ISSUE 84, SOUTHERN LANDRACE & HEIRLOOM CORN, Part 11: Jellicorse White Dent
Jellicorse White Dent
Created by farmer Reginald Jellicorse (1868-1937) of Elmwood, Tennessee during the 1910s, this prolific white cobbed 12/14 row dent corn underwent trials by the Tennessee Experimental Station from 1919 to 1923. Because it invariably set two ears to a stalk minimum, its productivity instantly riveted the attention of agronomists. In the first year of trials it averaged 53.9 bushels per acre, second only to Neal’s Paymaster. [“Jellicorse’s Twin Corn a very Promising Variety,” Carthage Courier (May 15, 1919), 2.]
Like other Tennessee White Dent varieties, Jellicorse belongs to a deep family of maize strains with Native origins. Tuscarora White and Tennessee Red Cob are ancestral forebears of Jellicorse. Beginning in the 1920s, plant breeders at the University of Tennessee made the variety a project, shortening its time to maturation, creating a yellow form of the dent, and attempting to boost its productivity further. In 1947 Ben Hazelwood, superintendent of the West Tennessee Experimental Station, published a book summarizing the qualities of the white dent, Jellicorse Corn. Among its findings were the observations that the corn withstood extremely hot summers and performed superlatively on poorly manured soil. This made it competitive with Hickory King, reckoned the most robust of the southern white dents.
Because of this quality, Jellicorse became an important parent corn in hybridizing projects. The Jellicorse family in Elmwood bred Angus cattle and had become interested in corn breeding as a mean of supplying optimal feed for their livestock. While production volume was important, perhaps as important was the savor with which the cattle consumed the grain and processed foliage of the plant for feed. A consequence of this attention to the delectation of cattle for various corn strains, the final Jellicorse corn possessed fine flavor. Seed is available from Mary’s Heirloom Seeds and from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. PI Ames3004.
https://npgsweb.ars-grin.gov/gringlobal/accessiondetail?id=1022863