Lena B. Smithers Hughes

Lena B. Smithers Hughes (June 8, 1905 – December 19, 1987) was an American botanist who developed improved strains of the Valencia orange, a sweet orange that is grown in the United States mainly for the production of commercial orange juice.^[1] She was the first woman inducted into the Florida Agricultural Hall of Fame^[2] and was also named to the Florida Women's Hall of Fame^[1] and the Florida Citrus Hall of Fame.^[3]

Lena B. Smithers was born June 8, 1905, in Elgin, Tennessee.^[2] She earned degrees from both the University of Tennessee and Wayne State University, Michigan, after which she taught school for a time.^[1][3]

In 1931, she and her husband Ausker Hughes, a chemist, moved to Lake County, Florida, where they both worked on citrus research.^[2] By 1935, they had 75 acres of test groves under production.^[4] Together they developed a number of new orange strains that are precursors of widely planted present-day varieties, working especially with nucellar seedlings of Parson Brown and Valencia oranges.^[2][3]

After Ausker died in 1944, Hughes continued the breeding research on her own, eventually settling near Orlando in Orange County.^[2] This research led to improved, virus-free varieties of the Valencia orange, which had originally been developed by American agronomist William Wolfskill in the mid-19th century.^[1][5] These virus-free strains were used to produce budwood for growers with such success that by 1983, her Hughes Valencia bud line made up some 60 percent of all Valencia oranges propagated for cultivation in Florida.^[2] Her work on Valencia oranges has been called "one of the most significant citrus developments" to originate in Orange County, then one of the nation's major orange-growing regions.^[2] She was the first woman member of the Orange County Citrus Extension Advisory Committee—serving ten years in that capacity—and likewise the first woman member of the Growers Administrative Committee.^[3]

في عام 1960، أنشأت هيوز، مستخدمةً عائدات بيع براعم شجيرات فالنسيا من إنتاجها، مؤسسة هيوز التذكارية لتقديم منح دراسية في مجال البستنة في كلٍ من جامعة فلوريدا وكلية فلوريدا الجنوبية في ليكلاند. ^{[ 2 ]} وقد تم إدخالها إلى قاعة مشاهير نساء فلوريدا في عام 1984 ^{[ 1 ]} ، وفي عام 1986 أصبحت أول امرأة تُدرج في قاعة مشاهير الزراعة في فلوريدا. ^{[ 2 ]}

في موجتي صقيع قاسيتين خلال شتاءي عامي 1984 و1985، دُمّرت آخر 150 فدانًا من برتقال هيوز، فقررت عدم إعادة زراعتها، لعلمها أنها ستحتاج إلى عشر سنوات قبل أن تتمكن من تحقيق الربح، وشعورها بأن الوقت المتبقي لها ليس طويلًا. ^{[ 4 ]} توفيت في 19 ديسمبر 1987. ^{[ 2 ]} وبعد خمس سنوات، تم إدخالها إلى قاعة مشاهير الحمضيات في فلوريدا. ^{[ 3 ]}