Nowadays, everyone knows about Pudge the cat. But there aren’t many here today who remember Prince Frederick, the falcon.
Up until 1927, Bowling Green State University (BGSU) didn’t have a mascot of its own; they were called the Bowling Green “Normals” due to their dedication to training teachers. But in 1927, the falcon rose and in 1967, it was decided that it was about time that they got a falcon of their own.
However, falconry was not legal in Ohio at the time. You could only privately own a falcon if you had a scientific collecting permit, and so the university tried to get one. Dr. Elden Martin tried going through the Air Force Academy at the time, because they had falcon mascots, but that did not work out.
Eventually, they found a researcher with the Fish and Wildlife Service who had been studying falcons and was willing to help them out. The BG News at the time put an article about the falcons in the paper, which John A. Blakeman took as a sign that he should step forward.
“That’s when I read it in the BG News. ‘Five falcons coming to Bowling Green’. I looked around and found somebody to call, and found out it was all being done by the BGSU alumni association. They said they were going to house the falcons up at the zoo, and every football game they’d put one in a cage and then walk it around. And I said ‘No, no. That’s not how it should be.’” said Blakeman.
Blakeman transferred to BGSU from The Ohio State University (OUS) in the fall semester of 1968, wanting to become a biology educator. He had a heavy special interest in raptors, and had learned to be a falconer at OSU.
“They said, ‘Well, what do you know about it’ and I said, ‘Well, I actually have three falcons at the university right now, three Kestrel falcons, and I’m an expert on them. You can’t keep them in cages, they’ll break their feathers. If you don’t believe me, let me come over tomorrow with my falcon,’” said Blakeman.
So Blakeman did, and upon watching his skill in handling his falcon, the alumni office knew that they had found their main handler. Blakeman named their first falcon Prince Frederick, both as a regal spin on Freddy Falcon, and as a tribute to the Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II, who pioneered the field of falconry.
It took Blakeman about six months to fully train Frederick to get used to people by practicing in public and to learn to fly with a tether on. By the time they were on the field together, the man had become something of a mascot himself.
“Every morning at about 10 a.m., I crawled out of the field house, and walked out there, near the library and I would just stand there and walk around with the falcon, hundreds of kids going by”
Blakeman said that one of his favorite memories with Prince Frederick was helping to kick off the football games. As the team would run out onto the field, he and the falcon would be in front of them, Frederick on Blakeman’s hand, with wings outstretched.
After graduation, Blakeman went on to teach Biology at Perkins High School for over 30 years, and earned the 1987 award for Outstanding Biology Teacher in Ohio from that National Association of Biology Teachers. He is also a known expert in tall prairie growth, helped to legalize falconry in Ohio in 1983, and worked for NASA on maintaining the natural landscape at the Neil Armstrong Test Facility.
