Pioneering blueberry farmer dies at 90

By Carlos E. Medina / CorrespondentPosted Nov 29, 2012 at 2:54 PM Updated Nov 29, 2012 at 6:13 PM

Dr. Robert Yancey Jr. remembers when his father got the idea of growing blueberries in his native Marion County.Robert W. Yancey was the first commercial blueberry grower in Marion County in the 1960s. It was a strange pursuit – with agriculture inherent uncertainty – for a man who lived for precision and expected results in his work as a chemical engineer.Yancey died on Friday at Legacy Hospice House. He was 90. 

Robert W. Yancey was the first commercial blueberry grower in Marion County in the 1960s. It was a strange pursuit — with agriculture’s inherent uncertainty — for a man who lived for precision and expected results in his work as a chemical engineer.

Yancey died Friday at the Legacy Hospice House. He was 90.

Dr. Robert Yancey Jr. remembers when his father got the idea of growing blueberries in his native Marion County.

“We were living in Aiken, South Carolina, and he was working for Dupont making heavy water for the nuclear arsenal,” Yancey Jr. said. “He always had the prettiest yard in town, and started raising strawberries. Then he heard about the rabbit-eye blueberry, a new variety being grown in Tifton, Georgia.”

The senior Yancey immediately thought of growing the new variety in Marion County, where he remembered eating wild blueberries as a child. But first, he had to become an expert on all things blueberry.

“He was the epitome of steadiness. He approached everything like an engineering project,” his son said.

After studying soil samples, and compositions and temperature gradients to get the best harvest, the senior Yancey bought some land in Silver Springs in the early 1960s.

“The banks didn’t want to lend him the money. They thought it was swamp land, but that’s the kind of soil blueberries love,” Yancey Jr. said.

At first, the land was worked on weekends, with both the senior and junior Yancey making the drive from Aiken.

“We stayed at his mother’s house, got up at dawn on Saturday, worked until noon and then went to the Gator game, which was always at 2 p.m. Then we’d work all day Sunday and drive back home Sunday night,” Yancey Jr. said.

“Some years he’d lose a big part of the crop, but he kept experimenting with new varieties,” Yancey Jr. added.

After the elder Yancey retired from Dupont, he moved back to Marion County and started growing blueberries in earnest.

“I think he just saw the potential. At that time, they were just starting to grow northern crops in Florida and south Georgia. He got caught up in that movement. He also saw the market could be big for early blueberries, and he was right. He’d sell them as far away as Amsterdam and Europe,” his son said.

The senior Yancey went on to become the president of the Florida Blueberry Growers Association, and was a member of the Michigan Blueberry Growers Association. He sold Yancey’s Blueberry Farm in 1990, but stayed up to date on the industry.

Yancey Sr. was a veteran of the U.S. Navy during World War II and later graduated from the University of Florida. He attended Woodside Baptist Church in Ocala.

He is survived by his wife Judith, Ocala; sons Dr. Robert Yancey, Gainesville; and James Yancey, Bluffton, S.C.; stepson Craig Stewart, Ocala; sister Ann Baursfeld, Washington, D.C.; and six grandchildren.

Memorial services was held at 1 p.m. on Saturday at Hiers-Baxley Funeral Services, 910 E. Silver Springs Blvd., Ocala. Those who wish to make memorial contributions are asked to consider the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, 7077 Bonneval Road, Suite 610, Jacksonville, FL 32216.

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