Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/215151
Jim McFerson cleans garlic bulbs that he grows at his Wenatchee home. He grows garlic and hops as a hobby. Growers recently voted to pay a "special project assessment" equal to their regular assessment that will raise $32 million over an eight-year period for research at Washington State University. Already, WSU has begun using the funds to hire two world-renowned scientists, Dr. Desmond Layne, as tree fruit extension team leader, and Dr. Stefano Musacchi as research pomologist, both based in Wenatchee. The university is also in the process of hiring a plant physiologist and a pathologist. With the addition of these new faculty, the commission expects to receive even more funding requests. Good writing Applicants should know that McFerson appreciates good, precise writing. "Especially for technical writing, to me, there's a premium on clarity and brevity, and the same thing is true of a research proposal," he said. McFerson, 62, is a skilled writer and avid reader who, after a day engrossed in the scientific realm, might go home and enjoy reading political analyses or pick up a biography of Elvis Presley, whom he always admired. "I love language and I enjoy its expressiveness, but I'm not a particularly poetic person," he said, revealing that he was a writer for his high-school and college newspapers and enjoyed investigative reporting. He and his three brothers grew up in Iowa and Wisconsin. All his grandparents were farmers and his father, Bob, was a fertilizer salesman. He left school in 1971 and did a number of unpleasant jobs, including loading fertilizer onto railroad boxcars and working at a funeral home. After deciding to continue his education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he kept the funeral home job to help pay expenses. As a bonus, he got a free room in the back of the building, but when anyone departed at night, he'd have to go out with the mortician to pick up the body. "It didn't help my social life much," he reflected. He was undecided whether to major in agricultural journalism or horticulture, but after getting a work-study job in a college greenhouse and being hired by his advisor Dr. Fred Bliss to work with the plant-breeding program, his mind was made up. He earned a bachelor's degree in horticulture, then went to Texas A & M University to study for a master's in horticulture. He returned to UW-Madison to obtain a doctorate in plant breeding and genetics. —Dr. Jim McFerson www.goodfruit.com PHOTOS BY TJ MULLINAX "My reputation would be seen as hard-nosed and brusque, and aggressive—which is probably fair enough." For the next five years, he worked as a vegetable breeder for a private company, and then headed the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Plant Genetic Resources Unit in Geneva, New York. In 1997, he was approached by George Ing, then manager of Washington's Research Commission, and commissioner Doyle Fleming, who said they were looking for a scientist to work for the commission on field horticulture research and help with strategic planning in preparation for Ing's retirement. GOOD FRUIT GROWE DECEMBER 2013 61