Registration for Fun Runs

Aug 4, 2023 | News

We are happy to announce that we will offer fun runs again this year for $10 a run! Fun Runs will start a 12pm both days. Registration for Fun Runs closes at 2pm each day. Runs may be completed after 2pm, but we will not accept additional walk-up entries after 2pm.
Please complete the following form FOR EACH DOG to reserve your spot and send payment either via PayPal to ekcmember@gmail.com (check Friends and Family) or bring cash/check onsite.
https://forms.gle/4iSJf2m9teS66n7x5
Dogs do not have to have an AKC registration to try a fun run. Dogs must be at least 6 months of age to participate. You can walk down the track with them and encourage them as necessary for these runs. First-timers are welcome!
The event is next weekend, August 12th and 13th at the Harborcreek Community Park, full event details are available here: https://www.eriekennelclub.org/fast-cat/
The track is enclosed with snow fencing and we will have a professional photographer, Emily Ferrans Photography on-site. Contact her for money-saving pre-order packages at e11.ferrans@yahoo.com

German Shepherd, becomes the 1st guide dog for a US citizen

Apr 25, 2023 | News

     On this day in 1928, Buddy, a German Shepherd, becomes the 1st guide dog for a US citizen Morris Frank.
Morris Frank was a blind man from Nashville. His father read him an article by Dorothy Eustis, a woman living in Switzerland who had seen shepherds training dogs to lead blind people get around. Excited by the idea, Frank wrote a letter to Eustis and received a response letter 30 days later inviting him to come see for himself. Frank then took a ship to Europe and trained extensively with a dog that had been bred specifically to lead a blind person. The training was hard, but after weeks with the dog, Frank could get around the nearby Swiss village holding tightly to a harness to which Buddy was strapped.
Morris Frank returned to America. From the day he got off the ship, he was successful. At one point, in front of a group of dumbfounded reporters, Buddy led Frank safely across a busy New York street. “I shall never forget the next three minutes, Ten-ton trucks rocketing past, cabs blowing their horns in our ears, drivers shouting at us. When we finally got to the other side, and I realized what a really magnificent job he had done” Frank later wrote.
When Frank returned to Nashville, people were amazed at the sight of the blind man and his dog successfully navigating busy sidewalks and couldn’t believe that it was the same blind boy they had so recently taken pity on. What amazed people the most was that Buddy had an ability best known as “intelligent disobedience,” which meant that he would obey Morris except when executing that command would result in harm to his master. If there was a low hanging branch ahead on the sidewalk, for instance, Buddy knew how to navigate around it to the point where Morris wouldn’t hurt his head on it.
About this time, Frank, Eustis and several others cofounded The Seeing Eye, an institution set up to train guide dogs and their blind masters. Today, the organization reports that it has, in its 80-year history, trained 14,000 dogs. Buddy is considered the first. In 1978, on the 50th anniversary of the founding of the school, the U.S. issued a commemorative stamp in honor of The Seeing Eye.
Source: wikipedia