TAKEN AS A LOT, the strawberry breeders of today display as varied a background as did the breeders of the past. Although methods of breeding and testing advance, and the body of knowledge concerning the strawberry expands, the earliest causes of interest in strawberries and the background of these causes remain much the same from generation to generation. Many of today's breeders came from the farm; most of them have college training; many are from agricultural colleges, and most have trained beyond four years of college. The training itself is highly varied, ranging from straight agriculture to plant pathology, genetics to botany. Some breeders owe their special interest in strawberry breeding to work with strawberries at college, as a way to help meet expenses, or as a research project accompanying college courses. All in some way acquired the vision of production of better strawberries.
While breeders work with a highly heterozygous fruit and generally, know in what species or varieties desirable germ plasm can be found, the breeders themselves, considered as an ideal type still in development, have a still more heterozygous makeup. Imbued with the vision of better berries, many a student has the germ plasm that could produce the excellent breeder of tomorrow. As the bulk of data grows from the increasingly sophisticated experiments, studies, and breeding programs, and as the difficulty of improving upon an already highly developed fruit increases, the breeder will have to advance by developing new techniques on the basis of wider training; this probably will have to include computer technology, biochemistry, and biophysics, as well as an intensive study in systematic botany, genetics, and strawberry varieties. Such demands will require a highly heterozygous quality of breeders, for in this quality lies the possibility for adaptation to particular needs.
The following biographic sketches, most of them accompanied by photographs, give a fair listing of today's breeders. Two of recent breeders whose photographs are shown, Morrow and Goldsmith, have passed on, but we are richer because of them.
Lewis E. Aalders(Fig. 13-1), cytogeneticist, Small Fruit Section, Canada Department of Agriculture Research Station, Kentville, Nova Scotia, was born at Kentville on July 19, 1933. He obtained his B.Sc. and M.Sc. at Acadia University in 1952 and 1953, respectively, and his Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1957. He has been with the Kentville Research Station since 1953, conducting research related to the breeding of small fruit crops, including the strawberry. With the strawberry, the work has been focused on an inbreeding program and on a program of recurrent reciprocal selection jointly with Dr. Craig. The production of an F1 hybrid variety that can be improved in a step-wise fashion by backcrossing has been the aim of this work. He and Dr. Craig introduced the variety "Acadia" in 1965.
Dr. Sadao Abe(Fig. 13-2), originator of the Chiyoda and Yachido strawberries at the Horticultural Research Station, Kurume, Japan, is now chief in Floriculture at that station.
Prof. Enrico Baldini (Fig. 13-3), director of the Department of Horticulture at the Agricultural University of Bologna and professor of Horticulture at the same university, was born in Florence, Italy, in 1925. He is a member of the Italian "National Agricultural Academy," of the "Georgofili's Academy" and of the "Italian Horticultural Society." His main publication on strawberries is Baldini, B. and Branzanti, C.: A monograph on the principal non-everbearing strawberry varieties.
Roland C. Blake (Fig. 13-4)was born March 8, 1920, at Rowland, Maine; graduated in 1949, University of Maine; obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota, 1954. From November 1938 to October 1941, when Dr. LeRoy Powers was making his studies of strawberry genetics, he helped in berry research at the Cheyenne, Wyoming, Horticultural Field Station and became interested in berry breeding. His thesis at Minnesota was on the evaluation of strawberry varieties as parents. From 1954 to 1957 he was in charge of the berry research at the Northwestern Station at Mount Vernon, Washington; from 1952-1959 he was in charge of the federal pear breeding and research at the Southern Oregon Station at Medford, Oregon; and since 1959 has directed the federal berry and grape research at Carbondale, Illinois. In the spring of 1964, at Carbondale there were about 173 strawberry selections from 22,000 seedlings, with 8 of the selections to go into advanced tests. About 6,000 seedlings are fruited each year.
Royce S. Bringhurst (Fig. 13-5), professor of pomology in charge of the strawberry research of the University of California, was born in Murray, Utah, December 27, 1918; he received his B.S. at Utah State University in 1947; his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin in 1950. Since 1953 he has been with the University of California in charge of small fruit research, most of which is concerned with the strawberry. Besides the introduction of the Solana (1958), Fresno (1960), Torrey (1960), Wiltguard (1960), and Tioga (1964), and breeding larger berries for California conditions, he has been interested in the native species, especially chiloensis and ovalis, and has found natural pentaploid chiloensis x vesca hybrids along the coast of California. He and his associate, Victor Voth, have been especially interested in the response of varieties to planting dates and temperature.
Albert N. Brooks (Fig. 13-6), originator of the Florida Ninety strawberry, was born October 16, 1897, College Hill, Ohio. He received his A.B. at University of Cincinnati, 1921, and was instructor in botany, plant pathology, and bacteriology there for two years. Then he went to the University of Wisconsin, obtaining his Ph.D. in 1926, majoring in plant pathology. For two years (1925-1927) he was with the Florida State Plant Board. In 1927 he went with the Florida Experiment Station where he has worked on all phases of strawberry research -- diseases, insects, culture, varieties, and breeding -- at a field laboratory at Plant City, the older strawberry growing section of Florida.
Though Dr. Brooks had done breeding work with strawberries in earlier years in Florida, his one great variety -- the Florida Ninety -- came in 1948 from seed of open-pollinated Missionary growing near Klonmore but in a field containing over 60 other varieties. ln the winter of 1948-1949, 1,075 seedlings from this seed were tested and of these 120 were retested. No. 90 was finally selected for introduction in 1952.
J.H. Clarke (Fig. 13-7) was born June 12, 1899, at Lafayette, Indiana, and grew up on a general farm. Severe asthma brought on by contact with both cows and sheep caused him to choose horticulture as a major in college. After graduation in 1921, he was for two years assistant horticulturist at the University of Delaware and received an M.S. there in 1923. From 1923 to 1946 he was small fruit specialist at Rutgers University, becoming full time specialist in small fruits in 1928. He obtained his doctor's degree in 1942 at Columbia University. In 1946 he became general manager of the Cranguyma Farms, with about 100 acres of cranberries at Long Beach, Washington. In 1954 he started a rhododendron and azalea nursery which he still operates with his son, and they also have some twenty acres of cranberries. Dr. Clarke has written two books -- Small Fruits in the Home Garden and Getting Started with Rhododendrons and Azaleas. While at Rutgers, he originated the Pathfinder in 1928, introduced in 1938; Sparkle, 1931, introduced 1942; and other varieties (July-morn, Crimson Glow, Redwing, and Redcrop). Sparkle is still one of the important varieties of the United States.
Donald L. Craig (Fig. 13-8), head of the small fruit section of the Canada Department of Agriculture Research Station, Kentville, Nova Scotia, was born in Kentville on December 18, 1923. Formal schooling included a B.Sc. (Agriculture) from McGill University and a M.Sc. and Ph.D. from the University of New Hampshire in 1955 and 1959. He has been at the Kentville Research Station since 1947 where his chief interest is in strawberry and raspberry breeding. Dr. Craig and Dr. Aalders introduced their first strawberry variety (Acadia) in 1965. Dr. Craig is interested in all aspects of horticultural research. He pioneered the first strawberry certification program in Canada.
George M. Darrow (Fig. 13-9)was born February 2, 1889, Springfield, Vermont; graduated in 1910, Middlebury College; obtained a Master's Degree at Cornell University in 1911 and his Ph.D. in plant physiology at Johns Hopkins in 1927. He started with fruit research of the U.S. Department of Agriculture July 1, 1911, and continued with this until retirement. For the summer of 1911 he assisted in sweet cherry, loganberry, and prune careful handling and storage investigations and later in storage and handling investigations with apples in Oregon. In the winter of 1911 he was assigned to careful handling with citrus in Florida and in 1912 began a four-year study of the physiographic regions of Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, mapping the fruit regions and describing the varieties in each state. Beginning in 1916 a study was begun of the cultural practices and varieties of berries in each producing region of the United States. After military service (1918-1919) these studies were resumed and the first strawberry breeding begun in the winter of 1919-1920. Strawberry and blueberry breeding and physiology were his chief interests. For the period 1946 to 1955 he was in charge of the research of all deciduous fruit production in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. ln 1956-1957 he surveyed the native strawberries of Chile and retired March 31, 1957. Since that time he has been breeding hemerocallis and azaleas at his home in Glenn Dale, Md., and assisting his sons with a twenty-acre "pick-your-own" strawberry project.
Hugh A. Daubney (Fig. 13-10)was born on December 6, 1931, Nanaimo, British Columbia. He received his B.S.A. in 1953 from the University of British Columbia, his Ph.D. at Cornell in 1958. Since then he has been with the farm of the Canadian Department of Agriculture, Agassiz, breeding strawberries and raspberries. He has been especially interested in sources of resistance to mildew and red stele and in selecting superior clones of the native chiloensis along the beaches of the Pacific.
Gene J. Galletta (Fig. 13-11) was born on July 3, 1929, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He received his B.S. at the University of Maryland, 1951; his M.S. at Rutgers University, 1953. After service in the Army (1954-1956), he obtained his Ph.D. at the University of California, 1959. He worked in the Galletta Bros. Blueberry Farms 1942-1951; he was research assistant in pomology at Rutgers University, 1951-1953; and at the University of California, 1953-1954 and 1956-1959. Since 1959 he has been professor at North Carolina State College and in charge of the blueberry and strawberry breeding cooperating with D.H. Scott of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Frankin A. Gilbert(Fig. 13-12) was born in Burlington, New Jersey, June 8, 1919; he received his B.S. at Rutgers University in 1942, and his Ph.D. in 1952. He was a field agent in horticulture for the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 1942, in the U.S. Army Air Force from 1942 to 1944, extension specialist 1944 to 1946, instructor and research assistant 1946 to 1950 at Rutgers University, and since 1950 professor of horticulture at the University of Wisconsin in charge of the Branch Experiment Station at Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin. In New Jersey Dr. Gilbert made the cross and selected the seedling later named and introduced as Jerseybelle.
P.L. Hawthorne(Fig. 13-15) was born September 15, 1912, Provencal, Louisiana. He obtained his B.S. in 1938 and his M.S. in 1949 at Louisiana State University. From 1938-1940 he taught in Amite High School; from 1940-1946 he was assistant horticulturist at North Louisiana Experiment Station at Calhoun, Louisiana. From 1947-1948 he was assistant horticulturist, Western Tennessee Experiment Station, and from 1948 to present, professor of horticulture, Louisiana State University. In 1935, as a student, he was associated with the strawberry breeding work and has been working with strawberries ever since. He became project leader for strawberry breeding at Louisiana State University in 1948. Subsequently the Headliner and Dabreak were originated, each of which in 1965 constituted about half the acreage in Louisiana. Three new selections are being tested by growers at the present time.
Earl B. Goldsmith(Fig. 13-13)was born December 9, 1892, in Santa Cruz, California, and died on March 25, 1954. He went to grammar school but not to high school. When the experiment station at Santa Clara (a suburb of San Jose) was established about 1928, he was a ranch foreman for a prune grower at San Jose, and was hired by Dr. Thomas as foreman of the station for field trials. Darrow had sent many selections to Thomas for trial and on his own initiative Goldsmith began crossing and raising seedling strawberries. He made his first crosses in 1929 and the work was made official as part of the research program in 1930. He continued to look after the breeding of strawberries under Dr. Thomas as research assistant at Santa Clara and later at Davis and Wheatland. In January 1944 he became an employee of E.F. Driscoll, a strawberry grower, and when Dr. Thomas became Director of the Strawberry Institute, Goldsmith became the strawberry breeder of the Institute under Dr. Thomas' direction. He was a rather small man, full of energy, a keen observer and an individualist . He was an idealist and devoted his entire energy to his strawberry work -- to breeding ideal varieties. As each year's seedlings seemed better than those of the year before, he kept on the level of accomplishment never quite reaching his ideal.
Marion Hagerstrom(Fig. 13-14), Monticello, Minn., was born October 7, 1910, in Wisconsin. He is one of the few private strawberry hybridizers who still competes with some success with the state and federal breeders. While his Red Rich everbearer has not gained wide acceptance south of Minnesota, it has been used as a parent of the successful everbearers Ozark Beauty and Geneva. His crosses of Red Rich with Midland, while not yet named, have done better for H.A. Wallace in northern Westchester, N.Y., than most of the Geneva and New Jersey varieties. Hagerstrom has spent nearly all his life on the farm near Monticello, where his great interest is fruit breeding. His varieties have great hardiness.
D.D. Hemphill(Fig. 13-16) was born at Crane, Missouri, November 8, 1918. He received his B.S. from the University of Missouri in 1940 and his Ph.D. in 1948. He was assistant horticulturist at the University from 1940 to 1942, was in the army 1942 to 1946, and has been professor of horticulture since 1946 at the University of Missouri. He has been especially interested in plant hormones, growth regulators, herbicides, and small fruit research. Since 1953 he has been in charge of strawberry breeding.
S.C. Harland was born in Snainton, England, June 19, 1891. He received his B.S.C. in Geology in 1912 and his D.S.C. in applied botany in 1920 at the University of London. In 1913 he became Pomological Assistant in the St. Croix Experiment Station, Virgin Islands; in 1914 Assistant Soil Chemist, Department of Agriculture, Nova Scotia; in 1915 Assistant Superintendent of Agriculture, St. Vincent, West Indies; 1920 to 1923 Head of Department of Botany of the British Cotton Industry Research Association, Shirley Institute, Manchester, England; 1923 Professor of Botany and Genetics, Imperial Col lege of Tropical Agriculture, Trinidad; 1926-1935 Head of Genetics, Empire Cotton Research Station, Trinidad; 1935-1939 Adviser on cotton to State of Sao Paulo, Brazil; 1939-1949 Director, Institute of Genetics of National Agricultural Society of Peru; 1950 to 1958 Professor of Botany, University of Manchester; retired 1958 as Emeritus Professor. His most important work was on cotton genetics and he published a book on Genetics of Cotton (1939), but also developed a school of research on the strawberry at the University of Manchester. His present address is Plant Breeding Station, Correo Nana, Kilometer 22, Carretera Central, Peru.
Edward M. Henry(Fig. 13-17), was born October- 7, 1906, on a farm at New Market, Tenn. He obtained a B.S. degree from the University of Tennessee in Agriculture. He was with the Experiment Station at Knoxville from 1931 to 1934 as assistant horticulturist under Dr. Brooks Drain, with his chief responsibility the project in strawberry breeding. The Blakemore was already the most popular variety in Tennessee and it was decided to try the same cross and to backcross Blakemore to each of its parents. He stayed with the breeding project long enough to make the selections later retested at Jackson and named the Tennessee Shipper and the Tennessee Beauty. Mr. Henry then worked for the Farm Security Administration for ten years and with the Agricultural Extension Service fourteen years. He is now agricultural county agent, living at Jonesboro in east Tennessee.
Walter H.J. Hondelmann(Fig. 13-18) was born in Hamburg, Germany, April 17, 1928. He studied horticulture and botany (1952-1956) in Cologne and Berlin, and received his doctoral degree (1958) at the Institut fur Vererbungs- und Zuchtungsforschung at Berlin-Dahlem. In 1959 he joined the Sengana GmbH. in Hamburg-Volksdorf, where he was junior breeder of strawberries and now is head of the breeding and research unit.
Harold A. Johnson, Jr.(Fig. 13-19), was born January, 30, 1923, Riverside, California. He attended Santa Barbara State College and University of California and received his B.S. at Davis; he did graduate work at the University of California, and has worked in plant pathology to the present. He became interested in strawberries while manager of the McCrea Seed and Chemical Company at Santa Maria an helped the Sheehy Berry Farm, the largest berry farm at that time, with their insect and fertilizer problems. In June, 1955, he became strawberry breeder for the California Strawberry Institute.
Miss Hester G. Kronenberg(Fig. 13-20) was born in 1912 at Rotterdam, Netherlands, and studied horticulture at the Agricultural University in Wageningen, taking her degree in 1936. In 1938 she began a study of strawberry disease problems at Beverwijk in the old strawberry area of Kennemerland. Since 1943 she has been at the Institute of Horticultural Plant Breeding in charge of breeding and variety research in small fruits.
Prof. F. Lalatta(Fig. 13-21), Director of the Institute for Fruit Culture at Rome, where strawberry breeding is carried on at Ciampino, about twenty kilometers from Rome.
Elwyn M. Meader(Fig. 13-22) was born March 31, 1910, Rochester, New Hampshire, adjoining the farm where he now lives. He received his B.S. in 1937 from the University of New Hampshire; his M.S. in 1941 from Rutgers University, where his thesis was "A Method for Determining the Relative Cold Hardiness of Dormant Peach Fruit Buds"; from 1938 to 1941 he did research on peaches for the U.S. Department of Agriculture at Rutgers, from 1941 to 1945 on berries at Beltsville, from 1945 to 1946 he was associate professor at the University of Vermont, from 1946 to 1948 he was horticulturist, U.S. Army in Seoul, Korea, from 1948 to the present he has been professor of horticulture at the University of New Hampshire. A native love of plants, a Yankee view of their good and bad points, and the desire to improve them, plus contact with A.F. Yeager, made him a plant breeder. He was associated in the work of the U.S. Department of Agriculture when the Midland and Temple varieties were introduced and when the major emphasis was put on breeding for red stele resistance and Fairland was selected. He has specialized in breeding everbearing strawberries without runners.
Julian C. Miller(Fig. 13-23) was born November 29, 1895, Lexington, South Carolina. He was in the Navy 1917-1919; at Clemson College he received his B.S. in 1921 and his Ph.D. at Cornell University in 1928. He was an instructor in horticulture, North Carolina State College 1921-1923; county agricultural agent, South Carolina 1923-1925; graduate assistant, Cornell University 1925-1928; professor of horticulture, University of Oklahoma, 1928-1929; professor of horticulture, Louisiana State University, 1929 to present. He was born on a farm six miles outside of Columbia, South Carolina, where strawberries were grown in the garden and in 1935 he initiated the strawberry breeding program that has resulted in the introduction of Klonmore, Konvoy, Marion Bell, Headliner, and Dabreak.
James N. Moore(Fig. 13-24) was born June 10, 1931, Vilonia, Arkansas. He received his B.S.A. in 1956, M.S. in 1957 at the University of Arkansas, and his Ph.D. from Rutgers University in 1961. Growing up on a farm, he became interested in strawberries when he was put in charge of the strawberry breeding project at Rutgers University and had as his research project the effect of gamma irradiation and photoinduction on auxin levels during the vegetative and reproductive growth of the strawberry. From September 1961 to January 1964 he was with the U.S. Small Fruits Research Unit at Beltsville and helped in the strawberry breeding. In January, 1964, he became associate professor of horticulture at the University of Arkansas in charge of small-fruit production work, including breeding.
Prof. Emmett B. Morrow(Fig. 13-25), born in Rowan County, North Carolina, in 1898, passed away July 1956. He grew up on a cotton, grain, and dairy farm with four brothers and four sisters. Even as a boy he was interested in horticulture, helping in the garden, planting shrubs and fruit. He graduated from North Carolina State College in 1921 and obtained his M.S. at the University of California in 1924. He was for one and one-half years assistant in statistics in the Market Division of the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and then, until 1936, horticulturist in the Extension Service. In 1936, with the North Carolina Experiment Station, he began his research work on blueberries and strawberries, in full cooperation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture. New varieties resulting from this cooperative work were: Ivanhoe, Walcott, Murphy, Angola, and Croatan blueberries, now the chief varieties in the State; and the Fairmore, Daybreak, Eleanor Roosevelt, and the Massey and Albritton strawberries, of which the last two have been almost exclusively grown in eastern North Carolina since their introduction. His work on strawberries, beside the varieties introduced, has resulted in notable publications, including: (1) "Fruit-bud differentiation in deciduous fruits" (Hilgardia, 1925), (2) "Effect of age of plant on flower production and yield of strawberries in North Carolina" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1931), (3) "Relation of number of leaves in November to number of flowers the following spring in the Blakemore strawberry (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1939), (4) "Inheritance of some characteristics in strawberry varieties" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1941), (5) "Effect of renovation of beds after harvest on yield and grade of strawberries" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1942), (6) "Rating system for the evaluation of horticultural material" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1949), (7) "Effect of limited inbreeding in strawberries" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1952), (8) "Genetic variances in strawberries" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1958), (9) "Genetic variation in an asexual species, the garden strawberry" (Genetics, 1958), and (10) "A quick method of cleaning berry seed for breeders" (Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 1954).
Donald K. Ourecky(Fig. 13-26) was born in Sterling, Colorado, September 11, 1932. He grew up on a small fruit farm in Oregon and worked in the lily and iris fields of Jan De Graaff Bulb Farms. He obtained his B.Sc. from Oregon State University in 1954 and his Ph.D. from Washington State University in 1961. He was a junior horticulturist at the Coastal Experimental Station at Long Beach, Wash., 1954-1956; research assistant at Washington State University, 1956-61; and research geneticist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture at Tifton, Georgia, 1961-1962. Since then he has been at the New York Experimental Station at Geneva, working with George Slate and John Watson on berry breeding.
Robert D. Reid(Fig. 13-27)was born February 14, 1902, at Carlisle in the County of Lanark, Scotland. A berry grower who began studying diseases of strawberries at Auchincruive College in southwest Scotland in 1930, he noted the resistance of Frith to the red core (= red stele) root disease. In 1933 he began crossing and testing his seedlings for resistance. His numbered seedlings, which resulted from this work, were the basis of the Scottish Industry until after he introduced the Auchincruive Climax in 1947. His Redguantlet and Talisman now are widely grown in Scotland and elsewhere, and the Templar was just introduced in 1964.
Donald H. Scott(Fig. 13-28) was born at Buxton, North Dakota, December 3, 1911. He received his B.S. from the University of North Dakota in 1936 and his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland in 1949. He was instructor in horticulture at the University of North Dakota from 1936 to 1937, and geneticist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture in peach breeding at the New Jersey Experiment Station, New Brunswick, 1937-1939, and at Beltsville, Maryland, 1940-1942. From 1943 to 1945 he was in charge of the U.S. Dry Land Horticulture Station at Cheyenne, Wyoming, working especially with tomato and strawberry breeding and shelter belts. Since 1946 he has been associated with the small-fruit research at Beltsville and in charge since the retirement of Darrow in March 1957. Even though allergic to strawberry pollen, he still makes the crosses.
Chester Druse Schwartze(Fig. 13-29) was born March 13, 1902, in the great tree-fruit region of Yakima, Washington, and was raised in his parents' fruit orchards near Yakima, as well as in his maternal grandfather's (D.L. Druse) pioneer orchard of many varieties. He obtained his B.S. in horticulture in 1924 at Washington State University, engaged in orcharding 1924-1930, and was fruit and vegetable inspector in 1930-31. In January 1932 he enrolled for graduate work, becoming a half-time research assistant at Washington State University in charge of strawberry and raspberry breeding. He obtained his doctor's degree in pomology in 1935, his thesis being "Rest period response and cold resistance in the red raspberry in relation to breeding of hardy varieties." He was appointed horticulturist at the Western Washington Experiment Station at Puyallup in charge of strawberry and raspberry breeding in 1935. Beginning in 1940, Arthur D. Myhre, B.S. in horticulture, assisted him and they jointly made crosses, raised and judged seedlings, made selections, and introduced varieties until 1957 when Myhre became head of the ornamental plant section there. Myhre's contribution was recognized in joint credit for the Puget Beauty strawberry and several raspberries and publications.
Having been brought up in a fruit environment, Dr. Schwartze's interest in fruit was crystallized by his reading, as a boy, about Luther Burbank's work, and later by courses in plant breeding, genetics, and cytology, and by his being in charge of strawberry and raspberry breeding while a graduate student.
Approximately 150,000 strawberry seedlings have been grown since he has been in charge and four varieties of especial promise have been named and released: Northwest (1949), which beginning in 1962 has had the largest acreage of any variety in the United States and is processed in larger quantity than any other sort; Puget Beauty (1956), Cascade and Columbia (1961). He has cooperated closely with other breeders in testing their selections, and varieties and selections of other breeders have entered into the parentage of his varieties. Dr. Schwartze is also well known for the raspberry varieties he has originated and for his blueberry work, for his willingness to test raspberry selections of other breeders for resistance to aphids that spread virus, and for his interest in the beauty of flowering crabapples at his home.
Reinhold von Sengbusch(Fig. 13-30) was born at Riga, Latvia, February 16, 1898, studied agriculture at University of Halle 1918-1919, where he graduated (Dr. rer. nat.) 1924, under Prof. Roemer. He was head of the department at Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut fur Zuchtungsforschung at Muncheberg 1927-1937, where he originated the sweet lupin (alkaloid-free lupin). After that he was owner and head of a research station at Luckenwalde until 1945.
In 1942 he first started breeding work with strawberries. Other objectives of those years were polyploid rye, hemp (monoecious, fiber-rich types), spinach and asparagus. For the next three years he was head of State Experiment Station for breeding sweet lupines at Luckenwalde. He moved to Hamburg in 1948, where a research station of the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft (successor of Kaiser-Wilhelm- Gesellschaft) was founded, which was given the rank of Institute (Max-Planck-lnstitut fur Kulturpflanzenzuchtung) in 1959 under his directorship. In 1954 he also founded the private Sengana GmbH., where strawberry breeding work and propagation and distribution of new strawberry varieties are carried out. Under his auspices the strawberry work continued on a large scale. At the institute, research with cultivated mushrooms (physiology, breeding, cultivation methods) is a considerable part of his work.
George L. Slate(Fig. 13-31) was born at Barnardston, Massachusetts, June 27, 1899, grew up on a dairy farm where an assortment of fruit varieties for home use were grown. He came to Geneva, New York, from the Massachusetts Agricultural College in 1922 and assisted in the preparation of The Small Fruits of New York. This gave him a love for books on fruits, especially on the strawberry, of which he has one of the best collections. It also gave him an understanding of the evolution of the strawberry as a cultivated fruit and started him in breeding. He still continues to breed strawberries, fruiting about 1,000 seedlings and over 100 selections in 1962. Of these (many of selfed lines) over half were for better everbearing varieties. Present objectives especially emphasize firmness of berry, though high flavor and everbearing qualities were important too. In all he has introduced 16 varieties, of which his best known, Catskill, is the standard midseason variety of the eastern United States. His hobbies are gardening, breeding lilies, and writing for garden magazines. His assistants are J.P. Watson and D.K. Ourecky.
L.P.S. Spangelo(Fig. 13-32) was born at Morden, Manitoba, in 1919. His father was for a time an apple breeder at the Morden Farm. He obtained his B.S.A. and M.Sc. from the University of Manitoba and as an undergraduate worked during vacations at the Morden Farm for Mr. Kerr, the senior pomologist, in crossing fruit and taking records. He joined the federal staff at Ottawa in 1948.
H.G. Swartwout(Fig. 13-33) was born in Springdale, Arkansas, May 12, 1895. He received his B.S. and M.A. at the University of Missouri, and he has been plant pathologist at the University from 1918 to the present. He is the originator of Armore, which was introduced in 1930.
K. Tamari(Fig. 13-34), originator, about 1938, of the Kogyoku, the leading strawberry of Japan, now retired.
Harold E. Thomas(Fig. 13-35) was born at Watsonville, California, March 25, 1900. He grew up on a small farm about six miles from the city. After high school he spent one year on the ranch and went to the University of California in 1920, obtaining his M.S. in 1924 and his Ph.D. in 1928 in plant pathology. He became a member of the plant pathology staff in 1927, working on strawberry diseases and continued in the work until he resigned to become director and pathologist of the non-profit Strawberry Institute of California, at Morgan Hill. The Institute, organized by E.F. Driscoll, a far-sighted strawberry grower who cooperated with the University beginning in 1930, was designed to conduct breeding and provide scientific assistance to the growers. In 1945 the University introduced 5 varieties of strawberries resulting from Thomas' and Goldsmith's work -- the Shasta, Lassen, Tahoe, Donner, and Sierra. Of these, Shasta and Lassen became important in the United States. Some Donner and Tahoe were grown in the early 1950's and Donner has now become important in Japan. The Goldsmith (Z5A) was patented and introduced by the Strawberry Institute commercially in 1958 as Z5A and named in 1963. Solana, named in 1957 by the University of California, was selected in 1937 by Thomas and Goldsmith.
In 1934 there were between 3,000 and 4,000 acres of strawberries in California. Just before World War II the strawberry acreage in California was about 5,000, most of which was Marshall (Banner) in central California and Klondike in southern California. By the end of the war the acreage was down to 900 acres. The five new varieties, introduced in 1945 as a result of Thomas' and Goldsmith's work, were relatively virus-free and were far more vigorous and productive than Marshall. The acreage increased steadily until there were 22,500 acres in 1956, composing 55 percent of the national production, with Shasta and Lassen as the chief varieties. With the passing of years, Shasta and Lassen also became infected with virus and a virus-free nursery program was put into effect. The acreage has stabilized in recent years at about 10,000 acres.
A second organization, Strawberry Institute Nursery, has been set up in recent years for propagation of the highest grade plant stocks for growers. Dr. Thomas is director of this also. Patented varieties originated by the Institute are propagated for members of the Institute only. About twenty million plants are propagated annually.
Victor Voth(Fig. 13-36), research specialist in pomology of the University of California, in charge of the research on strawberry in southern California, under Dr. Bringhurst, was born at Shafter, California, September 7, 1920. He obtained his B.S. from the University of California at Davis in 1942, and has been in strawberry work since 1946, first at Davis with Baker, next at Torrey Pines in 1952, and later, in 1956, with headquarters at the South Coast Field Station, Santa Ana, south of Los Angeles. Since January 1952 he has been in charge of the strawberry work in southern California, including Santa Barbara County. About half the seedlings raised each year are grown at either Torrey Pines or at the South Coast Field Station and the other half at Winters, near Davis. More than 10,000 seedlings are evaluated annually. His studies have shown Lassen to be the most salt-tolerant and have demonstrated this trait to be heritable. They have proved that the sprinkler system now used by 75 percent of the growers lessens the alkali problem.
George F. Waldo(Fig. 13-37) was born December 2, 1898, at Drayton, in the northeast corner of North Dakota. When he was fourteen, the family moved to a small fruit farm at Dayton, in western Oregon; and a year later he planted the first strawberries, growing up to two and three acres at times. He graduated with the B.S. degree at Oregon State College in 1922, was assistant to the horticulturist at the Oregon State Hospital, Salem, Oregon, for one year, then began graduate work at Michigan State College in March 1924, obtaining his M.S. in 1926, at which time he entered the U.S. Department of Agriculture, working at the Glenn Dale, Maryland, Station, 1926-1932. He was in charge of the work there from 1930 to 1932, while George M. Darrow was in charge in Oregon. Since September 1932 he has been in charge of the cooperative breeding work of the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Oregon Station for the Northwest at Corvallis, Oregon. His work on flower-bud formation in berries has been especially notable, as has been his breeding for better varieties for the Northwest. Although his raspberry and blackberry breeding has been his most successful work, his breeding with strawberries has been important in building up the desirable qualities of strawberries in selections used by himself and others. He has utilized selections of the native beach (F. chiloensis) and western field (F. ovalis) strawberries more than most breeders and has found selections of F. chiloensis that are more resistant to the red stele root disease than any others known for use in breeding.
George Waldo's graduate work at Michigan State College on flower bud formation in everbearing strawberries was what was needed in the federal work at Glenn Dale, and after he became a member of the staff in 1926 he surveyed the initiation and development of flower buds in varieties and species. This made breeding more intelligible and led later to a better understanding of the effects of photoperiodism on the growth cycle and adaption of strawberry varieties. ln this research he had a large part. He originated the idea of testing seedlings in greenhouse benches, to see whether they possessed resistance to the red stele root disease, a method that has greatly advanced the breeding for resistance to this trouble. Over the last twenty years, probably ten times more seedlings have been tested this way than could have been without this technique. Only the resistant seedlings are saved for field testing other plant and fruit qualities.
Henry A. Wallace(Fig. 13-39) has been interested in growing strawberries since 1902 but began producing them from seed in 1935 when he went with Dr. Darrow to the U.S.D.A. experimental plots and was greatly impressed by a row of plants which was inbred out of Howard 17. He expanded his strawberry breeding when he moved to South Salem, New York, in 1946 using cross pollination in an attempt to produce virus-resistant strains. He felt that there was a chance of revolutionizing the strawberry industry by growing strawberries commercially from seed an idea derived from his earlier success in producing hybrid corn.
To Wallace, his most intriguing project in recent years has been his effort to introduce vesca and moschata flavors into the domestic strawberry. Based on the work of Haig Dermen's application of colchicine to produce polyploids, that of Darrow in crossing tetraploid vesca with the domestic berry, and that of D.H. Scott in making a 10-ploid form which was 3/4 American and 1/4 wild European, Mr. Wallace converted the 10-ploid plants into 8-ploids in order to cross with other octoploids which he hoped could furnish size, firmness and color while retaining the taste of the wild European berry.
John P. Watson(Fig. 13-38), who assists George Slate in the breeding work at the New York Experiment Station at Geneva, was born October 21, 1922, at Worcester, Massachusetts. He graduated at the Stockbridge School of Agriculture in 1942, was in the Air Force 1942-1945, obtained his B.S. at the University of Massachusetts in 1948 and his M.S. at Rutgers in 1950. His breeding work has included work with plums, peaches, grapes, and strawberries, as well as with other berries.