Hartford Courant , June 20, 2002
SOUTHINGTON -- The UNICO Club will be dedicating a rose garden today at the Barnes Museum, honoring rose breeder and former Southington resident Nicholas Grillo, as part of the library's 100th anniversary this year.

The event is open to the public and will begin at 11:30 a.m. at the museum, 85 N. Main St. Refreshments will be served.

The UNICO Club has donated 12 pink American Pride thornless rose bushes, planted around the museum's gazebo, as well as a brass plaque in honor of Grillo.

Combining science and art, Grillo set up his greenhouse in the Milldale section of town in 1915, first developing the light pink Grillodale rose and gaining international attention in 1938 when he cultivated the first thornless rose, said Robert Cusano, member of the UNICO Club and the town's library board.

Grillo, who immigrated to the United States from Sicily at age 17, in 1932 donated a float made of more than 50,000 American Pride roses to the Washington, D.C., bicentennial parade to show appreciation for the success he achieved in his adopted land, Cusano said.

Grillo, who died in the mid-1970s at age 85, also sent many bouquets to the White House and first ladies. ``Mrs. [Eleanor] Roosevelt would call him all the time, asking about caring for the roses,'' Cusano said. "He left a real legacy.''

Images of America: Southington, p. 76 (2007)
Liz Campbell Kopec
N. Grillo Florist, Milldale. Nicholas Grillo (1888-1875) was born in Tusa, Italy, and immigrated to the United States in 1906. After apprenticing with the noted florist A. N. Pierson in Cromwell, Grillo opened his own greenhouses in 1915. His specialty was roses. In 1930, he developed the thornless rose, and over the years, he gained a national reputation with many gold and silver medals at the New York and Philadelphia flower shows. Eleanor Roosevelt ordered roses from Grillo.