Journal of Genetics, Vol. 96, No. 5, November 2017, pp. 815–826 © Indian Academy of Sciences https://doi.org/10.1007/s12041-017-0830-7 HALDANE AT 125 J. B. S. Haldane: the John Innes years SARAH WILMOT∗ John Innes Centre, Colney Lane, Norwich Research Park, Norwich NR4 7UH, UK ∗E-mail:
[email protected]. Published online 24 November 2017 Keywords. J. B. S. Haldane; John Innes Horticultural Institution; history of genetics; William Bateson; Primula sinensis; plant genetics; biochemical genetics. Introduction p. 101). Moreover, it is perhaps his idealized vision of what Bateson’s Institution could have been that later provided J. B. S. Haldane worked part-time at the John Innes JBS with the model for his planned research in India Horticultural Institution (JIHI) in Merton in Surrey, a (Dronamraju 1985, p. 48). London suburb, from 1927 to 1937. His appointment has been discussed in several biographical accounts (in most detail in Clark 1968; Harman 2004). Although the main Haldane’s appointment outlines of this history are well known, this decade in Hal- dane’s life is worth closer scrutiny. This was a transitional The John Innes Horticultural Institution was founded time for JBS. His position at the John Innes was on terms in 1910 following the bequest of a London property that prevented him feeling settled in his personal life and developer. William Bateson was the founding Director, career. Intellectually, his time there straddles the divide beginning the work with just six scientists, supported by a between his Cambridge years (1923–1932), when he did his garden staff of around 16, together with a ‘pomologist’ (a most important scientific work on population genetics and specialist in the genetics of fruit) and his assistants.