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"As a cocoa agronomist in the
Ministry of Agriculture for almost 30 years [William Freeman's]
devotion to duty, consideration for cocoa farmers
and basic love of the cocoa crop resulted in many improvements
to this crop and its unique farming system."
Professor Nazeer Ahmad
Mr William Freeman
studied the science of cocoa breeding and developed one of the
world's most commercially successful varieties of cocoa, the
Trinidad Select Hybrid (TSH), which now has eight clones.
These are highly regarded for their superior yield, excellent
flavour and resistance to diseases. TSH is distinct and
makes for the best and most expensive chocolate in the world.
William Edwin Freeman was born on 4th May,
1909 in Kent, England and moved to Trinidad as a young boy when
his father got a job as the Director of Agriculture. He
attended the primary school at the Queen's Royal College and
continued his schooling in England. With a great love for
nature, he gravitated to studying science at the University of
London. At the university, he proved to be both a good
student and a good athlete. He gained first
class honours in botany and did postgraduate studies at
University of Cambridge where he captained the university's
rugby team and excelled on the rowing team. He attained
further qualifications at the Imperial College of Tropical
Agriculture, Trinidad completing his thesis on cocoa.
After graduating in
1931, Freeman conducted research in Africa on various crops,
including tobacco, oil palm, groundnuts, cotton, banana, cocoa
and rubber. He supervised numerous plantations and did
research on the use of different fertilisers on these
plantations. He retired as Senior Botanist in 1953.
He returned to Trinidad
in 1954 and lectured in crop husbandry at the Eastern Caribbean
Farm Institute (now Eastern Caribbean Institute of Agriculture
and Forestry - ECIAF) in Centano. A few years later, he
joined the Cocoa Board as a research officer where he bred
improved cocoa clones and hybrid seedlings during the period
1956 to 1978. He also started using methods of planting
 cocoa
trees at closer intervals to increase yields. After many
years of experimentation, he developed the highly acclaimed TSH
clones.
His work was of importance to all cocoa
growing nations, but mostly to Trinidad and Tobago, which
produces the finest quality cocoa in the world. When the
Cocoa Board stopped operations, Freeman continued his work at
the Ministry of Agriculture until he retired in 1978.
Freeman loved plants and was an active member
of the Horticultural Society of Trinidad and Tobago. He
was honoured by the Agricultural Society of Trinidad and Tobago
and The University of the West Indies, which named a street
after him. He passed away on 15th December, 1988. He
was posthumously awarded the Chaconia Medal (Gold) in 1991 for
his outstanding contribution to agriculture.
Mr William Freeman believed in simplicity and
advised, "If there are two words with the same meaning, always
use the shorter one."
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