Keith Mott's The Champions of Yester Year (Part 47) 

MR & MRS BERNARD JORDAN OF OXFORD

When I travelled up to Hitchin in Hertfordshire, to photograph pigeons for the Inter Counties Federation Show in January 1978, I had the good fortune to meet up with the ‘ace’ partnership of Mr. & Mrs. Bernard Jordan. Bernard and Dot were judging at this great old show and they were described to me as the main spring of the racing pigeon section of the Kidlington Sports and Social Club, although their home and lofts were some miles away at Woodstock.

The partner’s family of Bricoux-Sion pigeons were a dual purpose bird winning out of turn in the show pen and on the road. Bernard has had pigeons since he was a kid and started racing in 1962. He smashed his novice status in 1964 from Dorchester with a Bricoux blue chequer hen. When I first met them in 1978 they had 30 pairs housed in two lofts, racers in a 22ft. x 8ft. structure and the breeders were kept in a nice roomy 12ft. x 12ft. loft. The open door trapping method was used and a sand and lime dressing used on the loft floor. The birds were paired up on 14th. February and were fed on a good channel mixture, with the odd tit-bit to help condition for racing.

Bernard had brought two of his premier racing birds to Hitchin for me to photograph and I had the pleasure of inspecting them both. The first was his fantastic Bricoux red chequer hen, ‘Jen’, and she handled like a dream, above medium, appled bodied and had the looks of potential show winner. The parents of ‘Jen’ were both obtained from Bernard’s good friend, E. Matthews of Berwick in Scotland and she recorded in 1977: 1st. club, 2nd. Federation Rennes, 1st. club Nantes, 3rd. club, 8th. Federation Bergerac. A half sister to ‘Jen’, bred off the same sire, was sent up to Mr. Matthews and had won many prizes, including eight firsts, plus Federation positions. The grandsire of these two outstanding racers was Mr. Matthews well known pigeon, ‘Gimpy’. In the 1977 season ‘Jen’ won the Overseas Average and was instrumental in helping to win the Old Bird Average for the Jordan loft. Bernard’s second pigeon I looked at was his Bricoux blue chequer cock, ‘Needle’, and he handled medium, apple bodied. This great pigeon had been a most consistent racer on both hard and easy days, winning from Rugby, velocity 1820 and Perth, velocity 918. Good fortune had not always favoured this cock as he was out in front from both North Allerton in both club and Federation, only for the race to be declared void. ‘Needle’ also won in the show pen.

Bernard liked the longer races and his family excelled at the long distance and his yearlings flew 400 miles with comparative ease. Bernard didn’t race young birds as a rule and found his birds came on better as two year olds. He didn’t believe in over training or over racing his birds. Bernard rated his good friend, E. Matthews of Berwick, his ideal pigeon fancier and said he was second to none.

There you have it, a great fancier I met up with in the 1970s. I can be contacted on Telephone: 01372 463480.

TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT. 

22/11/06