German
Beauty Homer
The German Beauty Homer was developed in the early 1900's by German fanciers who treasured their birds for physical beauty as opposed to strictly flying ability. A thin-necked, straight-legged bird of medium size and horizontal carriage, the German Beauty's most remarkable characteristic is its massive, almost semi-circular head with straight lower mandible of almost equal substance as the upper beak. The breed was originally known by its German name of "Schonheitsbrieftauben" which literally means "letter pigeons of beauty". "Brieftauben" is the German word for homing pigeons, literally "letter pigeons". As the story goes, the breed obtained its present name "Deutsche Schautauben" or "German Show Pigeon" when Hitler nationalized all German homing pigeons for the war effort. By designating it a show pigeon rather than a homer the German fanciers were able to avoid losing all their stock to the German war machine. Most of the current stock in the USA goes back to a number of imports from Germany and Switzerland made by Dr. K. Robert Durig of the University of Louisville in the early 1970's, although there were earlier importations by Leroy Tharp of Mississippi and George Lander of New York State.
Since the start of the new millenium, there have been some more German imports that have greatly impacted the breed. The "newer" type consists of a bird that is slightly more downfaced than before, with an even more powerful head. Body type, station, and other breed characteristics remain unchanged.
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