Red Delicious
The Red Delicious is a clone of apple cultigen, now comprising more than 50 cultivars, first recognized in Madison County, Iowa, in 1880. According to the US Apple Association website, it is one of the fifteen most popular apple cultivars in the United States.
Richard Cox (horticulturist)
In 1830 he planted pips from a Ribston Pippin apple grown in his orchard, crossed with Blenheim Orange. Satisfied with the quality of the fruit produced by two of his seedlings, in 1836 he supplied grafts to E. Small & Son, the local nurseryman who offered the first trees for sale in 1840. The two varieties, Cox's Orange Pippin and Cox's Pomona, remained mostly unknown until Charles Turner of the Royal Nurseries in Slough, impressed by their quality, began to offer them in his catalog in 1850. Other English nurserymen began to graft and sell Cox's Orange Pippin trees, and by 1883 it was one of the most popular apples in the country.