April 21, 1939 – June 24, 2022
A 61-year romance ended when Darrell Wilson Pidgeon, 83, of Parker, Colo., passed away June 24, at The Denver Hospice. Darrell was the husband of North Scott graduate Ann Lage. The couple met in a cattle barn when both were showing at the 1961 National Dairy Cattle Congress in Waterloo, when Ann was a senior at North Scott.
Darrell was born to Leonard Wilson Pidgeon and Thelma Gumley Pidgeon in Wilmington, Ohio.
Darrell parlayed the purchase of two Guernsey heifers when he was a 10-year-old 4-H boy into a lifetime career in the dairy cattle industry. After graduating from Wilmington High School, where he played baritone horn in the marching band, he received his BS in dairy science from The Ohio State University. Darrell paid his way through OSU traveling across the country –- often by boxcar -– working a fitter and showman.
Darrell gained a keen eye for good cattle, which translated to his winning the national collegiate dairy judging contest as a member of the OSU dairy judging team in 1964 and receiving the Dairy Shrine Kildee Scholarship for graduate study. He used the scholarship to obtain a master’s degree in dairy genetics from the University of Missouri, and joined American Breeder’s Service as a young sire analyst.
Darrell and Ann were married Sept. 27, 1969, at First Presbyterian Church, in Davenport, and spent part of their honeymoon riding in a boxcar with nine Holstein heifers from Wisconsin to the Western National Holstein Show in San Francisco. The couple moved to Colorado in 1973 –- never expecting to still be there 50 years later -- when Darrell became a partner and herd manager at Paclamar Farms, Louisville.
Darrell was introduced to the cattle export business when the Paclamar herd was sold to an Italian businessman, and he rode in the plane with the cows when they were flown from Denver to Rome. For the next 25 years, Darrell pioneered a global movement of dairy animals to countries with great need to improve their dairy herds and milk production. Working with Dave Bachman, Sheyboygan Falls, Wis., he arranged the export of U.S. Holstein heifers to Eastern Europe when trade was just opening with those Communist countries. Darrell vividly recalled armed soldiers always met the cattle planes when they landed in Budapest, Hungary, and intently watched him and the plane until the American cattle were unloaded.
Darrell had a groundbreaking opportunity with the Inter-American Development Bank in l977, when the bank launched Prodel, an ambitious project to provide a more wholesome and stable milk supply to Mexico City. Darrell traveled with Prodel officials and Mexican dairymen to select 24,000 bred heifers from the U.S. and Canada, opening new markets for high-quality grade North American heifers. Darrell and Ann returned to Colorado in 1980 and formed their own export entity, Pidgeon Cattle Co., focusing on exportation of live Registered Holsteins to the Asian market.
In September 2021, Darrell was recognized by the National Dairy Shrine as a Dairy Pioneer for his entrepreneurial work in the dairy cattle export business that helped open and develop markets for U.S. Holstein cattle around the world. The Missouri Hall of Dairy Honors recognized Darrell for his Meritorious Service to the dairy industry in January 2022.
Darrell is survived by his wife, daughter Marla and her partner Amy Hagerman, Denver; son Andrew and his wife Kelly and their two sons Graham, 10, and Brady, 7, McLean, Va.; his sisters-in-law and brothers-in-law Richard and Jane McCurdy, Goodyear, Ariz.; Dean and Karen Potratz, Pewaukee, Wis.; and Janie Pidgeon, Wilmington; nephews John Potratz, Brooklyn, N.Y.; Daniel Potratz, Waukesha, Wis.; and Kyle Pidgeon, Wilmington, Ohio.
He was preceded in death by his parents and a brother Phillip Pidgeon, all of Wilmington.
In lieu of flowers memorials can be made to National Dairy Shrine, Ft. Atkinson, Wis.; United Church of Christ, Parker Hilltop, Parker, Colo.; The Denver Hospice, Denver, Colo.; or the Junior Dairy Show at the Colorado State Fair, Pueblo, Colo.
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