Walter E. Lammerts

• Geneticist, Horticulturist, Plant Breeder, Creationist
• Undergraduate degree and doctorate (Ph.D.) in horticulture (with a strong focus on plant genetics) from the University of California, Berkeley
• His early scientific publications included cytogenetic studies of interspecific hybrids in Nicotiana (tobacco) in the journal Genetics in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
• Established plant research facility of Armstrong Nurseries
• Professor of Ornamental Horticulture at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) from 1940 to 1945
• Assisted Knott’s Berry Farm in developing its berry program
• Developed a plant research program at Descanso Gardens in La Cañada, California
• Research and breeding work in Livermore, California, for Germain’s / Amling-DeVor Nurseries
• He specialized in the scientific breeding of ornamental plants, particularly roses, applying genetic principles, hybridization, and techniques such as embryo culture to shorten breeding cycles.
• Lammerts is best known as a pioneering rose hybridizer. Between roughly 1940 and 1981 he introduced about 46 new rose varieties. Roughly 25% of his introductions received high rankings or awards from All-America Rose Selections (AARS).
• His work combined practical commercial success with scientific rigor in plant genetics and breeding.
• Lammerts was a leading advocate of young-Earth creationism and a critic of neo-Darwinian evolution, drawing on his expertise in genetics and plant variation. He argued that genetic variation is limited within created “kinds,” that most mutations are harmful or neutral rather than progressive, and that the data from genetics and breeding do not support unlimited evolutionary change.
• He published extensively in the CRSQ on topics including genetics and mutations, limited variation in plants (e.g., roses, beans, corn), biogeography of cultivated plants from a creationist perspective, plant succession, tree-ring dating (challenging long ages for bristlecone pines), and geological features such as overthrusts (e.g., Lewis Overthrust).
• He had earlier been involved with the American Scientific Affiliation but became dissatisfied as theistic evolution gained influence there.
• Editor of the Creation Research Society Quarterly (1964-1968)
• Died: June 4, 1996