Kees Putman painted some key figures in the history of tulip cultivation:

• Carolus Clusius (1526-1609); one of the most important botanists of his time. He travelled his whole life through Europe and comes to Leiden in 1593. There he becomes the first director of the Hortus Botanicus. He plants the tulip bulbs he brings from his travels and so the first tulip grows in the Netherlands.
• Hans Gillisz. Bollongier (1600-1645); was a dutch painter, belonging to the ‘Hollandse School’. He was specialized in flower still lifes. He lived and worked in Haarlem.
• Judith Leyster (1609-1660); a painter, who painted the Brabantsson tulip in detail. Meanwhile it is one of the best known of the 40 pictures in the famous Tulip book from the 2nd half of the 17th century. Collectors, cultivators and merchants ordered this, to see what kind of tulip would grow out of the bulb.
• Prof. Dr. E. van Slogteren (1888-1968); found the solution to a parasite, which seriously affect the leaves of a daffodil; named the stem eel. He dipped the daffodil bulb in water with a temperature of 43ºC. The eel died, while the bulb stayed intact. He was appointed as an extraordinary professor at the school of agriculture in Wageningen.
• Dirk Lefeber (1894-1979); a tulip breeder, born in Lisse, who developed well-known varieties, among which the famous ‘Red Apeldoorn’, promoted export and co-founded the Keukenhof.

This Giant bulb is donated to museum De Zwarte Tulp by Stichting Gildemeesters Bollenstreek