Leon Dexter Batchelor (May 8, 1884 – March 21, 1958) was an American

horticulture Horticulture (from ) is the art and science of growing fruits, vegetables, flowers, trees, shrubs and ornamental plants. Horticulture is commonly associated with the more professional and technical aspects of plant cultivation on a smaller and mo ...

professor. He was the longest-serving director of the

University of California Citrus Experiment Station The University of California Citrus Experiment Station is the founding unit of the University of California, Riverside campus in Riverside, California, United States. The station contributed greatly to the cultivation of the orange and the overall ...

Early life and education

Batchelor was born in 1884 and grew up on a

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

farm in

Upton, Massachusetts Upton is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. It was first settled in 1728. The population was given as exactly 8,000 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. History Upton was orig ...

. He attended the New Hampshire College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts, as did his older brother, chemist Harry David Batchelor (class of 1903). Both were members of

Kappa Sigma Kappa Sigma (), commonly known as Kappa Sig or KSig, is an American collegiate social fraternity founded at the University of Virginia in 1869. Kappa Sigma is one of the five largest international Fraternities and sororities in North America, fr ...

. Batchelor also served as a cadet in the college's

Reserve Officers' Training Corps The Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC; or ) is a group of college- and university-based officer-training programs for training commissioned officers of the United States Armed Forces. While ROTC graduate officers serve in all branches o ...

Battalion, and was student manager of the 1906 New Hampshire football team. He earned his Bachelor of Science degree in 1907. He then attended

Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...

and earned his Doctor of Philosophy in 1911.

Career

Batchelor taught horticulture at

from 1907 to 1910 and resigned to teach at Utah Agricultural College. While teaching at Utah, Batchelor published studies about

thinning In agricultural sciences, thinning is the removal of some plants, or parts of plants, to make room for the growth of others. Selective removal of parts of a plant such as branches, buds, or roots is typically known as '' pruning''. In forestry ...

apple orchards. In 1915, he joined the

as an Associate Professor of Plant Breeding. Batchelor was promoted to Professor of Orchard Management in 1919 and to director of the Citrus Experimentation Station in 1929 to replace retiring director Herbert John Webber. Batchelor became a preeminent authority within California on the study of

walnut A walnut is the edible seed of any tree of the genus '' Juglans'' (family Juglandaceae), particularly the Persian or English walnut, '' Juglans regia''. They are accessory fruit because the outer covering of the fruit is technically an i ...

s. He was named by the state director of agriculture in 1940 as the seventh member of the California Walnut Control Board. Batchelor remained director of the Citrus Experimentation Station until July 1, 1951, when he returned to research. Batchelor was selected as the

University of California, Riverside The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Riverside, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of Cali ...

's Faculty Research Lecturer for 1954. Batchelor Hall on UC Riverside's campus is named after Batchelor, the longest-serving director of the Citrus Experimentation Station.

Selected published works

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References

Citations

Bibliography

External links

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Draft registration card
of September 1918 at fold3.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Batchelor, Leon Dexter 1884 births 1958 deaths People from Upton, Massachusetts Cornell University alumni University of New Hampshire alumni American horticulturists University of California, Riverside faculty