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RIP to an old dog man

Discussion in 'Chit Chat' started by slim12, Dec 7, 2021.

  1. slim12

    slim12 Super Moderator Staff Member

    Howard passed. He was the man that turned me onto the dogs when I was 10-11 years old. Times were different back then. He would sit on a five gallon bucket with one dog on the treadmill and his son walking a dog around a bean/tobacco field. On the way back his son would blink the flashlight and I would get the next dog off the mill and make the track around the field. It was affectionately called the 'five gallon bucket' keep by the locals. Howard would drop us three-four-five dollars after a work out, $5 if we jogged around the field. $5 in rural NC as a ten year old is Bezos/Musk type money. I may as well have been a billionaire.

    Howard was loud, obnoxious, rude, crude and socially unacceptable. He was brutally honest when it came to the dogs and the dogs in sport. Most everything else he lied about. If we walked down the dog food aisle in a grocery store he would point at a bag/can of food and say, "I bred and raised that dog right there and sold him for $$$$". A harmless lie, but a lie the same. His own mother said he would rather 'stand on a telephone pole, one legged in the high wind and tell another lie so he would not have to stand on the ground to tell the truth'.

    If he walked on your dog yard and you had trash dogs or you did not keep things up as they should, he would let you know. So much so he was not invited back to most places he went. If you went with him somewhere it was often said, "Son, you are welcome back anytime, but don't bring that gray headed sonofabitch with you".

    A guy once bested his dog in a roll and then commenced to doing the shit talking to any and everyone who would listen. It was getting around pretty fast. Howard loaded up the same dog and drove to the guy's house, knocked on the front door and told him the shit talking stops now. Walked his dog around the corner and let him go. He hit a dog in this guy's yard, a really nice neighborhood, and two pit dogs were doing the do with a neighbor cutting his grass next door. The shit talking stopped.

    As this semi-eulogy paints him in a bad light for most, I will say he was always good to me and he was good for the game. He was the best ref ever because he loved the dogs and no one loved him. He was fair and strict and no side ever gained an advantage. After the show if he thought your dog was trash and you were a shitty handler the whole world would soon know.

    At his house he had 10-12 dogs who were on their way to the show or on their way to their next show. No brood dogs and no stud dogs. Only match dogs that were open to the world 24/7/365. He had sons and daughters off Red Boy. He had dogs off Molly Bee. He got locked up twice, once with the most famous breeder in the world. He once spent a couple weeks out west with Don Mayfield. He came home with some of that old family blood and at the end of the day he told one of his biggest, "I showed that sonofbitch how to work a fucking dog".

    A character. Some like him. Most hated him. And I loved him.

    RIP old man.
     
  2. Michele

    Michele CH Dog Super Moderator

  3. San Siro

    San Siro Big Dog

  4. che

    che Top Dog

    Rest in Peace Mr Legend. This how i call him after reading his manners the dogs and crap people. I handled many time at the same way like he did but the truth is most off the time a hard pill to swallow. Our world become a place where a plausible or entertaining lie is more welcome than the truth. Man would rather believe a lie than the truth because the truth require changes. Respect to the ones who speak the truth. Rest in Peace big DogMan
     
    ckBone and david63 like this.
  5. AGK

    AGK Super duper pooper scooper Administrator

    Rip
     
  6. wicked13

    wicked13 CH Dog

  7. bamaman

    bamaman GRCH Dog

    RIP .I lost one similar a couple years ago.
     
    david63 likes this.
  8. slim12

    slim12 Super Moderator Staff Member

    He is a 'local' they could write a book or make a movie out of his character.

    We drove from NC to Orangeburg, SC to the World Red Bone hunt when I was a kid. He had decent, decent at best coon dogs, and he was going there to pick up a dog he had bought. he did not have anything that was a Grand Nite CH or anything that would remotely resemble a dog of that caliber.

    We stopped about ten miles from O-burg, SC and was at smalltown full service gas station.

    To preface him a bit, he would include you in his lies and really put you on the spot.

    I am like 12-13 and the guy looks in the empty dog box and asks if we were going to the hunt. Howard said, "Going to the hunt? Hell we are going to win the hunt." So the guy asks where are the dogs.

    Howard says, " I don't ride my dogs around like everybody else, I flew mine in and they will be landing over at the Anderson, SC airport in a couple hours. Another absolute lie, but he tied it together by looking down at a 12 year old kid who was four or five hours from home and said, "Ain't that right Scott?".

    I had had this happen before so with no so much as a pause, "Yes sir, coming in at the Anderson airport in a little while". He then glanced at his son and he said, "Yes sir, we win everywhere we go".

    There are literally a thousand stories just like this.

    It is hard to hold a man in high regard that was pretty much telling a lie any time his lips moved, but........I did/.

    When he was in the Navy he was on a plane/military hop with Cassius Clay who would soon become Muhammed Ali. The first part was true as he had a 8X10 with them together. But the best part was, "He ain't shit, I backed that black bastard down".

    So these are the stories that we will be sharing over the next couple of days.

    S
     
  9. mistabonz

    mistabonz Top Dog

  10. bamaman

    bamaman GRCH Dog

    Lol dude I'm talking bout was in the Navy and a boxer.He picked me up one day an a I rode with him and wound up at his daughter's house and knocked her husband out cold lol and then pulls a 5 gallon bucket off the truck and waited for him to wake up and knocked him out again.This guy was quite the character also.
     
    david63 likes this.
  11. bamaman

    bamaman GRCH Dog

    Guys brother was there and he looked at him and said you want some to ? Guy was like Helll Naw
     
    80BOWTIE and david63 like this.
  12. Beartrap

    Beartrap Big Dog

  13. oldguy

    oldguy CH Dog

     
  14. reids skipper

    reids skipper CH Dog

    Sounded like a right character slim …. RIP dogman
     
    david63 and oldguy like this.
  15. oldguy

    oldguy CH Dog

    Enjoyed reading the eulogy @slim12, thanks for posting, sincere condolences on passing of your friend & mentor... RIP
     
    david63 likes this.
  16. patjr

    patjr Top Dog

    My condolence slim12 for the passing of your friend.... you've always shown appreciation towards him and acknowledge his guidance whereby sometimes the answer to a query is itself a question given to ponder as 'food for thought'. For me the light your painting in is full of color to match his character of 'spinning a line' to 'shoot from hip'. A timely and fitting occasion to put a name to the stories in remembrance....RIP
     
  17. Sleep

    Sleep Big Dog

    He's up there looking down on you and us all knowing we keeping the breed alive and strong....and he's up there with all the great dogs of the past....Rip from me and my family slim
     
    david63 likes this.
  18. Blackpoison

    Blackpoison CH Dog

    Rip old man

    Nice write up slim , was fun reading it.
    You should write books
     
  19. slim12

    slim12 Super Moderator Staff Member

    Thanks.

    He was good people.

    I thought about writing a book once but it would hard to get all that shit into one sock. When I got thru babbling about nothing it would like a volume of War and Peace. LOL

    S
     
    Blackpoison and Sleep like this.
  20. Sleep

    Sleep Big Dog

    Still be worth the read for sure
     

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