The History of the Discovery of Sexuality in Plants

Duncan S. Johnson

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In the opening paragraph of this article, Professor Johnson, says:

From the beginning of man's thoughtful consideration of natural processes, the phenomena of sexual reproduction, with the associated phenomena of heredity, have persistently engaged his keenest interest. The primary fact of the necessary concurrence of two individuals in the production of offspring in the case of animals was recognized from the beginning. The equivalent phenomenon was not established for plants until the end of the seventeenth century. ...

... for 18 centuries men attempted to solve the problem with recourse to philosophical reasoning, without the aid of detailed observation or experiment. Then, in less than 2 centuries, by the use of these means, Camerarius proved that pollination is a necessary condition of seed formation; Koelreuter demonstrated that characters from both parents appear in hybrid offspring; Amici, Pringsheim, Schmitz, and Strasburger showed how the mingling of parental qualities is made possible by the approximation and mingling of parental protoplasms and nuclei.

This history was presented as an address to the Botany section of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in December, 1913. It appeared in Science, February 27, 1914.