Tulip festival

Tulip Festivals are held in several cities around the world, mostly in North America — usually in cities with a Dutch heritage — such as Albany, New York; Ottawa, Ontario; Gatineau, Quebec; Montreal, Quebec; Holland, Michigan; Lehi, Utah; Orange City, Iowa; Pella, Iowa; Mount Vernon, Washington; and Woodburn, Oregon, and in other countries such as AustraliaIndia and England. The tulips are considered a welcome harbinger of spring, and a tulip festival permits residents to see them at their best advantage. The festivals are also popular tourist attractions. The tulips are displayed throughout the cities. In certain years the peak of tulips does not coincide with the actual festival due to climatic conditions.

Asia

Europe

Tulip Festival (Albany, New York)

The Tulip Festival is held in Albany, New York every spring at Washington Park. It stems from when Mayor Erastus Corning 2nd got a city ordinance passed declaring the tulip as Albany's official flower on July 1, 1948. In addition, he sent a request to Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands to name a variety as Albany's tulip. On July 11, 1948 her reply was "Her Majesty gladly accepts the invitation to designate a tulip as the official flower of Albany." She picked the variety "Orange Wonder", an 18-inch tall tulip that is orange-shaded with a scarlet toward the center, it is a slow-grower and relatively rare. The first Tulip Fest was celebrated the next year on May 14, 1949 with opening ceremonies still carried on today as tradition, such as the sweeping of State Street and the crowning of a Tulip Queen. In 1997 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the festival the state of New York designated Albany as the "I Love New York Spring Destination". Also for the 50th anniversary a descendant variety of the "Wonder Orange" tulip was found in the Netherlands, and the new variety was named "City of Albany". The African-American tradition of Pinksterfest, whose origins are traced back even further to Dutch festivities, was later incorporated into the Tulip Fest. Since 1998 the Tulip Fest has included the Mother of the Year award.

Canadian Tulip Festival

The Canadian Tulip Festival (French: Festival Canadien des Tulipes; Dutch: Canadese Festival van de Tulp) is a tulip festival, held annually in May in Ottawa, Canada. The festival claims to be the world's largest tulip festival, displaying over one million tulips, with attendance of over 500,000 visitors annually. Large displays of tulips are planted throughout the city, and the largest display of tulips is found in Commissioners Park on the shores of Dow's Lake, and along the Rideau Canal with 300,000 tulips planted there alone. As well as tulip displays, the festival also includes music performances, speakers and exhibits of international cuisine.

History

In 1945, the Dutch royal family sent 100,000 tulip bulbs to Ottawa in gratitude for Canadians having sheltered Princess Juliana and her daughters for the preceding three years during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, in the Second World War.

The most noteworthy event during their time in Canada was the birth in 1943 of Princess Margriet to Princess Juliana at the Ottawa Civic Hospital. The maternity ward was declared to be officially a temporary part of international territory, so that she would be born in no country and would inherit only her Dutch citizenship from her mother. In 1946, Juliana sent another 20,500 bulbs requesting that a display be created for the hospital, and promised to send 10,000 more bulbs each year.