James "Ivan" McCulloch owned an appliance store in Point Pleasant for years. He never married and lived on the family homestead just down the road from the Brown House. It was a delight to see the summer blooms when we drove past his home.

Ivan's passion was his daylilies. He told us that he got interested in hybridizing daylilies after reading a magazine article. His back yard was filled with rows of daylily beds containing over 500 varieties. His home never had running water, but he had a tap installed in his yard so he could water his flowers. Ivan died on July 11, 2002 in his back yard, tending his lilies.

Ivan willed his daylilies to a fellow daylily breeder in Ohio. The gardener moved some of the daylilies to his beds across the river. The Ohio gardener donated a dozen varieties of daylilies to the WV State Farm Museum where we were active volunteers at the time. In the above photo Jim can be seen installing the plants on museum grounds in a memorial bed for Ivan.

Sadly, today not a trace of either Ivan's backyard daylily patch nor the one we planted at the museum remains.