Going to the dogs in Palmerston North
Dogs are said to be a human’s best friend, and for the past 145 years, they have wagged many a tale,
Letter to the editor, February 15, 1910: ‘‘Sir, as one who sincerely appreciates the Square gardens, I write to protest against the moist-chinned idiots who take their dogs with them into the reserves.
‘‘Last evening, Sunday, I counted no less than five dogs at the one time chasing and tearing around, (when) they were not making a convenience of the flower beds ... They were not even decently-bred dogs, but composite mongrels that were not fit for shark bait.’’
I am, etc: DOG FANCIER. They’ve got character and photographic good looks, but dogs have barked and sparked many a heated debate through Manawatu¯’s news history, often to hysterical, hyperbolic levels.
Manawatu¯ Times editorial, January 2, 1878 (abridged): ‘‘There is one great evil in this town – that is, the introduction of ferocious dogs into places where dogs were never intended to be admitted. Anyone visiting our places of worship will notice numbers of them there, some seemingly well disposed and others quite the reverse, oftentimes causing serious interruptions during the service and ending invariably in an attempt by someone to put the intruders outside. At the funeral on Sabbath afternoon, a few wildlooking brutes took up a position near the grave and kept up a continual growl ... such a state of canine morals should not be tolerated any longer. We trust that the owners of dogs will in future consider the old adage: a place for everything and everything in its place. Dogs are not in place at church or funerals.’’
Manawatu¯ Standard, February 17, 1913: Dogs were starting to be registered and taxed two shillings and sixpence, but not everyone readily agreed with this. At a Pohangina County Council meeting, the clerk confided that, when approached for the tax, owners said they would destroy their animals; but he’d pointed out that even if they did so, ‘‘they would still be liable for the current year’s registration’’.
During the 1930s, stray alsatian dogs were causing havoc around the city and environs.
In Parliament, Sir Francis Bell announced on July 26, 1934, that ‘‘a large number of women and children lived in terror of attacks from the alsatians,’’ and there was serious talk of sterilising these dogs.
The Manawatu Kennel Club protested to the city council about the ‘‘victimisation’’ of alsatians because of all the bad publicity.
The council replied that its chief desire was to regulate dogs within the business area and ‘‘see that citizens were protected from vicious dogs’’.
By January 15, 1937, however, R. Emmett, registrar of dogs for the Palmerston North City Council, was declaring ‘‘there are fewer stray dogs about now than for some considerable time’’.
It had been his job to arrange capture of these dogs.
Mr Emmett quoted a Hamilton friend who had said Palmerston North was the cleanest city in that regard he had seen in New Zealand.
He had thought there would be far more dogs about, considering it was in the middle of a farming district. But ‘‘he was amazed when I told him that 900 dogs were registered in the city, and about 200 were destroyed each year’’.
The canine conundrum wasn’t totally gloomy. In the Standard of March 27, 1931, a cable piece from England under the headline ‘‘Menus for dogs’’ told this unusual story:
‘‘Dogs’ dinners – two pence for small ones, three pence for large ones and four pence for outsizes’ is the wording of a notice displayed outside a restaurant opened in London by Mrs Hugh Gillilan, sister of Viscount Scarsdale.
‘‘Mrs Gillilan showed a screenedoff corner where customers’ dogs are taken to dinner, and given only the best English food – brown bread, raw meat and vegetables.
‘‘There are some mistresses who like their dogs to eat what they are having, so we serve their dogs with a cut off the same joint,’ she declared.’’
And on December 23 of the same year, the newspaper ran a story about a luxury ‘‘hotel’’ in Chicago for stray dogs and cats, which had cost £14,500, and featured private compartments and baths.
‘‘On the first floor are cages for dogs and stalls for horses; on the second are private pens for dogs. There are two gleaming white bathtubs and bars of fragrant soap on the first floor. 350 dogs may be accommodated.’’
During the late 1920s and
‘‘There are some mistresses who like their dogs to eat what they are having, so we serve their dogs with a cut off the same joint.’’
The Standard of March 27, 1931
through the 1930s, movies about hero dogs were well-patronised in Palmerston North.
At the Palace Theatre, Coleman Place, on May 22, 1926, the greatest canine actor of the day, Rin Tin Tin, was starring – as a wolf -- in the movie Tracked in the Snow Country, although he shared the bill with a live onstage magic act by Chun Yuen Tai and Wong Pat See, the ‘‘Chinese wonder workers’’.
Rin Tin Tin’s real-life story was as exciting as any movie. He’d been rescued as a puppy from a bombedout site in Germany by an American soldier, Lee Duncan, during World War I, and brought back to Los Angeles. There, Rin Tin Tin’s extraordinary intelligence brought him a long movie career.
Another dog movie star was ‘Lassie’, debuting in Lassie Come Home at the Regent Theatre on January 25, 1945. Lassie was actually a male collie named Pal, who would go on to appear in another six movies to local and worldwide acclaim.
Other dog film stars came and went, but no-one could compare to Rin Tin Tin and Lassie at Palmerston North’s box office.