October 4, 1980

Dear Mr Plant,

Your letter of August 1 and September 18 arrived yesterday. It appears your letters are taking a long time now whereas they used to come through in from three to five days.

My grandson, Jonathan, will be pleased with stamps on this envelope as he is a stamp enthusiast. Several years ago I turned over to him a small collection that I had accumulated in prior years.

I believe that we will be able to make practically all of the changes that you have suggested in these two letters but will have to wait until I can muster a meeting of our standard committee which is going to be hard to accomplish before the big meet at Columbus, Ohio.

The ABA Standard does have a description of the Cuckoo color pattern. It is listed as Barred as in Cuckoo.

I also wish to refer you to the self blue color pattern which would probably fit your requirements and am going to set up a self blue color pattern which can be added to the other varieties previously sent to you. This would give you two different color patterns to exhibit the blues under and eliminate squabbles among the exhibitors who prefer one of the other blue patterns.

About a year and one-half ago, my ophthalmologist changed my eye drops from the same kind you are presently using to TIMOPTIC 0,25% manufactured by Merck Sharp & Dohme, West Point, Pa. I use one drop in each eye morning and evening and after starting to use them had a slight improvement in my vision. Since then I have heard of several persons who have been changed to these drops by their doctor who report varying degrees of improvement in their vision.

There will be no problem in the use of items in our glossary provided you give credit to the American Bantam Association when you use them.

You are correct in assuming that an adult male showing spur buds but really no length of spur would be a defect rather than disqualification in this breed. Other breeds ( page 283) would require disqualification.

I am addling the following variety of the Pekin Bantam and suggest you do the same on your copy of the material I sent you.

SELF BLUE PEKIN BANTAM

COMB, FACE, WATTLES AND EAR LOBES: Bright Red

BEAK: Yellow, shaded with black

EYES: Red

SHANKS AND TOES: Yellow, black shading permissible; bottoms of feet yellow, plumage same as balance of plumage

PLUMAGE: Refer to self blue color description.

I have made all the changes you suggested except the eye color which in our standard will appear as Red only. We have a policy which cannot be deviated from in halving but one eye color in any variety, If you wish to make an exception to this in the material you are distributing to your members, that is your prerogative.

I admire your courage in the face of adversity and encourage you to STAND FAST with the descriptions we have jointly agreed upon. You will find that, once this is in print, the objections will melt away and disappear over a period of time.

Keep a stiff upper lip.

With respect to the Australorp as bred in Australia, I would appreciate your referring to our standard descriptions and informing me just what differences occur, as you breed them, and as they are described. With respect to Mrs Banning, she forwarded me a large amount of material which I have used to describe several European breeds. In the past, I have set up standards descriptions proposed by her and simply had them included in our standard without additional correspondence. I am following the same practice this time. I have completed ten European breeds for the fifth edition. Mrs. Banning’s address is as follows:

A. C. Banning - Vogelpoel
Steenweg 16
4181 AL Waardenburg, Netherlands

Mrs Banning has recently (1978) published a book titled Kippen houden als liefhebberij which has a number of color illustrations principally done by A. O.Schilling and which have appeared in the past in many of our books on poultry.

I will write you separately on the Australian Pit Game Bantam at later time.

Kindest regards,