July 11, 1985

Dear Mr. Plant:

Yes, I received your book on the Origin, Evolution and Distribution of Domestic Fowl  and Chicken Bone Recoveries. I must confess that I glanced briefly at it, wrote down a book review which I published in the American Poultry Historical Society’s newsletter and have intended to go back and read it in greater detail. As of now I have not done so. I think you have taken on a tremendous project there to collect and consolidate some very interesting material. I’m certainly glad to see you do it. It is going to be a great building block when you get it all put together. It sounds like your contact in China has been quite beneficial to you and I trust you will be able to hold that party’s interest over a period of time because I believe a lot of things are just beginning to open up in China.

The 1985 edition of the American Standard of Perfection, again in color, is on the presses. I’ve been quite involved in getting that thing put to rest.

I’ve also been very busy trying to get my own affairs in order prior to retiring in September of this year. In that connection, I am attempting to catalogue and classify and sort through some 16,000 pieces of poultry literature in my basement. There are obviously some duplicates there which I will be offering to whoever is particularly interested. If you have some friends that are collecting poultry literature, you might have them drop me a line indicating what they are specifically interested in. Should I come across it, I will be glad to contact them.

You raised the question regarding the American Bantam Association and Fred Jeffrey. Yes, Fred is stepping down after 10 years. He’s done an excellent job of being the prime mover in the American Bantam Association. I have been contacted relative to being Ns successor but I have promised myself that I’d get current with more of these little personal jobs of mine than I am at the moment before I take on any additional projects.

Mr Gary is a very hard-working individual but of very advanced age. He is hampered by being almost totally blind. I think this is a case of the American Bantam Association would do well to get Mr. Gary to train a successor but enable him to step down gracefully knowing that somebody else would be filling his shoes. I sort of have the feeling that after a person has done a job he is entitled to do a bit of kibitzing from the sideline. I think maybe that is the position Mr. Gary should take at this time because he has certainly given more than expected service to the American Bantam Association. No organization should get the feeling that it is dependent on one individual to make it go so we do need to think about some turnover from time to time.

I’m not attempting to raise very many chicks this year but I do have a few little Cochins to command my attention from time to time. Now that they are about half grown, they are as you know in some of their cutest stages of development.

Did I send you a copy of the 1984 revision of my Bantam circular which is NCR #209. If not, I’ll be glad to send it to you as I feel that our artists in ag journalism at the University of Wisconsin did a rather nice job of copying the likeness of several breeds of bantams. Drop me a line when you have time and perhaps in the future I’ll be able to do a little better job of staying current with our correspondence. It is always a pleasure to hear from you.

With best personal regards, I am sincerely yours,

John L. Skinner
Poultry and Small Animal Specialist