THE POLICE DOG IN AMERICA*

By WALTER A. DYER 1915

Photographs by Walter F. Loomis and the author

Given a burglar or hold-up man with the thief's natural fear of a wide-awake and powerful dog, and given a dog trained to patrol the back yards of a suburban neighborhood and to attack on suspicion, and you have a combination bound to result in a decrease of crime. Yet the police dog idea has been slow to take hold in this country in spite of the success of the single experiment of any consequence that has been made here.

A few years ago, at about the time when the German shepherd dog began to attract the attention of American fanciers, illustrated articles on the police dogs of Europe appeared in a number of periodicals, and a good deal was heard about the desirability of adding dogs to our American police forces; but except for tentative experiments made in New Haven, Conn., and Glen Ridge, N. J., New York is the only American municipality that has made any fair test of a dog squad as a part of its police force. And even this test has been attended by remarkable indifference, both popular and official, in the face of the conclusive fact that in the precinct where the dogs are used, burglaries, hold-ups, and other night crimes have been reduced 50 percent, and house-breaking after 11 P. M., when the dogs go on duty, has become so infrequent as to be negligible.

The idea originated in Belgium some eighteen or twenty years ago and was first tried in the city of Ghent, where the system later reached its highest degree of perfection. The practice spread throughout France and Germany, so that before the war there were nearly 2,000 police dogs employed in the latter country, the majority of which were German shepherds.

In 1907 the Police Department of the City of New York sent Inspector George R. Wakefield to Ghent to investigate the subject of police dogs. He brought back with him five young Belgian sheep-dogs, about one year old, which were placed in kennels on Riverside Drive and given a course of special training under Inspector Wakefield's direction.

After about three months they were declared fit for service and were placed in the 172nd Precinct, Parkville, Brooklyn, a residential district made up chiefly of detached houses where night burglaries had been excessively prevalent. One patrolman was detailed to have charge of the care and feeding of the dogs, each of which was assigned to a policeman.

More Belgian sheep-dogs were imported and two Airedales were added, bringing the squad up to fifteen in 1912, when the reports showed that night crimes had been cut down one half.

There followed a period of decreased interest in the dog squad, accompanied by less care in their training, so that now there are but eleven dogs besides old Max, who is superannuated. But Commissioner Woods has shown a renewed interest in the squad, new and more adequate quarters are being built for them, and there are indications that the service, which has suffered criticism as a fad, is to be taken seriously and extended.

In most foreign cities the dogs are used without muzzles and are taught to seize and hold their victims without inflicting serious injury. In Brooklyn, however, it has been found more practicable to work them with stiff leather muzzles and to train them to attack ferociously, hurling themselves against criminals who attempt an aggressive attitude, and to trip and throw them if they try to escape by flight. Such tactics, together with the alarm raised by the dog's war-cry, have made him more greatly feared than the patrolman's night-stick or revolver.

The training, which begins with obedience to fundamental commands, requires time, perseverance, and infinite patience, for these dogs are necessarily active, alert, and possessed of individual initiative. In the end, however, it produces dogs of extraordinary intelligence, devotion, and courage. They are taught to cleave to a single master, to recognize men in uniforms as friends, and all others as possible enemies: to answer at once to the police whistle or the rap of the stick; to hurl themselves upon a man attacking a policeman; to pursue and throw a fleeing criminal; to search around buildings at night and to give notice by barking of the presence of persons lurking in the shadows. They become very clever at throwing a runner, seizing his leg in their forepaws much as a football player tackles his man. Trailing by scent is more difficult to teach to dogs trained to depend upon the alertness of eyes and ears.

The men on the dog squad are patrolmen chosen because of their love for dogs and their interest in the work. They are on duty from 11P. M. to 6 A. M., each patrolman taking out the same dog each night and keeping him on leash going to and from post.

The dogs are kept in training by sending out one man each night in citizens' clothes for the somewhat strenuous duty of impersonating a burglar. Sergeant Joseph Hickey, who commands the dog squad, goes the rounds every night taking the acting burglar with him and using him twice on each dog, once running in the open and once hiding in a back yard or porch. The bruises and knock-outs which some of the men have received in this most realistic acting bear witness to the effectiveness of the dogs' methods of attack. That the men endure this without complaint is a proof of their interest and belief in the work.

When a genuine burglar is discovered the results are even more decisive, since he is less likely to be prepared for what is coming to him. Fifty-odd pounds of solid dog, hurled violently at your chest or tangled up in your feet is no joke if your desire is to remain quietly in hiding or to get away.

At present the dogs are kept shut up during the day in small kennels in the precinct stables, but they are soon to be provided with roomier quarters. They are fed in the morning soon after their return from duty, and again late in the afternoon a heavier meal, after which it is natural for them to sleep soundly and awake refreshed for the night's work.

Any strong, active, alert dog of medium size may be trained for police purposes. The "one- man" type is preferable, and it is somewhat easier to train dogs whose ancestors have been accustomed to special work, such as hunting or herding.

In Germany the German shepherd dog, which has become familiar to Americans of late years, is the most popular police dog, though Airedales and other breeds have been successfully used. The Airedale would be ideal for the purpose but he is somewhat more difficult to train. He is by no means slow to learn, but he is nervous and his attention is so easily attracted that he is hard to control when young. Once taught, however, the Airedale is unsurpassed. Bull terriers have not been tried extensively, but they have many of the qualifications for first-class police dogs.

In Belgium the Belgian shepherd or sheep-dog has been most extensively employed. There are several varieties of Belgian sheep-dog which comprise two really distinct breeds. One is a wire-haired, muscular dog weighing generally between fifty and sixty pounds, resembling in a measure the German shepherd dog. He has the same large, erect ears, but he is a trifle smaller, less grizzled-looking, and with a face less wolfish. Some individuals are fawn-brown, short-haired fellows, with broader heads, ears showing a greater tendency to flop, and with certain characteristics strongly suggestive of the bull terrier. Doubtless this variation is due to a lack of standard in breeding.

The other kind is a beautiful, long-haired, jet-black animal, averaging perhaps a few pounds less in weight, and with a distinctive appearance that faintly suggests the collie.

In addition to police department work, dogs are trained for duty as personal attendants, as watchmen's assistants, for military and ambulance service, etc. Several schools for dog training are now in operation in this country, and trained dogs--chiefly the German and Belgian shepherds--are offered for sale. A number of these dogs are in use on the Rockefeller estate at Pocantico Hills, N. Y.

Most of the dogs in the Parkville police squad are Belgian sheep-dogs. Mirette, Lady, Ollie, Frizzie, Wolf, Rap, Max, Sherlock, and Duke are wire-haired or short-haired animals of both sexes, varying considerably from one another in appearance. Rap especially looks like a fawn-colored bull terrier with large, erect ears, if such a thing could be.

Nogi is a handsome young Belgian of the black, long-haired type. Max II is American-born and half Belgian, being the son of old Max and a collie mother. The cross bids fair to be a good one.

The last dog is Ginger, a rascally Airedale, who has nearly exhausted the patience of his trainers, but who will yet make a valuable police dog, as did his two Airedale predecessors, April and Jim. He is not the small, show type of Airedale, but the heavier kind one sees running about in the farming country, broader between the eyes and ears, rougher looking, and duller in coloring.

In the yard beside the station half a dozen home-bred puppies are kept--future guardians of the peace. When the new quarters are ready the question of breeding is to be taken up more seriously.

The work of these dogs has been for the most part of the quiet, preventive sort, yet their uniformed friends treasure many tales of their prowess: how this one discovered a fire in a house whose inmates slept; how that one found the prostrate form of a man in zero weather and was the cause of saving his life; how Wolf the other day trailed the despoiler of a delicatessen shop by the scent of cheese; how in 1909 Joe Williams, a colored hold-up man, after terrorizing all Flatbush and shooting two detectives, was finally captured one night by April among the timber supports of a house that was being moved; how citizens and officers alike mourned when Jim died on post of heart failure (or was it poisoning?) and when April's life was crushed out on the Boulevard.

They are stirring tales, but the real story lies in the commonplace scouting of every night, the unremitting vigilance, the tireless trotting, the employment of senses keener than man's, and in the quiet departure of second-story operators and black-mask gentry to sections where they have only fat men with batons to fear.

* This article was originally published in "Country Life In America," July, 1915.
Donated by Kathy Champine