ON THE WINGS OF THE BRITTLE RACHIS: AARON AARONSOHN FROM THE REDISCOVERY OF WILD WHEAT ('URWEIZEN') TO HIS VISION 'FOR THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND'

Around 1910 Aaron Aaronsohn of the Jewish community in Ottoman Palestine became very well known both as botanical explorer and agricultural expert, especially on the semiarid regions of the Mediterranean basin and the United States. He attracted the attention of the scientific world through his rediscovery of the long-sought wild progenitor of emmer wheat. Based on his claim that wild emmer wheat, as well as other wild forms of domesticated plants, may serve as what is today known as “gene pools”, Aaronsohn formulated an agricultural vision for improvement of agricultural varieties and practices, particularly aimed at dry-land farming. Capitalizing on the wide reception of his assertions, both by American professional circles of the United States Department of Agriculture and by lay public there, Aaronsohn succeeded in recruiting financial support for founding a Jewish agricultural experiment station in Palestine. It was an institute registered in New York, and was the first American research station to o...