Orpington

In the Orpington we have an English breed named after the village in Kent where the originator, William Cook, had his farm. He introduced the black variety in 1886, the white in 1889 and the buff in 1894. Within five years of the original black Orpington being introduced exhibition breeders were crossing Langshan and Cochin and exhibiting the offspring as black Orpingtons, the birds fetching high prices, and attracting many for their immense size. But this crossing at once turned a dual-purpose breed into one solely for show purposes, and it has remained so until today. A late introduction, the Jubilee Orpington, is now rarely seen.