Perhaps I should rephrase my question. Is there such a thing as a non-hybrid Celebrity?
Everything I've e-researched tonight has produced very little history of the Celebrity tomato, and all plants or seeds available for purchase were hybrid.
In theory, doesn't everything come originally from a non-hybrid variety, even the Celeb?
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The Helpful Gardener
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Everything comes from somewhere, what they call the genotypic epicenter. Fo instance the GE for apples is in Kazachstan.
Tomatos were a Central American thing. The Aztecs writings were very unclear as to whether they were talking about tomatoes or tomotillos, the husk tomatoes that those of us who love salsa verde know, but eventually the tomatoes catch on with the Euro-invaders and that's the one we start to play with. So there are tomatillo genes likely polluting our pure tomato from the very beginning (they are the same genus if not the same species, and Nature does that and worse all the time).
Once people get their hands on plant genes, they get a little crazy. Witness the tulip craze of 1634-1637 in Holland. They ended up basing the entire economy on these bulbs, which they wer breeding madly as the newest bulb was the new currency. Well, these varigated and streaked tulips became the rage, but here's the thing, the varigation was viral. Turns out they were breeding for viral susceptibility. The virus ran a bit rampant, and suddenly here was a nation, holding bulbs with disease that was bullion just a few weeks before. Ruined the tulips and crashed the economy. Sounds vaguely familiar; just swap credit default swap for tulip...
We breed for human reasons, not natural or tomato reasons, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't...
I've got an aquaintance, an ex-prof of nutrition and biology who grows acres of tomatoes and tomatillos, but no more than three or four of any one variety. He tries to keep the tomatillos away from the tomatoes and certain tomatoes away from each other , but he smiles when you talk about this or that variety as a static thing, because he knows better than most that you can't stop hybridization. He has the seeds to prove it; every year there are plants that obviously aren't the parent it says on the collection packet. It's Nature's Way...
HG
Tomatos were a Central American thing. The Aztecs writings were very unclear as to whether they were talking about tomatoes or tomotillos, the husk tomatoes that those of us who love salsa verde know, but eventually the tomatoes catch on with the Euro-invaders and that's the one we start to play with. So there are tomatillo genes likely polluting our pure tomato from the very beginning (they are the same genus if not the same species, and Nature does that and worse all the time).
Once people get their hands on plant genes, they get a little crazy. Witness the tulip craze of 1634-1637 in Holland. They ended up basing the entire economy on these bulbs, which they wer breeding madly as the newest bulb was the new currency. Well, these varigated and streaked tulips became the rage, but here's the thing, the varigation was viral. Turns out they were breeding for viral susceptibility. The virus ran a bit rampant, and suddenly here was a nation, holding bulbs with disease that was bullion just a few weeks before. Ruined the tulips and crashed the economy. Sounds vaguely familiar; just swap credit default swap for tulip...
We breed for human reasons, not natural or tomato reasons, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't...I've got an aquaintance, an ex-prof of nutrition and biology who grows acres of tomatoes and tomatillos, but no more than three or four of any one variety. He tries to keep the tomatillos away from the tomatoes and certain tomatoes away from each other , but he smiles when you talk about this or that variety as a static thing, because he knows better than most that you can't stop hybridization. He has the seeds to prove it; every year there are plants that obviously aren't the parent it says on the collection packet. It's Nature's Way...
HG