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As his wife tells the story, when Mike Huss was a young boy growing up in Little Chute, he begged for a job at the local flower shop so he could "mix dirt."
Seems a prophetic beginning for Huss. He and his wife, Shirley, have owned Riverside Florist and Greenhouses in Appleton for almost 40 years. They assumed the business, the oldest florist in the city, in 1968, after it had fallen into bankruptcy under previous owners. Shirley, who previously owned a hair salon, says, "I went from my hands being chapped with water to dirt under my fingernails."
Located near Peabody Park, Riverside Florist and Greenhouses has been in the same location since the late 1800s. And while it now seems somewhat hidden - on a side street off the far north end of Wisconsin Avenue - the venue was once amid a bustling part of the city.
"Now we're off the beaten path, (but) this used to be the last trolley stop before Green Bay," says manager/floral designer Lisa Brennan, the Husses' daughter.
While more than three decades in business is enough cause for celebration, by all accounts, Riverside...