Sherret S. Chase recognized while completing his Ph.D. at Cornell University that naturally occurring haploids could be used for corn breeding. Hybrid corn results from crossing two inbred parents, each developed by selfing a corn line for 6-8 generations until it is mostly homozygous, while a haploid has only one set of chromosomes from the female plant and its self-pollinated progeny would be a homozygous diploid genetically equivalent to an inbred line. In 1947 at Iowa State University, Chase became the first scientist to produce homozygous pure-breeding diploid corn plants from haploids. In 1954 he joined DeKalb Agricultural Association, where he became the first to develop doubled haploid corn lines used in a commercial hybrid, DeKalb 640. Although more than 30 years and other advances in breeding technology passed before the benefits of the doubled haploid method were fully realized and widely utilized, the method he pioneered is now widely used by plant breeders to accelerate development of inbred corn parent lines in just two generations, benefiting farmers worldwide. For these innovations, Chase has been called the Father of Doubled Haploids.