99-year-old Elgin man trained pigeons for war, peace

Whether he was training pigeons to serve in World War II or sorting chicks, riding a bucking bronco or calling for bids at a livestock auction, Ed Schmidt's long life has often revolved around animals.

But the rural Elgin man never did achieve his childhood goal of becoming a veterinarian.

Schmidt, who will mark his 100th birthday on Sept. 16, was honored during Elgin's Memorial Day ceremonies this year as one of the last survivors of the U.S. Army's homing pigeon service. He was a leader of the Elgin Homing Pigeon Club for decades before he had to give up his own birds seven years ago.

But when friends gather to celebrate his birthday at a restaurant/bar where he has liked to hang out for decades - "it's like the TV show 'Cheers,'" he says - they will have a lot of other colorful parts of that long life to celebrate, too.

Schmidt said his interest in breeding, training and racing pigeons began when he was a child in Woodstock.

"A guy down the street had pigeons and showed me how to do it. Believe it or not, his name was Homer Mann." When the Schmidts moved to Elgin, 10-year-old Edwin started raising pigeons in a loft in his backyard and joined the Elgin Homing Pigeon Club.

When he was drafted into the Army on the eve of World War II, he was assigned to work with pigeons in the Signal Corps. Soon after Pearl Harbor was attacked, 24-year-old Ed Schmidt was sent to Hawaii to breed and train birds who could carry messages from troops on the front lines.

It was a proven technology, he said. When 500 men who would go down in history as "the Lost Battalion" had become trapped behind German lines during World War I, American artillery had accidentally begun shelling them. They desperately sent a message on the leg of a pigeon named Cher Ami, begging the cannoneers to stop. The Germans shot off one of the bird's legs and one of her eyes, but she made it 15 miles to the division headquarters, saving the surviving battalion members. Cher Ami later was stuffed and put on display in the Smithsonian Museum of American History.

By World War II, many Army units had portable "walkie-talkie" radios. But Schmidt said that sometimes hills or distance would block the signal from such radios. So G.I.s took along pigeons as a backup. Schmidt said that saved hundreds of Allied lives in 1943 on the Italian front when a brigade of British soldiers entered an enemy-held town ahead of schedule. They knew that American air forces were scheduled to bomb that town in a few hours, but they were unable to contact the American headquarters by radio. Finally a homing pigeon named G.I. Joe flew 20 miles and the bombing raid was aborted. After the war, the now-29-year-old Schmidt wanted to enter the University of Illinois on the G.I. Bill and become a veterinarian. "But I couldn't get in because my father had never gotten his citizenship papers" after immigrating from Germany, he said.

Instead, Schmidt took a course teaching how to tell male chicks from female chicks when they were nine hours old. He returned to Elgin to try a career as a "chick sexer" for hatcheries in the area. "I could sex nine to 12 birds a minute at a penny per chick," he said.

When the Kane County poultry industry moved to the South, Schmidt found his main career as district sales manager for a molasses company.

"I lived in airplanes for 34 years," he said. He retired in 1982 - a mere 35 years ago.

He began a side career when he accompanied a friend to a livestock auction at the Chicago Stockyards. When the auctioneer failed to show up, Schmidt volunteered to take his place. He turned out to have a talent for such work. He still occasionally calls auctions and prices antiques.

"Just two months ago he did an auction in Rockford," said his caretaker, Tina Chapman.

Meanwhile, he spent one summer with a friend rising Brahma bulls and bucking broncos on the rodeo circuit out West. And he always kept raising pigeons, training 60 or 70 at a time to fly home from hundreds of miles away and competing in races.

While he was still in Elgin High School, he said, he and his friend Ralph Walker raised one pigeon who flew 1,200 miles in two days and seven hours.

Schmidt said American pigeon fanciers have included Roy Rogers, Jimmy Doolittle, Terry Bradshaw, Mike Tyson and Willie Nelson. But he said America is unusual in not having lots of pigeon-racing fans.

"In Belgium pigeon racing is like baseball is here. It's popular all over Europe. Every year there's a race in South Africa and this year a man from Indiana won. He auctioned off the pigeon and it got $110,000. A lot of money is bet on pigeon races."

The sport is even more popular in Mexico than here, he said, and many of the Elgin club's members are now Mexican immigrants.

Unfortunately, Schmidt notes, his long-lived mental acuity was not shared by his wife Norma, whom he met a Schneider's Bowling Alley in downtown Elgin before the war. She died in 2008 after a 67-year marriage. For the last 17 years she was in a nursing home suffering from dementia.

"I visited Norma every day," he said. "By the end she was in a coma. One day I had an appointment with a lawyer. But something told me I had to go see her that day. When I went in, she opened her eyes, saw me, sat up, said 'I love you' and passed away."

They never had any children.

Ed Schmidt's key to living to 100?

"I never smoked in my life, I never had a drink and I never went out with girls. One of those is true - I never smoked," he jokes.

"Actually it's luck. I did have a cousin who lived to 105, and my dad was 89 when he died. But I'm gonna go to 150."