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Orville Vogel (1907–1991) was an American scientist and wheat breeder whose research made possible the "
Green Revolution The Green Revolution, also known as the Third Agricultural Revolution, was a period of technology transfer initiatives that saw greatly increased crop yields and agricultural production. These changes in agriculture began in developed countrie ...
" in world food production.


Life and career

Orville Alvin Vogel was born in Pilger, Stanton County, Nebraska, one of the four children of William and Emelia Vogel. He graduated from high school in 1925 and received bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1929 and 1931, respectively. He married Bertha Berkman in 1931 and began his career as a wheat breeder at Washington State College (now University) in Pullman in 1931. Vogel worked for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agriculture Research Service at Washington State University for his whole career, from 1931 to 1972. In retirement, Vogel established a fund to help finance wheat research. He and his wife, Bertha, matched donations to help launch the fund. Vogel died of cancer in 1991.


Role in the Green Revolution

Cecil Salmon, a biologist working in post-World War II Japan, collected 16 varieties of
wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeological ...
, including
Norin 10 is a semi-dwarf wheat cultivar with very large ears that was bred by at an experimental station in Iwate Prefecture, Japan. Its parents were a semi-dwarf Japanese landrace that may have originated in Korea in the 3rd or 4th century AD, and two ...
, which was developed by an agronomist Gonjiro Inazuka in Iwate Prefecture to be very short, thus less likely to suffer wind damage. Salmon sent them to Vogel in Washington in 1949. Vogel began crossing Norin 10 with other wheats to make new short-strawed varieties. Vogel led the team that developed Gaines, the first of several new varieties that produced 25 percent higher yields than the varieties they replaced. Vogel shared his seeds of Norin 10 and Norin 10/Brevor 14 cross with
Norman Borlaug Norman Ernest Borlaug (; March 25, 1914September 12, 2009) was an American agronomist who led initiatives worldwide that contributed to the extensive increases in agricultural production termed the Green Revolution. Borlaug was awarded multiple ...
, who later received the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in the “green revolution.” Borlaug publicly acknowledged Vogel's contributions to his research.


Honors and awards

Among many honors, Dr. Vogel received the 1975 National Medal of Science, Washington State's first Medal of Merit in 1987 and the 1990 John Scott Award given by the City of Philadelphia for useful inventions. He was inducted into the Agricultural Research Service's Science Hall of Fame in 1987. Washington State University honored Vogel by naming a chair and a building after him: the Orville A. Vogel Endowed Chair in Wheat Breeding and Genetics, that is currently co-occupied by winter wheat breeder Arron Carter and spring wheat breeder Michael Pumphrey , and the Orville A. Vogel Plant BioSciences Building.


References

National Medal of Science laureates American biologists 1907 births 1991 deaths 20th-century biologists {{US-biologist-stub