“My father had been raised on a prune and apricot ranch in Los Gatos in the 20’s and 30’s.” (Both towns are in Silicon Valley.) In the 1980s, Kennedy’s father wanted to plant old fruit trees that he remembered from his youth during the Valley of Heart’s Delight days, and he asked Kennedy to help.īut Kennedy wasn’t a horticulturist. “My parents had a large property in Atherton,” Kennedy says. White apricots, “Mesch Mesch Amra” plumcots, pitangas, “Beauty” plums, and “Shakar Pareh” plumcots from Kennedy’s collection. According to Thomas Gradziel, a University of California, Davis professor and plant breeder, knowledgeable fruit growers (Kennedy chief among them) saved many fruit varieties from disappearing forever. In the late eighties and early nineties, Kennedy says, many federal repositories lacked the money or space to receive new genetic material. The genetic diversity they house may hold the key to overcoming catastrophic plant diseases (such as the citrus greening currently devastating Florida’s orange crop) or developing fruit cultivars that can withstand climate change.īut these important endeavors can be overlooked and underfunded. National Plant Germplasm System has repositories across America, each focused on preserving and researching different types of food plants. Kennedy’s contribution is the result of a long partnership. “Half of the named varieties in the national collection come from me,” he says. When asked, Kennedy makes only a slight correction.

In 2010, horticulturist Clay Weeks estimated that half of the national collection of old stone fruit cultivars come from Kennedy. But his four-decade dedication to fruit has been remarkably important in another respect: preserving and adding to America’s agricultural legacy.

As a co-founder of the Arboreum Company, he distributes rare and vintage fruit trees that produce prickly pears and little-known peaches. Todd Kennedy is one of California’s premier fruit experts, collectors, and growers. The campuses of Google, Facebook, and other businesses have pushed out most fruit growers. California’s Silicon Valley, as it happens, used to be known as the Valley of Heart’s Delight, a slogan that often accompanied illustrations of sunshine and fruit trees.

The epicenter of America’s tech industry was once orchards as far as the eye can see.

Forgotten fields of america