Have you ever wondered where the expression, “running around like a chicken with its head cut off” comes from? Most chickens can still roam around for a few minutes without their head. This was well known in the United States during the 19th century. To date, the longest a chicken has survived without a head is almost two years.
The record goes to a chicken named Mike who lost his head 75 years ago in Fruita, Colorado.
On September 10th, 1945, Lloyd Olsen’s wife told him to go get a chicken from their backyard. Lloyd chose one of his chickens named Mike who was five and a half months old. Lloyd swung the ax at Mike’s head but missed the jugular vein. The head fell off but most of Mike’s brain stem and one ear remained. Lloyd’s cat ran off with Mike’s head while he was still scampering around. Mike refused to die. So Lloyd decided to make Mike a pet. He fed Mike some worms and milk water with an eyedropper.
Lloyd couldn’t believe how lucky his chicken was and set out to make him famous. Many people in town didn’t believe Llyod had a headless chicken. They thought it was a hoax just like flying saucers. Lloyd didn’t like being called a liar so he took Mike to the University of Utah. The University people figured out that a blood clot had stopped Mike from bleeding out. Mike still had all his basic functions like a heartbeat. Heck, even without his head he was healthier than most chickens in Utah. It was living proof that someone didn’t need a brain to live. Mike became an overnight sensation and was renamed Mike the Headless Wonder Chicken.
Mike the Headless Wonder Chicken hit the road and toured sideshows along with the cutest little two-headed baby that anyone had ever seen. Admission only cost a quarter in those days and Mike raked in more than $4000 a month. Many people tried to copy Mike. There was a rash of chicken beheadings but none of them lived longer than a few days. Mike’s value skyrocketed to ten thousand dollars. Lloyd even made Mike another dried chicken head for the road. Mike was so popular that he picked up a few modeling jobs and even posed for Life and Time magazines. Mike had a taste of fame that most of us could only dream of. He gained a few pounds and spent his time pecking around joyfully without his head. A close friend even commented on Mike’s success.
“He was a big fat chicken who didn’t know he didn’t have ahead.”
Sadly, Mike passed away at the tender age of 23 months in a motel room in Phoenix, Arizona. It was as if a million chickens cried out at once that day. Mike got a kernel of corn stuck in his throat and died. We’ve all been there. Lloyd had forgotten the eyedropper at the last sideshow. Lord only knows why Lloyd didn’t bring an extra eye dropper.
Mike’s memory lives on in Colorado with the annual Mike the Headless Chicken Day every third weekend in May. There’s a 5k chicken race, egg toss, and chicken bingo. Even though my second-grade Catholic school teacher, Sister Nancy Jean, said chickens can’t go to heaven. She never said anything about a headless wonder chicken named Mike.