Seeds of a thought

So, I was listening to a podcast while walking this morning. (It was a recent episode of The Splendid Table, a podcast I recommend to all of a foodie bent.) And they had a segment on seed banks, talking to a journalist named John Seabrook, who has written an article about seed banks recently.

He talked about a seed bank that existed in Leningrad during World War II, and how, when the Germans had the city under siege, the scientists at the seed bank defended it against hungry citizens who wanted to break in and eat the seeds. He said that many of those scientists starved to death, surrounded by edible seeds that they wouldn't eat because they wanted to make sure those strains were preserved.

I was in equal parts appalled and moved. I don't think that I would die just so that an endangered strain of wheat or barley could survive. And I'm certain I wouldn't deny a starving person food for that reason. But you kind of have to admire the dedication that would lead a person to do that. Maybe.