Long keepers

[Pippin]

I was growing long keeper tomatoes first time in 2021, below is my very last Reverend Morrow's Long Keeper from today. Not the best tasting tomato but still interesting enough to test again next season as it is a good addition to long and boring winter.

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Here is a better picture from earlier in the fall. Very strange tomato, looks almost like a watermelon or something.

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I also tried the Green Thumb (in the pic below) but that was a bit disappointment as it didn't really ripen very well at all. Much less lycopene in the flesh, and the tomatoes went leathery quite early in the fall.

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These must have those ripening inhibitor genes, i.e. not producing ethylene or not sensitive to ethylene.

[bower]

I have never grown any varieties specifically designated as 'long keepers', but I think you're right that, at least for varieties that did keep longest, genes for firmness and slow ripening seem to play a part in most cases. I also wonder about secondary substances that inhibit mold and other rots, in the peel of long keepers.
The 'de colgar' varieties from Spain are especially interesting, but I haven't tried them as yet.
I have to confess, your long keeper pics don't look very appetizing.
I had a struggle with the firmness/ripening set of genes in my Zolotoe Serdtse F1 crosses. Quite a few offspring hard as rocks, and some odd combinations of ripe/not ripe in different parts. One I recall seemed ripe on the outside while hard as a rock inside, sort of an inverse of what your Reverend Morrow looks like.

[Nan6b]

I grew some de colgars a few years back. They looked like your Reverend Morrow's in color. The best tasting long lasting one was Flor d'Artana. You harvest a lot and then a substantial number of them do start to rot, especially ones with imperfect skin.

[Pippin]

I crossed the Reverend Morrow's Long Keeper with my compact determinate cherry last season (that I am using as the primary other parent in my breeding project). This was more out of curiosity to see how the F1 would look like rather than a serious start for a breeding line. I saved the seeds today and took some pictures, just sharing it (and an earlier one) here in case someone is interested. The flavour was rather average but it was nice to see how the non-ripening gene behavef in heterozygote form. Still slow to ripe but now it gets eventually full red colour. In the first pic three weeks ago some toms are still rather unripe. The second pic is from today, after three weeks in rather high room temperature (as I stored them next to my wood stove where temps are sometimes close to 30 C).

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[bower]

They look really juicy when ripe!