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AURORA – Alton Heimes is a fast talker when the time calls for it – and his speedy speaking skills have led him to quite an honor.
The 78-year-old Hartington man was recognized Saturday, April 27, as a 2024 inductee of the Nebraska Auctioneers Association Hall of Fame. The ceremony took place during the organization's annual convention in Aurora.
Heimes described himself as feeling “pretty proud and lucky” to have had a long career as an auctioneer and to be honored by his peers for it.
He found out about the Hall of Fame honor on April 19 – the same day he and his wife, Sharon, celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary.
“I was surprised,” Heimes said. “I just didn't really think this was ever going to happen to me.”
Heimes has been an auctioneer since 1968. He also has been a member of the Nebraska Auctioneers Association for more than 50 years.
He has enjoyed the camaraderie with people he has met through his career as an auctioneer, adding putting on a good auction comes with a certain satisfaction.
“The people that you had the auction for were well-satisfied the way you ran the auction and what you did for them – you come home with a satisfied ego to do it again,” Heimes said.
He enjoyed watching the auctioneers work the crowd.
“My dad and I went to some farm auctions years ago,” Heimes said, noting a couple of Hartington auctioneers inspired him. “Listening to Ferdie Peitz and Gerry Miller selling – it just kind of intrigued me.”
Heimes later told his father, Albert, that he thought he could be as good an auctioneer as Peitz and Miller someday.
Heimes' father encouraged him – a 1963 graduate of Holy Trinity High School in Hartington, the school's last class before it was renamed as Cedar Catholic – to attend auctioneering college, which is what Heimes did in 1968 in Mason City, Iowa.
However, before he set foot on the auctioneering school's campus the fall of that year for a two-week session, he received a 33-revolution-per-minute record of vocal exercises – tongue-twisters and bid-calling number drills – to listen to and practice during the spring and summer.
One tongue-twister that Heimes had to practice saying repeatedly was, “A big brown bug bit a big brown bear.”
“They had also little books that you could read these same little sayings (in),” Heimes said. “That's how I practiced until I went to school.”
He noted he was auctioneering “pretty good” by the time he was done with his training.
Heimes owned his own auctioneering business – Heimes Auction Company – from the late 1960s to the late 1990s before joining forces with Gerry Miller, Ryan Creamer and Roger Jansen and creating a business called MCHJ Auctioneers.
Over the years, Heimes, Creamer and the other area auctioneers went their separate ways, and Heimes had his own company again by 2021.
“Ryan and I work together like we always did,” Heimes said. “Ryan is the main spoke in the wheel. Him and his boys – they do the bigger share of the auctioneering, but if they need help, I'm right there. I can sit in and do it.”
Heimes estimated he has called more than 3,000 live auctions – including farm, household and antique sales – during his career, including ones that featured livestock at the Laurel Sales Company barn for about 25 years, which he stepped down from in 2015.
“With the Creamer boys, they’re really busy,” Heimes said. “I can auction just as much as I want to. We average over a sale a week, I know that. Once in a while, we have two besides the online auctions that they have.”
He said he will continue his auctioneering career for as long as he can.
“As long as I feel good and I’m healthy, I don’t feel like quitting,” said Heimes, who has four children, 10 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. “I’ll just kind of keep tagging along.’’
He again noted his appreciation to his peers for honoring him as a member of the Nebraska Auctioneers Association Hall of Fame.
“I’m just thrilled to death that they think I’m worthy of this award,” Heimes said.
