More on Howard 17 and (or) Premier Strawberries

Abstract

The name of the Alton, Illinois man who sent the seedling strawberry to R. M. Kellogg in 1912 from which the Premier was allegedly developed, almost certainly was not "E. H. Riche", (as printed in Mr. H. K. Bell's article, page 57, in the winter, 1955 issue of Fruit Varieties and Horticultural Digest). **I find no one of that name listed among Illinois growers, but Edwin H. Riehl was superintendent of Experiment Station No. 8 of the Illinois State Horticultural Society at Alton in 1912 and for a number of years. He belonged to a family long prominent in growing, breeding, and propagating fruits and nuts in that area, and had tested small fruit varieties. According to his reports, published in the Transactions of the Society, Riehl had fruited the "Howard's No. 17" strawberry at least by 1911, in which year he ranked it second only to Early Ozark among June bearing varieties at his station. I think it likely, although Riehl appears to have been a strawberry breeder himself, that he would have included the Howard selection among promising new varieties if he sent any of them to the Michigan nurseryman the next year. So if Kellogg did indeed get his start of "Premier" from a horticulturist at Alton, what he got was very probably the Howard 17 from its Massachusetts originator, and not one of Riehl's own seedlings or an "unknown". The possibility exists that it could have arrived at Kellogg's as a mixture with some other variety or selection, or as a bundle on which the label was lost, so that the subsequent renaming as "Premier" may not have been a deliberate deception.