Gregor Mendel

📍Mendelianum, St Thomas's Abbey, Mendlovo náměstí 1, 603 00 Brno, Czech Republic

“I was born Johann Mendel, a farmer's son in a small Silesian village, and I joined the Augustinian friars of St Thomas in Brno in 1843 because I loved learning and my family could not afford it. Taking the name Gregor, I found in the abbey a home where study was honoured. Our abbot, Cyrill Napp, believed that science served God and the farmer alike, and our community included botanists, philosophers and musicians. The abbey sat on a square in the old town, with its great church, library and a walled garden behind. I taught science at the local school and studied in Vienna, but my true laboratory was a strip of garden beside the abbey, and the greenhouse that Abbot Napp built in 1854. From 1856 to 1863 I grew and crossed thousands upon thousands of pea plants there, counting round and wrinkled seeds, tall and short stems, purple and white flowers, and recording every result. I kept bees and measured the weather too. In 1865 I presented my findings to the Natural Science Society in Brno: that traits are passed on in predictable patterns, by units we now call genes. Few people understood my work at the time. In 1868 my brothers elected me abbot, and I spent my later years caring for the community. My laws were rediscovered in 1900, and I am now called the father of genetics. The abbey still stands, and the Mendelianum museum tells the story. A new greenhouse has now been built on the foundations of mine, and peas grow there once again.”

Sources: english.radio.cz archiweb.cz aleteia.org Wikipedia: St Thomas's Abbey,_Brno