SEGMENT: CROPS
Jacqueline Jackson>ISM Interviews A-L>ISM Interviews A-L, Segment 28
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- CROPS
- Teosinte is believed to be an ancestor of corn. In CT people were experimenting with corn. One man (perhaps Brinkley) came out to University of Wisconsin to work on hybrid corn in 1923. U of W was a land grant university. They would crossbreed corn until they got a uniform product of a vigilant hybrid. In 1934 the schools began to give farmers the hybrids. There was no way you could replant because the seed would lose its vigor. Monsanto has been accused of selling corn like this to third world countries. She talks about a disease called southern leaf blight that could have destroyed the entire crop if the weather was bad. It started in the growing season of 1970. It was worse the further south you go. The land grants schools were started by Abraham Lincoln in 1865. Around 1935 Jackie's father and grandfather had days where they would invite people out to their farm to inspect their crop. One year he had gotten his hand stuck in a husker and it was in bandages during the corn trials day. One year the FFA came and so did a congressman. The year his hand was bandaged he said it was from defending the field from raccoons. Normally it didn't matter but since it was a special crop they had to protect it. They tried to scare them away with radios. They eventually had to hire people to patrol the fields at night.
