Devoted
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Sietos performs an energetic cleansing by lighting salt—a purification element—on fire like a candle. (illustration credit 37.2)
The only sign of Wilma’s difficult path is that she wears makeshift “shoes” to protect her feet, which Sietos treats with herbal poultices, and although her tongue still hangs out at a funny angle, “she’s so beautiful,” says Sietos. “She’s not perfect, but no one is. She’s been the best teacher I’ve ever had. She’s my main squeeze.”
HISTORY OF THE FIREFIGHTER’S BEST FRIEND Dogs have been a part of firehouses for more than 200 years. Fire departments depended on horse-drawn firefighting equipment, and dogs proved useful in keeping the horses calm. They would also be used to guard the stables and rid the firehouse of rodents.
Santina, pictured at the age of 21, inspired his owner to help rescue dogs across America. (illustration credit 38.1)
Santina
A NEW KIND OF MUSE MIXED BREED KENTUCKY
In January 1988, artist Mark Barone was walking to his church in Paducah, Kentucky, where he volunteered as a youth minister, when he passed an abandoned, boarded-up apartment building with a small German shepherd mixed breed sitting on the stoop. As he approached to pet her, the dog began to yelp in fear, so Barone continued on his way. But as he walked past her again on his way home, the dog followed.
After they had played together on his lawn for a while, Barone went inside, assuming the dog would go back home. Two hours later, with the temperature now hovering in the teens, the dog was still there, lying on the welcome mat. “I called my wife at the time and said, ‘What do I do?’ ” Barone remembers, “And she said, ‘Bring her in.’ And that was how we got Santina.”
Santina’s favorite place was by her master’s side. “She was around me 24/7,” says Barone. Santina and Rudy, a dog he adopted later, “were my stability and my foundation.” But a decade after Santina arrived, Barone’s marriage had ended in divorce, and he was drinking to excess. One night, as he sat drinking in a largely unfurnished house—“The one thing I asked for and got was my dogs”—he looked at the dogs and was gripped with fear, and then clarity. “Here they were, completely dependent on me, and I couldn’t take care of myself. How could I take care of them?” Barone remembers. “I got up and poured out all the liquor in the house. The next morning, I went to my first AA meeting.”
A sample of some of the portraits Mark Barone has painted of dogs euthanized in American shelters. (illustration credit 38.2)
Santina, along with Rudy, became a vital part of Barone’s recovery. “I would get up at 5 a.m. because they wanted to walk, and that became a walking meditation for me,” he says. “Without them, I would have been left to nothing but my own thinking, and my own thinking was so screwed up at that point.”
PAINTERS AND THEIR PETS
Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol both owned dachshunds. Picasso’s dog was named Lump, and Warhol’s were Archie and Amos.
Georgia O’Keeffe raised six chow chows during her life.
René Magritte and his wife raised canaries and a Pomeranian, Loulou.
In July 2010, at the age of 21, Santina died. “I was depressed for at least six months,” says Barone, who is now living with his partner, Marina Dervan. “Before her, I had never experienced the love of a dog,” says Dervan. “She changed my life.”
The couple could never have guessed how much. When Dervan began to research shelters online to find a new dog to adopt, she learned about the country’s euthanasia rate for unwanted pets. She told Barone they had to do something to educate people. The next morning, he presented a plan: He would paint 5,500 portraits—an approximation of the number of dogs euthanized each day in the United States—of those who hadn’t made it. They dubbed the project An Act of Dog.
While Barone works from pictures provided by rescue sites, Dervan, with their new hound-boxer mix, Gigi, by her side, is searching for a philanthropist or city to partner with to help house this memorial-museum. The Act of Dog Foundation aims to raise $20 million for organizations that have committed to making the transition to no-kill by adopting the No-Kill Equation—programs and services adopted and implemented by organizations that take steps to end euthanasia of animals—and to all other solution-oriented groups aiming to make American a no-kill nation.
“If Santina hadn’t followed me home, this never would have happened,” says Barone. “What she did for me in my life was so profound. She allowed me to find my calling.”
POKER FACE “Dogs Playing Poker” is one in a series of 16 oil paintings of dogs in human situations by Cassius Marcellus Coolidge, originally created for the advertising firm Brown and Bigelow in 1903. In 2005, two of the original paintings were sold for $590,400.
Resources
COMPANIONS FOR HEROES
www.companionsforheroes.org
1-866-701-7553
INFO@companionsforheroes.org
SURFICE DOG INITIATIVE
www.puppyprodigies.org
707-228-0679
PuppyProdigies@aol.com
ROSE BROOKS CENTER
www.rosebrooks.org
EDUCATED CANINES ASSISTING WITH DISABILITIES
www.ecad1.org
914-693-000 ext. 1950 or 1953
info@ecad1.org
COURTHOUSE DOGS
www.courthousedogs.com
celeste@courthousedogs.org
NUNEATON AND WARWICKSHIRE WILDLIFE SANCTUARY
www.nuneatonwildlife.co.uk
+44 (0)2476 345243
info@nuneatonwildlife.co.uk
DOBERMAN ASSISTANCE NETWORK
www.dobermanassistance.org
danboard@dobermanassistance.org
PILOTS N PAWS
www.pilotsnpaws.org
info@pilotsnpaws.org
BRUISED NOT BROKEN
www.bruisednotbroken.com
dave@bruisednotbroken.com
NATIONAL DISASTER SEARCH DOG FOUNDATION
www.searchdogfoundation.org
(888) 459-4376
Rescue@SearchDogFoundation.org
WHEELS OF PROGRESS
www.wheelsofprogress.org
(347) 645-3265
DOGS FOR THE DEAF
www.dogsforthedeaf.org
1-800-990-DOGS
info@dogsforthedeaf.org
CLOSE TO HOME ANIMAL RESCUE
www.cthar.org
PUPS ON PAROLE
www.lassenhumanesociety.com/pop.html
(530) 257-4555
lassenhumanesociety@yahoo.com
LILLY’S FUND
www.lillytheheropitbull.com
LillytheHeroPitbull@hotmail.com
AN ACT OF DOG
www.anactofdog.org
270-519-0967
info@anactofdog.org
Illustrations Credits
COVER: David duChemin. WILMA: col1.1 Brad DeCecco. AUTHOR: col2.1 Ellen Watson. CHEYENNE (1.1, 1.2, 1.3): The Washington Post/Getty Images. RICOCHET: (2.1) Splash News/Newscom; (2.2) AP Photo/Lenny Ignelzi. DEEDEE: (3.1) Brooke Lim; (3.2) Tao Chin Lim. SCHOEP (4.1, 4.2): Hannah Stonehouse Hudson. DOOGIE: 5.1 Linda Murphy. HOOCH: (6.1) Jay Town/AFP/Getty Images; (6.2) Jim Smith/AFP/Getty Images. HANK: (7.1) Photograph by Dale E. Smith, Courtesy Paw Prints the Magazine; (7.2) David A. Riffel. SHANA: (8.1) Sharon Cantillon/The Buffalo News; (8.2) Topps trading cards used courtesy of the Topps Company, Inc. For more information about the Topps Company, please see our website at www.topps.com. ROSIE: (9.1) Kelly Shimoda/the N. Y. Times/Redux Pictures; (9.2) Dale Picard; (9.3) Lu Picard. JASMINE (10.1, 10.2): Caters News/ZUMA Press/Newscom. WENDY (11.1, 11.2): Elaine Heath. SONNTAG: 12.1 Richard Olsenius/National Geographic Stock. BROCK: 13.1 Deborah L. Boies, co-founder Pilots N Paws. CHANCER (14.1, 14.2): Bill Simmons. WILLOW: (15.1) Dan Callister/PacificCoastNews/Newscom; (15.2) Karine Aigner/National Geographic Image Collection. HENRY: 16.1 Jane Walker. LUCA: (17.1) Josh Ferris/@joshferris on Twitter;(17.2) Brooke Slater. FAITH: (18.1) The Washington Post/Getty Images; (18.2) Stephen Holman/ZUMA Press/Newscom.
EFFIE: (19.1) Gary Path; (19.2) Maxine McClanahan. PEARL: (20.1) Kelly Morrison; (20.2) U. S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Justin E. Stumberg; (20.3) Eliot Crowley. CHASER: 21.1 Chris Bott/ZUMA Press/Newscom. DUTCHESS: (22.1) AP Photo/Al Grillo; (22.2) Newhouse News Service/Landov. IZZY (23.1, 23.2): Joe Vaughn. JAROD: (24.1) Photo courtesy of Nestlé Purina PetCare Canada/Purina Animal Hall of Fame™; (24.2) Randy Perreault. PICASSO: 25.1 Julia HahnGallego, sceno. LOUISE (26.1, 26.2): Abigail McGrath. BEAR: (27.1) Sarah Louise Chittenden; (27.2) Daniel L. Tatsch; (27.3) Daniel L. Tatsch. COOPER: (28.1) Mike Cole; (28.2) Steve Cole. ALFIE (29.1, 29.2): Courtesy of Victoria House Assisted Living. CASEY: 30.1 Jerri Kelly. WANG CAI: (31.1) TPG Top Photo Group/Newscom; (31.2) Pubic Domain, via Wikimedia Commons. HATTIE (32.1, 32.2): Tonya Werner. LILLY: (33.1) Dave Ferris, Littleton, MA; (33.2) Christine Spain. ROCKY (34.1, 34.2): Dawn Tibbetts. K’OS (35.1, 35.2): Greig Reekie/PURINA ANIMAL HALL OF FAME/Newscom. DINGO: (36.1) Robin Morrish; (36.2) Harry Taylor. WILMA: (37.1) Brad DeCecco; (37.2) Theron Humphrey/www.thiswildidea.com. SANTINA (38.1, 38.2): An Act of Dog Inc.
Devoted
38 EXTRAORDINARY TALES OF LOVE, LOYALTY, AND LIFE WITH DOGS
Rebecca Ascher-Walsh
Published by the National Geographic Society
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