ABSTRACT
Litt le is known about Mendel because no one paid much at-tention to him during his lifetime . How were they to know he was going to turn out to be the founder of a science with such important consequences? He was just another Moravian monk , mumbling his devotions and messing about in the monastery garden with his many varieties of peas. The locals thought of him with benevolence, but they certainly didn’t take his botanical experiments very seriously. The few scientists with whom he att empted to communicate held that opinion as well. By the time the world noticed how wise and clever he was, he had been dead for sixteen years and most of his contemporaries were dead as well. History was in serious trouble .
