Gartons Agricultural Plant Breeders - History of The Business

History of The Business

John Garton and his two brothers, Robert and Thomas, were in business with their father, Peter, in Golborne and Newton-le-Willows in Lancashire, England, as corn and agricultural merchants.

As a young man, John Garton (1863–1922), was the first to understand that whilst some agricultural plants were self-pollinating, others were cross-pollinating. He began experimenting with the artificial cross pollination firstly of cereal plants, then herbage species and root crops.

He attracted the friendship and encouragement of a young Scottish seedsman, George Peddie Miln (1861–1928) who had trained in Dundee and was seed manager of Dicksons Limited of Chester.

Knowing he had developed a far reaching new technique in plant breeding John Garton began to carry out many thousands of controlled crosses on fields at the family farm in Newton-le-Willows. So satisfied was he with the results, he and his colleagues were happy to give publicity to this new science. Indeed, In 1889 they tried to interest the UK Government’s new Board of Agriculture in the invention they called Scientific Farm Plant Breeding. But this was to no avail.