Luther Burbank
American botanist and horticulturist who developed over 800 plant varieties, including the Russet Burbank potato.
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Luther Burbank was an American botanist and horticulturist who developed over 800 plant strains and varieties during his 55-year career.[1][2] He is best known for creating the Burbank potato, which later gave rise to the russet Burbank potato that dominates food processing worldwide.[3][4] The National Inventors Hall of Fame inducted Burbank in 1986.[1]
Life and work
In Santa Rosa, he purchased a 4-acre plot and established a greenhouse and experimental fields inspired by Charles Darwin's work.[5] He later bought an 18-acre farm in Sebastopol called Gold Ridge Farm.[5] Burbank called the 'Delicious' apple variety "the finest-flavored apple in all the world," according to a 1913 Stark Bro's catalog.[6][7] Burbank was active in the American eugenics movement and was elected to the American Breeders' Association Committee on Eugenics in 1906.[8]
He died on April 11, 1926, aged 77, after suffering a heart attack in mid-March.[9] Following his father's death, Burbank took the money he inherited and purchased a 17-acre property close to Lunenburg; on that land he created the Burbank potato.[10][4][2] Between 1904 and 1909, the Carnegie Institution awarded Burbank multiple grants that funded his hybridization research.[11]
What the cited sources add
Dan Barker's 1993 article in Freethought Today reveals that Burbank was a freethinker who publicly declared "I'm an Infidel" in a January 1926 newspaper interview.[12] According to Barker, Burbank was inundated with thousands of letters after his declaration, with 532 arriving in a single day.[12] The National Inventors Hall of Fame record states that Burbank developed 113 varieties of plums and prunes, 10 varieties of berries, and 50 varieties of lilies.[2] That same record notes that Burbank received his plant patents posthumously.[2]
The 1913 Stark Bro's catalog quotes Burbank saying the Delicious apple "keeps about as long as any we have, and longer than any other good apple".[7] Burbank had chosen not to widely broadcast his freethought beliefs until a teacher's prosecution for instructing about Darwinism motivated him to speak openly.[12]
References
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Luther Burbank. Peach and Other Fruit. US Patent No. PP15. Inducted in 1986, National Inventors Hall of Fame (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Luther Burbank. Peach and Other Fruit. US Patent No. PP15. Inducted in 1986, National Inventors Hall of Fame. facts only, no text reused. invent.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Smith, "The Garden of Invention : Luther Burbank and the business of breeding plants", Penguin Group, 2010, p. 1–2 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Luther Burbank, California Studies Weekly" (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Gold Ridge Luther Burbank's Experiment Farm" (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Stark, "Stark Delicious: The World's Best Apple", Stark Bro's Nurseries & Orchards Catalog, 1913 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Stark, "Stark Delicious: The World's Best Apple", Stark Bro's Nurseries & Orchards Catalog, 1913. facts only, no text reused. archive.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Stansfield, "Luther Burbank: Honorary Member of the American Breeders' Association", Journal of Heredity, March 2006, p. 95–99; Stansfield, "Luther Burbank: Honorary Member of the American Breeders' Association", Journal of Heredity, March 2006, p. 95–99; Carlson, Elof Axel., "The unfit : a history of a bad idea", Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2001; Stansfield, "Luther Burbank: Honorary Member of the American Breeders' Association", Journal of Heredity, March 2006, p. 95–99; Stansfield, "Luther Burbank: Honorary Member of the Amer en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Boy Scouts in honor guard to Luther Burbank", Napa Journal, 15 April 1926; Barker, "I Am An Infidel", Freethought Today, August 1993 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Luther Burbank, Biography" (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Luther Burbank" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Luther Burbank" (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Barker, "I Am An Infidel", Freethought Today, August 1993. facts only, no text reused. ffrf.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Luther Burbank (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
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Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Luther Burbank (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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