100 Dogs Who Changed Civilization (10 page)

Many authors suffer to gain literary fame, but few suffered as much as a poor nineteenth-century Canadian mongrel named Beautiful Joe. The dog lived in the town of Meaford, Ontario, and spent his early years in the clutches of a brutal, physically abusive owner who cut off his ears and tail. He was rescued in 1890 by a local woman, Louise Moore, who nursed him back to health—and, in spite of his appearance, named him Beautiful Joe. Not long afterward, Moore's fiancé's sister, writer Margaret Marshall Saunders, came to the little town for an extended visit. She was so moved by Beautiful Joe's heartrending story of survival that she decided to write a novel about him.

Actually, she decided to ghost author a book under his name. Using the peculiar device of writing as if her four-legged friend were telling the story—an approach pioneered with considerable success in the then-recently released
Black Beauty
—she penned an “autobiography” of the luckless canine called simply
Beautiful Joe
. Published in 1894, the book became an immediate sensation. It was the first Canadian book to sell
more than a million copies (sales surpassed seven million by the late 1930s) and was translated into more than a dozen languages. A sequel,
Beautiful Joe's Paradise
, was published in 1902.

In 1934 Saunders was made a Commander of the British Empire in recognition of her help in advancing animal welfare. The book's firstperson tone served to “humanize” the suffering of its animal protagonist in a way a more conventionally written account might never have done.

The story had a happy ending, both in literature and real life. After he escaped his brutal owner, Beautiful Joe lived a long and interesting life. He even got the satisfaction of bringing his former owner to justice by catching him in the act of breaking into a house. Today the town commemorates him with Beautiful Joe Park, located in the heart of Meaford, not too far from where Joe spent his happiest days.

Few great artists enjoyed the attention of a muse as constant and obedient—not to mention as hairy—as the one who helped make the career of William Wegman. The photographer is world famous for taking pictures of his pets—an entire platoon of dour, reserved-looking Weimaraners. His photos hang in cultural institutions around the world, including the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Wegman's foray into dog photography was accidental. Originally trained as a painter, he was teaching at California State University, Long Beach, when he acquired a hulking Weimaraner he named Man Ray, after the expressionist artist of the same name. At the time, Wegman was trying to shoot conceptual videos, and Man Ray kept barging into the scenes. Instead of shooing him away, the artist decided to let nature take its course and filmed the dog. Man Ray, with his deadpan expressions, turned out to be a natural. By the mid '70s Wegman's photos and videos gained both critical acclaim and a huge popular audience, appearing everywhere from exclusive gallery shows to
Saturday Night Live
and
The Tonight Show
.

Not surprisingly, the artist felt a bit nonplussed
that people only seemed interested in looking at snapshots of his pet. For a year he stopped taking Man Ray's picture. But in 1978, his faithful collaborator developed a severe case of prostate cancer—so severe that Wegman's vet recommended euthanasia. Instead, Wegman opted for aggressive treatment, and Man Ray survived. His master swore off his no-photos vow, and soon the Weimaraner was everywhere again. By the time of Man Ray's passing in 1982, he was such a fixture in the New York City art scene that the
Village Voice
dubbed him “Man of the Year.”

His work was carried on several years later, when Wegman acquired (and began to photograph) a female Weimaraner named Fay Ray. And when Fay had a litter of ten puppies in 1989, a franchise was born. Today Wegman's pack appears on everything from postcards to refrigerator magnets.

The nineteenth-century poet Lord George Gordon Byron was, by all accounts, quite a piece of work. A leading figure in the Romantic movement, he was a prolific writer who produced verse of undeniable genius. He even helped inspire his friend, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, to write
Frankenstein
during an impromptu ghost story contest.

But while his poems were sublime, his private and public existence were often ridiculous. Described by one of his many, many ex-lovers as “mad, bad, and dangerous to know,” he spent most of his short life living extravagantly, running up huge debts, enjoying erotic interludes with everyone from noblewomen to scullery maids, and participating, sometimes at great personal risk, in various European revolutionary movements. It was during one of these improbable adventures—fighting for Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1824—that he died of fever.

Among his many near-obsessive interests, Byron was a legendary lover of animals. He owned, at various times in his life, a badger, an eagle, a crocodile, a bear, and numerous other creatures. But no member of his vast menagerie was closer to his heart than a Newfoundland named Boatswain.

For a time, the two were inseparable companions. When the dog contracted rabies, Byron cared for him personally, disregarding the very real danger of being bitten. And when the animal died and was laid to rest, Byron authored one of his best-known works in honor of his friend. Called
Epitaph to a Dog
, its loving words could be applied to almost any faithful canine who has ever brightened a human life with his or her presence. It reads in part:

Byron's companion lies in Newstead Abbey in a grave marked with a monument that bears the poet's tribute—and which is larger than the monument over the grave of the poet himself.

Alexander Pope was one of the premier poets of the early eighteenth century. Though the casual reader might not know his larger works, such as
The Rape of the Lock
, almost everyone remembers his pithy witticisms and observations. It was Pope who invented such time-honored phrases as, “To err is human, to forgive, divine,” and “For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” But many of those remarks might never have been uttered without the timely intervention of Pope's Great Dane, Bounce.

Throughout his life, Pope always kept large dogs—usually Great Danes, usually named Bounce. They were part companions, part bodyguards. The poet's habit of attacking critics, other writers, and prominent professionals in his satirical works earned him a long list of ill-wishers, some of whom (Pope feared) might stoop to physical violence. And since Pope was only four feet, six inches (137 cm) tall and severely debilitated by a form of tuberculosis that attacks the spine, he wasn't a physical match for anyone. For this reason, according to his sister, he never went for walks without pistols in his pockets and his loyal dog Bounce at his side.

His vigilant canine companion did save his life one night, though not from someone he'd savaged in print. Pope's valet resigned unexpectedly and a replacement was quickly hunted down. But that very evening, Pope awoke in the middle of the night to find the new valet creeping up on his bed with a knife. Knowing the poet was too weak to resist, the man intended to kill him and steal the money Pope kept lying around the house. But the new valet hadn't anticipated the presence of Bounce, who sprang from beneath the bed, knocked the would-be killer to the floor, and summoned help with his thunderous barking.

With Bounce's help, Pope lived to write another day, and to make the following too-true observation: “Histories are more full of the examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.”