Beloved beagle champ Uno dies at 13
Popular pup won first at Westminster in 2008
Every dog might have its day, but not many ever had a night like this.
Cheered on by a roaring, packed crowd at Madison Square Garden, the playful beagle responded like a true champ.
“Ah-roo!” Uno bayed that evening, a decade ago. “Ah-roo!”
Uno, who became perhaps the most popular pooch to step into a dog show ring, has died. He was 13.
From a president to parades to ballparks, Uno charmed admirers wherever he wandered.
“He lit everyone’s fire,” longtime dog expert David Frei said. “It’s because he was exactly the kind of dog everyone could imagine on the couch next to them.”
Uno died Thursday at the 200-acre ranch where he lived in Austin, Texas. He was in good health until the last month or so when cancer advanced.
“Everybody loved him,” said Dan Huebner, who manages the ranch for Uno owner Caroline Dowell.
No beagle had won the prestigious Westminster Kennel Club dog show until Uno did good ol’ Snoopy proud, barking his way to the prized silver bowl in 2008. He was clearly the crowd favorite and fans exulted when he was picked, giving the 15-inch champ a standing ovation.
Uno soon was the first Westminster winner to visit the White House, with President George W. Bush and wife Laura meeting him in the Rose Garden and presenting him with a red, white and blue collar.
The tri-color package of personality later rode in a float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, took part in first-pitch ceremonies at Busch Stadium and Miller Park and even had his own bobblehead.
Uno spent years traveling, welcomed at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and hospitals across the country as a certified therapy dog.
Frei, the television voice of Westminster for more than a quarter-century, was Uno’s frequent companion on the road.
“There was never one like him,”
Frei said of Uno. “That’s no disrespect to all the other great dogs.”