"In 1935 Mr. Hans Sass divided a new seedling with us which we used more than any other single iris to the extent that it became the backbone of our breeding efforts. This iris was later named Matula. Crossed with Happy Days it gave us our first named iris, Golden Spike, which was introduced in 1940." “Agnes Whiting Awarded AIS Medal for Hybridizing” The Bulletin of the American Iris Society, No. 109, (April 1948): 24.]

In her 1940 Maple Valley Gardens catalog, Agnes Whiting explained how the Sasses helped her decide to introduce it:

A very deep yellow seedling seemed to impress Henry most as he piloted his father, Mr. Jacob over to see the ‘break’ as he called it, which has since been named Golden Spike. Jacob said it ‘wasn’t bad’ and later asked if he might take a bud home to compare with one of his next day, adding slyly that he 'might use the pollen’. It made us very happy to see how interested and pleased they were with our seedlings - it was as if they had been their own. And in a way they are for we have been gratefully learning all we could from them for years and we have used their originations very freely in our breeding because they have the qualities we want - hardiness, beauty and pure lineage. And so before they left we checked and numbered a few over a hundred to watch another year. But Mr. Jacob said. “You won’t need to watch that deep yellow another year. it's ready to go now." A few days later Dr. and Mrs. Everett were here and he said. “I‘ll go further than Jake – I’ll say it must be introduced." And so, with the suggestion of many Omaha friends and our own memory of Golden Spike Days there, Golden Spike it is and we are proud of it.