A Repository for Bottled Monsters: Military Working Dogs

Showing posts with label Military Working Dogs. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Aussie military dogs are awarded medals

Our friend Mike Lemish sent me a link to an article about a medals ceremony in Australia last month that honored six working dogs, two of them posthumously. There's a nice video that goes with it.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

Happy Holidays from Mike Lemish

Today we received an email from Mike Lemish, a researcher of ours who has a special interest in military working dogs, and who I have written about in the past. Now, isn't that a cute dog?

To all:

Sedona had her picture taken with Santa

to help support the Falmouth Animal Shelter in Falmouth, Massachusetts. Over eight years old she wouldn't stay still - but the photographer caught her on the fly - notice the ear and tongue.

A special hello and Merry Christmas to all my tracker friends in Australia! Thank you all for your support down under- I really do appreciate it. The efforts you have taken to recognize your friends that served in Vietnam and were left behind is incredible.

For all the Vietnam Dog Handlers - thank you for your service.! I have not forgotten you or the dog that you worked with.

Let us not forget the dog teams that are working for us every day to secure our liberty and work for our safety. If you want to help out, check out the Space Coast War Dog Association (www.scwda.org) and contact Sheri Wells. If you are interested in adopting a retired military working dog please check out www.militaryworkingdogadoptions.com and contact Debbie Kandoll.

For those of you without a dog - consider having one. They will always be there for you.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Best Wishes
Mike Lemish
Historian
Vietnam Dog Handler Association

Merry Christmas back to you, Mike!

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Military Working Dogs again

Today I got an email from Mike Lemish about the post I made yesterday. The Military Working Dog website is not his; he just forwarded an email he received from Debbie Kandoll, whose website it IS. Mike also told me, "Also the MWDs may not be Iraq war veteran's. With over four thousand dogs worldwide it may be a bomb/drug detector dog from anywhere in the world but most likely CONUS [continental United States]." Check it out, folks.

Here's another picture from our collection. This is a shot of elevated kennels in Vietnam.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Military Working Dogs

We've had a couple of researchers lately who've looked into our large Veterinary Corps collection. One of them is Mike Lemish. Mike's research has to do with Military Working Dogs from the Vietnam war. Recently he sent me an email announcing a website that promotes adoption of working dogs that have been retired from the Iraq war but are great dogs that still have a lot to give. However, too many of them are euthanized because they don't get adopted and have nowhere to go. As of 2000, civilians have been allowed to adopt these animals (H.R. 5314 on 6 Nov 2000) and Mike's website gives information about how to do so.

Who are we?

Mike Rhode was the chief archivist of the Museum from 1989-2011, and is the founder of this blog. I maintain an interest in the course of the museum, and will be posting relevant information.

The Army Medical Museum was founded in 1862 during the American Civil War. After World War II, a parent-child relationship was inverted and the Museum became part of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. Since then, the Museum has moved around Washington, stopping for years in Ford's Theatre, and on the National Mall where the building it shared with the National Library of Medicine once stood, until it was demolished in 1968 for the Hirshhorn Museum. For 35 years it was at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, and now is in Silver Spring, MD.

So what about that blog name?

It's historical. I found it in a quote from one of the former curators. World War II confirmed the Army Medical Museum's primary role in pathology consultation. James Ash, the curator during the war and a pathologist, noted, "Shortly after the last war, more concerted efforts were instituted to concentrate in the Army Medical Museum the significant pathologic material occurring in Army installations." He closed with the complaint, "We still suffer under the connotation museum, an institution still thought of by many as a repository for bottled monsters and medical curiosities. To be sure, we have such specimens. As is required by law, we maintain an exhibit open to the public, but in war time, at least, the museum per se is the least of our functions, and we like to be thought of as the Army Institute of Pathology, a designation recently authorized by the Surgeon General."

After the war, it evolved into the tri-service Armed Forces Institute of Pathology.

A Repository for Bottled Monsters

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