children grew to adulthood and brought their own families to the Highland Park home for Sunday dinners and holiday celebrations.
Paul was the first to learn the secret of the Iris flowers and then tell his younger sisters and all the cousins who gathered there for an Easter Holiday hunt. “You can always find the eggs where all the Iris grow.”
As young families grew and moved to other homes they took with them the tradition of planting Iris. Beds were grown in Florida and Indiana, North Carolina, and Texas. They were found on McKay Street, Clarks Lane, Sharron Drive, Orchard Lane, Blue Lick Road, Preston Street, Illinois Avenue, and Newburg Road.
So now when the Kernen Sisters finish arranging flowers on the Calvary Hill, they slowly drive down around the bend and looking up, take much pleasure in recalling the many warm memories of “where all the Iris grow.”