When did population genetics emerge?

When did population genetics emerge?

I recently heard an eminent geneticist declare that population genetics began with Theodosius Dobzhansky’s Genetics and the Origin of Species in 1937. My immediate reflex was to be skeptical of this, at least going by Will Provine’s treatment in The Origins of Theoretical Population Genetics, which seemed to push back the timing to the 1920s.

So I looked up “population genetics” in Ngram viewer.

 

 
These results are not consistent with my expectations. Looks like my intuition was wrong. At least for the term population genetics. Score one for experience and wisdom.

Razib Khan