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Inventing the Potato and the Peach

Monday, February 15, 2010 10:19 am

Because my most recent Blog was about Plant Patents, it would be a huge oversight to leave that topic without devoting some time to America’s greatest Horticulturist/Botanist and 1986 Inventors Hall of Fame inductee, Luther Burbank (1849-1926). Although he is the patent holder of many Plant Patents, they were all issued following his death. As we previously discussed, patent rights started being granted in 1930 to developers of asexually, replicatable variety of fruits, flowers, vegetables, tubers and similar plant-based discoveries.

Burbank is credited with developing more than 800 strains and varieties of plants, including 113 varieties of plums and prunes, 10 varieties of berries, 50 varieties of lilies the Elberta Freestone Peach, and perhaps his greatest invention, the Russet Burbank Potato. Burbank’s potato developed in 1870 was first introduced in Ireland proving to be resistant to the then devastating Irish potato blight. The potato invention was the single most important event that stopped people from leaving the Emerald Isle, saved those who stayed from starvation and helped the country to recover economically.

Burbank’s potato was introduced to American farmers in 1871. By 1875, Burbank had sold the rights to his potato for $150.00 enabling him to move from Massachusetts to Santa Rosa, California. Later his potato would come to be known in America as the Idaho Potato.

Santa Rosa would be Burbank’s home for more than 50 years until his death in 1926. "I firmly believe, from what I have seen, that this is the chosen spot of all this earth as far as Nature is concerned", Burbank said. The 4-acre outdoor, living laboratory is where he conducted his work bringing him world renown. His objective was to improve the quality of plants and thereby increase the world's food supply.

Another of Luther Burbank’s plant-based inventions that this writer is particularly fond of is the Elberta Freestone Peach. Burbank’s peach invention tolerated most climates, was disease resistant and would bear fruit that would fall easily off the center pit unlike cling-style peaches. Further, his peach trees bore more and larger fruit that could be harvested earlier and longer.

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