Historical archives revealed that Rouge de bordeaux (RDB) appeared probably around 1865 in Lectoure, in Southwestern France, then started moving toward Bordeaux (still in Southwestern France) and toward Central France during the years 1870–1871 (Vilmorin‐Andrieux Companie 1880).

Chiddam Blanc de Mars, a soft white landrace wheat variety from Ville de Paris in France was chosen originally because the French have such a wonderful reputation for good bread - thinking of Poilane’s whole wheat country loaf. It is often more prolific than Sonora wheat.

Sonora, a soft white landrace wheat, has a history here in the Southwestern United States, because it is a variety grown early by the agricultural Native Americans in Mexico. They used it to make their whole wheat tortillas, and apparently liked the way it could be ground to a whole wheat flour on their metate. Sonora wheat might be the very first wheat successfully introduced onto the American continent soon after Columbus’s famous journey of discovery in 1492. It was grown in the Southwest continuously until about 1960.

Wit Wolkoring (white woolly wheat) was selected as an alternative to Sonora wheat, from a similar climate region in South Africa, and has proved to be quite similar to the Sonora. The difference is most readily seen in the field. The heads of Wit Wolkoring are cream colored like the straw, whereas those of the Sonora are bronze. Like the Sonora the heads are also woolly, or velvety, in appearance.