Sgt-Marks-A-Lot makes my day again with another great animal tale . . .this one made me cry!


My folks were off in their pickup/camper up in the Canadian Rockies for a couple weeks one summer. Brother and I were holding down the family fort (near Portland, OR) we were both working summer jobs (I was in college & brother was in HS). A friend bicycled over to our house and while passing through town he stopped and petted a dog that had no collar and seemed to be abandoned. This dog trotted behind him 4 miles as he rode to our house. This dog was a spayed female German Shorthair and looked to be maybe 1-1/2 years old, a purebred dog but on the small side for this breed, maybe 35 lb. She was perfectly proportioned and was very sweet dog but had clearly been abused and would slink and tremble whenever anyone talked in a loud voice.

My friend asked if we would care for the dog while he convinced his mother to take the dog in. His mother was pretty cold blooded and after a week he let us know that it wasn't going to happen.By this time we had named her Queenie and she was getting along well with our old Brittany Spaniel and fit in at the house like she had always been there. Queenie had no objectionable traits at all, no messes, didn't get car sick, loved to go on walks but almost always stayed within sight and was very good about coming when called.

She was timid around other dogs and actually seemed to prefer human company. Later I discovered that she was horribly gun shy which may have been why she had been beaten by her prior owner. If you just brought a gun into the room she would cower and tremble uncontrollably.

The folks came home from vacation and my mother came unglued. "What are you thinking of, we don't need another dog. Someone wants this dog back, we'll call the humane society and put an ad in the paper. Don't get attached to it, this dog is going back to her owners!"Within a few days she fell in love with Queenie and after two weeks announced that no one had phoned about the ad and there were no reports of similar lost dogs at the humane society so she could stay. Queenie became my parents favorite.

After a couple of years my father was transferred to Omaha, Nebraska and they reluctantly moved to the midwest. I stayed in the NW to continue college.So far this is just a stray dog tale but now comes real story.

My folks moved to a suburb on the outskirts of Omaha. Each evening they would load Queenie into the Olds and drive her a short distance to a new subdivision where there were no houses with the lots bordered by corn fields. The streets were in, but the lots were overgrown with tall grass and weeds. They would walk along the paved street in a pattern to get a one mile walk in and Queenie would run in the grass and brush following scents, chasing rabbits and occasionally flushing quail or pheasants.

They had been going there for 6 months when one night, near dusk in the early spring Queenie just disappeared into thin air. They searched and called for her for 45 minutes until it got dark but she had simply vanished. They were really upset about this and for the next 9 days they came every evening and walked the normal circuit calling and whistling for her, but no Queenie.

On day 10 a workman was mowing along the road with a tractor and deck mower. They had seen him before and flagged him down to ask if he had seen Queenie. He told them no but then he mentioned that earlier that evening he had heard a dog barking far off, real quiet. Dad went to a storm drain, got down on his knees and called for Queenie. In about a minute she trotted up about 10 feet beneath the grate and began barking frantically.After carefully searching the area where Queenie had disappeared they found a manhole with no cover in a patch of thick brush. She had evidently been running and fell into the opening, falling 10' to the bottom of the concrete storm drain pipe and was trapped there.

The mower guy got some rope and Dad climbed down and fashioned a crude sling that they were able to hoist her out with. She had lost 7 lbs. and her nails were worn completely down to the pulp probably from desperate attempts to leap to freedom. My folks figured that water must have been trapped in low spot somewhere in the system or she wouldn't have survived. A real close shave.

Queenie recovered with no adverse effects and went on to live for 9 more years and moved with them back to the NW when my Dad retired. Queenie accompanied me on many memorable backpacking trips over the years and was always a perfect companion. She was a real sweetie. --Posted by Sgt Marks-a-lot