Back in November of 2001, the American Owl Club sponsored a special issue of the “Pigeon Debut” magazine. For that special, I wrote an article detailing, as well as I could, a general history of all the African Owl clubs that have been known to exist in the United States. At that time, I wrote that although we had always heard from elderly members that the American Owl Club had been formed in 1893, we really had no concrete proof of this. We also had no idea of who the original organizers and officers were.

     The next summer after the special came out, I went out to Oklahoma City and spent several hours rummaging through the library of old magazines at the World of Wings Pigeon Center, just to see what I could find about the history of African Owls in North America. What I found was an African Owl historian’s dream. Tucked away in the corner of the library room were a couple of books that held almost two year’s worth of issues of a small weekly magazine printed in 1892 and 1893. The magazine was “The Fancier” and the publisher was John Abel of Baltimore Maryland. He was apparently an ardent supporter of the pigeon fancy and a strong advocate for the formation of specialty clubs for the various breeds. From some of the commentaries he did, I got the impression that he was either an Owl breeder or had a particular fondness for them.

     In nearly every issue of the magazine that I saw, there would be letters from various fanciers or comments from Mr. Abel, debating the merits of organizing a specialty club for the Owls. The most ardent supporter for organizing the AOC was Mr. C.W. Buttles. He is basically the father of the American Owl Club. Without his pushing the issue, it never would have happened. Ironically, his idea for the name of the club was not the American Owl Club but rather the Owl Club of America.

     During the 1890’s there was quite a push to form specialty clubs. The Tumbler and Turbit fanciers had done so in late 1892 and the Jacobin breeders had in early 1893. Mr. Buttles was adamant that to be seen as a major breed in America, the Owls had to have their own club. He was concerned that the Magpie and Archangel breeders would beat the AOC to the punch. All three breeds formed their own clubs in 1893. Out of all the clubs I saw listed though, only the American Turbit Club, the American Owl Club and the American Oriental Frill Club remain today. What does that tell you about the persistence of the short-beaked breeders!

     “The Fancier” magazine apparently either went out of business, was sold, or changed names to “The Pigeon World Weekly” in the beginning of 1894. There were a couple of issues of this magazine in the books I found and they had lists of all the officers of the known specialty clubs of the time. The list for the AOC matched a list of officers recommended by C.W. Buttles and the first secretary, H.T. Klusmeyer, in a previous article. The first officers of the AOC were: President – C.W. Buttles, Vice President – William Ehinger, Secretary – H.T. Klusmeyer, and Treasurer – George W. Eckert. The executive committee was composed of John H. Kuhn, Dr. Charles Meyer, J.G. Nagle, and Robert Stowell. The other original members of the club were given by last name only: Cassedy, Lackman, Bordon, Stertzer and Robbins. Sounds like a Wall Street law firm!

     In the beginning, the AOC sponsored all of the known Owl breeds in the country, namely Africans, English and Chinese. Many of the breeders raised more than one variety. It sounds like all three types were equally popular. The English Owl was the first to lose popularity but the AOC continued to sponsor all three breeds until World War II when the club went dormant for a while. The history of the club in the early to mid – 1900’s is nearly non-existent but I have been able to find a few tidbits of information. Some of the prominent fanciers were George Harrison, who was President of the club in 1921, Asher and Lou Stichler, George Henning, J. Wilson Hagen, John Busher, Bill Westhus, Hyman Holland, E. B. Ulrich, John Sueme, Ed Atwood, Carl Bassano, Bill Meyer, Victor Becker, P. F. Wannemacher, John Bell, Robert Andrews, Edward Evers, J. Almer Tindall, H.E. Dugan, Erskine Morse and Fred Bechtold. Two other fanciers I saw listed as winners at shows in the 1920’s were Bloemer and Donovan. A partnership of two men named Robinson and Littleson claim in their ad in 1921 to have been winning for 20 years.

     Lou Stichler was secretary of the club in 1923 for the 30^th Annual Meet, The meet was held in Chicago and had $125 in prizes offered with E.B. Ulrich judging. That’s an impressive amount for prizes in 1923. Fred Bechtold also served as secretary in 1939. The Chicago show of 1921 sounded like a great event. There were 192 Owls shown with the Champion being a White of H.E. Dugan’s. Dugan also had Best Owl at a meet in Toronto in 1922. Other winners in 1921 were J. Almer Tindell and J.P. Haberstien. A 1939 Champion in Oakland California is listed as Black OC #6804, bred by C.A. Schabel. It sounds like there was a good bit of Owl activity in the early 1900’s but finding records of it is difficult.

     Sometime in the 1940’s, probably because of the war, the AOC went dormant. The breeders of the Midwest part of the U.S. formed the United Owl Club in 1947 and sponsored all three varieties of Owls again. This club folded in the late 1950’s and within a year or two, the AOC was revived by Bill Meyer and Phil Roof. Roof was to become the most famous Turbit breeder of all time but he was also a top breeder of Africans. He was a great publicity man and he coordinated African Owl and Turbit special issues in the “American Pigeon Journal in the 1970’s. Some of the Owl breeders of the 1950’s and 60’s were A.J. Stratton, Si Berger, Gene Pardini, Ray Groh, Frank Vonesh, Urban Billmeyer, Glen Bedell, Floyd Stajkowski, Joe Kilburg, Hobson Goodman, Jim Conway, Frank O’Regan, Fletcher Brothers, Doc Krohn, Albert Lauer, Chan Grover, Fred Grayber, E. Wayne Harlow, John Sisler and Hubie Reith.

     In the literature about the club from the late 1950’s on, there is no mention of English or Chinese Owls. The English Owls had pretty much died out and the Chinese Owls had grown in popularity to the point where their supporters formed their own specialty club. Mainly two men, Bill Meyer and Phil Roof, ran the AOC. When they stepped away from running things, the club went out of business. This happened again in the late 60’s. A few years later they encouraged Bob Eveland to restart the club with their support and the club has been operational ever since. Throughout the 1970’s and 80’s there were a number of other regional clubs sponsoring African Owls but all of them were shut down by the mid 1990’s. One has restarted in recent years: the Western Turbit, Frill and Owl Club. The AOC has good relations with this club and holds a couple of joint meets each year with them. Some of the regional clubs operated for many years and held some great shows but the strain of having too few members to support all the clubs became too much to bear.

     Over the past 30 years or so, many great achievements have been made. Three terrific African Owl specials have been published, two in the “American Pigeon Journal and one in the “Pigeon Debut”. All were well done and very informative. Some of the prominent African Owl breeders of the past 30 years have been Ed Pointer, Tom Zaengle, Jerry Asper, Wayne Diviney, Paul Cheman, Charlie Eslinger, John Izzo, Howard Kogan, Chris DeGregorio, Don Gilmore, A.J. Stratton, Frank O’Regan, Orrie Moore, Brad Atwood, Ed Bills, Bill LaLonde, Tim Stajkowski, Jeff Adair, Tony Delquaglio, John DeCarlo Jr, Bonnie and Rob Kulungian, John Heppner, Art Diekmann, Glenn Diehl, Glen Bedell, Dale Jett, Carl Miller, Chip Tannehill and Tim Heidrich.

     Until the early 1990’s, there had been no program in place to honor Master Breeders of African Owls. Those named as Master Breeders were bestowed that honor by either the National Pigeon Association or the American Pigeon Club. These awards had to be applied for by either the recipient or friends of the recipient, consequently, many deserving breeders never applied, for whatever reason. The National Pigeon Association has named 9 men as Master Breeders of African Owls and the American Pigeon Club also named 8. Ed Atwood, Bill Meyer and A.J. (Skinny) Stratton were named by both organizations. Those listed by the NPA are: John Sueme, Ed Atwood, Bill Meyer, John Izzo, Frank O’Regan, A.J. Stratton, Orrie Moore, Tom Zaengle and Jerry Asper. The list I received from the APC includes Ed Atwood, A.J. Stratton, Dr. L.D. Krohn, Bill Meyer, Fred Grayber, E. Wayne Harlow, Joe Kilburg and John Sisler. All of the APC recipients came in the early 1960’s so I wonder if there were others earlier that I just don’t have records for. Certainly there were many other excellent breeders of African Owls that are not listed here.

     In the mid-1990’s the AOC established it’s own Master Breeder program. Since thorough records had not been kept of the show results, it was determined that everyone would have to start over from the beginning. At this date, with the system having been in place for over 10 years, only two breeders have qualified for the award. Those men are Ed Pointer and Jerry Asper. The minimum amount of time it takes to earn the award is 6 years, although you have to have bred African Owls for 10 years total to qualify. Ed earned the award in just 7 years. It took Jerry ten years. The difficulty in attaining the award has become very evident. Jerry became the first person to be named a Master Breeder by both the NPA and the AOC.

Copyright © 2007 The American Owl Club. All rights reserved

Revised Tuesday, June 05, 2007