MY INVENTION
Miss Ten was the only champion dog I ever owned. If it weren’t for Marshal Loftin, I would have never had one, but that’s a different story. Grinning Sue was a Charley-O setter I picked up from John O’Neal Sr. at his kennel in Hatchechubbee, and that’s another story too.
I registered her as Grinning Sue because she developed the habit, if encouraged, of rolling back her top lip and baring her teeth. It was always a fond moment of mine when I asked her to grin in front of a crowd of people. We would all get a laugh and Sue loved to perform. More about her in a moment.
Miss Ten was the first real running dog I ever had. Didn’t need a whistle, just a scout. She was exciting to watch, only hit home runs, or struck out, no in between. Fun times.
I was running her at Freddy Epp’s Blackbelt trial near Selma one fall under the wild eye of judge George Haney from California. (He’s a bunch of other stories.)
Ten was out front when I called point. George and I cantered our horses only to find Ten in a different spot, a few yards away. She was now pointed under a call back box dangling from a little live oak in a ravine, out of sight unless you were up on its bank. We arrived just in time to watch Ten root up a trio of quail. She’d point again and then send another bunch scattering into the Alabama sky. I jumped off my horse and caught Ten as she passed by looking for some more to run up. I collared her and made my way toward my lead rope. George yelled at me, “Don’t pick her up! I like her.”
I was 27 at the time, just married, broke and wanting to build a house. My wife and I scraped and saved little bits at a time and finally had walls and a roof but not much more. We needed cabinets. George had told me if I ever wanted to sell Ten, he would have a place for her. My wife thought it the perfect time to sell, so that’s what happened. It was enough buy cabinets and more.
When I looked into sending Ten to California that August I found out that the airlines wouldn’t ship animals unless the temperature was below 85 or some similar temperature. Um? I thought, I guess no cabinets till fall. As it turned out I had to wait a few weeks, but it all worked out well. (By the way, when she arrived after 20 hours of flight and layovers, George drove her to a trial, and she placed 2nd that same day.)
I’ve always been an optimist. No problem is without a solution. The airline rules about temperature got me to thinking about building an air-conditioned crate. I gathered some rigid foam board, about 2” thick, and fashioned a box the size of a regular crate. At the top of the crate, I added a compartment about 6” deep, much like boxes you’ve seen with storage on top. In the storage area, I installed 3” PVC pipe in a serpentine arrangement with one end turned up to draw in fresh air and the other end pointed down into the dog compartment. A little battery hat fan from Walmart was placed at the fresh air end and I packed ice all around the serpentine arrangement. My idea was to pull in fresh air, cool it as it passed around the curves of the pipe, thus sending conditioned air onto an awaiting passenger.
It took many months to progress from problem to idea and then to prototype. It was now July, and I was anxious. I imagined how nice it would be if it were built out of “Igloo” quality materials. Shining, in different colors, maybe kennel names embossed on the side. You could ship a dog in 100 degrees weather. Genius!!
But I couldn’t wait. It’s a Saturday afternoon and I had a funeral to attend. I was a pallbearer. But a genius never sleeps. I ran to the store and bought ice. Told my wife I would only be a minute. If she only knew our financial woes were soon to be cured. I got back and placed the box in the sun because I wanted a true test. Packed with ice and a battery turning the little fan, I stuck my hand in the box and felt the cool air pouring into the compartment. I was flush with excitement.
Sue would be the honored one. Might even name these boxes the Grinning Sue Crates. I whistled to her, and she knew to kennel into the box. She was white with lemon ears, and smart, a beautiful dog with a long silky coat. She never won a trial and couldn’t have pups, but you just don’t forget some dogs.
The funeral was a drawn-out event for an old aunt. People got up and recounted 90 years of woe. Some broke down and cried and had to be helped off to the side. I couldn’t leave because of my pallbearer duty and at the graveside service it all played out again. The hearse got stuck which added another hour to my suffering.
Four hours later, when I finally got back to Sue and the Grinning Sue Crate, I ran from my truck to the box. I heard the fan still running and was relieved to some extent. What I found next was neither discouraging nor encouraging. It was typical dog, typical love you despite the circumstances, typical Sue.
Removing the door of the box, my beautiful setter was drenched in cool water and lying in an inch more of the same cool water. Water was dripping off the end of Sue’s nose, but she did not seem to mind.
Condensation! I hadn’t thought of that. I laughed at Sue who knew nothing of my creative or financial struggles. She never knew I had failed. She just looked up at me and grinned that perfect grin that made everything ok
Related Aritlces
Twice Bitten
For a fourteen-year-old, truth can be illusive. In many cases it’s hard to sort out and in other instances it’s just as plain as the nose on your face. I do know one thing that was true; it was well into November, and it hadn’t rained in Amite County since July. The farmers had fed out all their hay and were hoping to get winter rye into the ground before the December frosts, but they needed a rain.
The Long Journey Home
It would have been different had Belle been at home. She would have found a safe warm spot near the hay loft. Randall would have looked in on her throughout the day, more than likely bringing her bits of leftover bacon and biscuits and making sure the pups had a clean place to be whelped. She was royalty at Bent Pine and didn’t kennel with the other dogs. She had the run of the plantation. Her favorite place to lie, be it summer or winter, was under the rail fence of the barn lot. There, she was shaded in the summer by huge spreading oak and beech trees. In the winter she was warmed by the sun shining through those same trees then leafless and unable to fend off the warm welcomed rays. She laid under the bottom rail that was positioned just right to offer a scratch to her long back whenever she chose to do so. It was perfect. The spot seemingly offered a respite, though actual work didn’t exist for Belle. Maybe she enjoyed the spot for reflection, that now, she had aplenty. From her favorite spot she could view anything approaching the main house, as well as view over a mile of cleared bottomland, a bottom that stretched eastward to the Black Warrior River and south for three miles farther than Belle could see from the rails even on a clear day.