#fred hirth

With temperatures near freezing one hundred years ago, Elsie Hirth, aged 51, and her daughter Antoinette, 37, drove all night from Grand Rapids, Michigan, to Cincinnati in search of a lost pet. In those days before interstate highways, when even federal routes outside cities were iffy, what domestic creature inspired such an arduous odyssey? No, it was not a pampered feline nor a prize-show pooch. Elsie and Antoinette sped through the darkness to Cincinnati in search of a Baltimore oriole they had named Hansi.

This was no wild goose – er, oriole – chase. Fred Biehl, a farmer in Bridgetown, had discovered an oriole on his property the day before. As a bona fide resident of the Western Hills, Fred tried to shoot the feathered intruder. Good thing he missed, because neighbors directed Fred to an article in the newspaper through which he learned that a man in Grand Rapids was offering a $1,000 reward for the safe return of his family’s wayward oriole. Based on the advertisement, this was no ordinary oriole.

“If you should see this bird hold out your hand so it will light on the top of your hand. Do not try to grasp it, as it will dodge and fly away.”

Fred Biehl, dollar signs before his eyes, fired off a telegram to the Michigander: “Your oriole found. Wire disposition.” The recipient of Fred’s telegram, by coincidence, was another Fred – Fred H. Hirth, in particular – proprietor of a stone-cutting business located along the banks of the Grand River. Mr. Hirth immediately wired back four telegrams of his own, providing detailed instructions on how to care for the bird if it was, in fact, Hansi. Those instructions probably involved firing up the radio. Hansi apparently enjoyed the musical broadcasts. The Flint, Michigan, Journal [17 December 1925] quoted Hirth at length about Hansi’s winning personality:

“The Baltimore oriole is the shyest of birds, but Hansi was different. When he was here, even if the house was empty, the house was full. He was the lovingest, most cheerful thing that ever lived. We never kept him in a cage, for we wanted him free to come to us when we were lonesome. He came to everyone – all they needed to do was to hold out their hand and call ‘Come, Hansi.’”

Mr. Hirth was, if not exactly wealthy, certainly more than merely comfortable. His offer of $1,000 in 1925 would be equivalent to more than $18,000 today. That kind of cash inspired a lot of amateurs to develop a sudden passion for ornithology and eager bounty hunters telegraphed the Hirth family with reports that turned out to be pigeons, robins and a dozen other non-oriole representatives of the avian family. The volume of mail and telegrams – most from cranks or gold-diggers – was so overwhelming, Mr. Hirth reduced his reward to $100 to discourage the greedier correspondents.

There is no question that Fred Hirth was a generous guy. When a local radio station broadcast his offer of a reward for the return of Hansi, Hirth sent them a check for $25 to cover the cost of airtime. The station donated that contribution to the local Audubon Society chapter. On hearing that some miscreant had shot a robin, Hirth posted a $10 reward for the identification and arrest of the perpetrator. When one reward-seeker, ignoring Mr. Hirth’s requirement that Hansi be returned alive, shipped a dead oriole, Mr. Hirth paid to have a taxidermist preserve it in a lifelike arrangement in memory of his lost Hansi.

Among the pile of letters claiming to have found Hansi, there were accusations of animal cruelty. What were the Hirths doing with a wild, migratory bird? Aren’t there laws against such things? There are, and there were. In fact, while news of the Hirths’ escaped oriole made headlines across the country, the Boston Transcript editorially disparaged the State of Michigan for allowing songbirds to be imprisoned without penalty. The Grand Rapids Press [21 December 1925] rose to the defense of its subscriber:

“Hansi was not caged. He was a deserted baby oriole left alone in the nest after all the family had flown south. He was sheltered and raised with the Hirth family, given ample opportunity to leave them in summer and proved there are exceptions to every rule by preferring domestic life.”

Because Hansi flew away from home in December, the Hirths were convinced that Mr. Biehl must have located their bird. Orioles migrate to the Carribean at the end of summer and so, the Hirths reasoned, the only oriole still in the Midwest in December must be Hansi

However, after their long nocturnal drive, Elsie and Antoinette found nothing but disappointment. Farmer Biehl, to save the women a long drive out to his home in the wilds of the Western Hills, directed them to the Hotel Sinton downtown, where he waited until midnight. When they did not arrive by then, he retired to his farm.

The two arrived at the hotel after 2:00 a.m. and early next morning discovered that the bird rescued by Farmer Biehl, although it was indeed an oriole, was not Hansi. According to the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune [18 December 1925]:

“’It isn’t Hansi,’ Mrs. Hirth said, after one look. ‘It is an oriole, but much bigger than ours and of a different color.’ They turned sorrowfully away and began their tiresome journey back to Grand Rapids, still weeping for ‘Hansi’.”

Within hours after the Hirths’ departure, the oriole that was not Hansi died at the Biehls’ homestead. According to the Commercial Tribune, the Biehl bird was buried on their property under a carefully chosen stone. One wonders if that stone might still be there. Most of the former Biehl farm is now a subdivision constructed along Biehl Avenue.

For the Western Hills Press, the year-old newspaper created to promote development of the West Side, the whole affair was hot stuff. Under a breathless headline (“Eyes Of The Nation Focused on Western Hills for a Few Days”), the paper related the gist of the Hirths’ quest and concluded:

“The Biehls have only the excitement and unusualness of the incident to remind them of a hectic forty-eight hours; but the whole country knows, through the Associated Press and the newspapers, the story of Hansi and of the strange bird that for a short period found haven at the Biehl home before its bird soul winged its way to the bird heaven. And the Western Hills came in for no end of national publicity.”