╠Eustis, Dorothy Leib Harrison Wood1886╨1946philanthropist and dog breederBorn in Philadelphia on May 30, 1886, Dorothy Harrison was educated at the Agnes Irwin School in her native city and at the Rathgowrie School in Eastbourne, England. In October 1906 she married Walter A. Wood, a businessman and political figure of Hoosick Falls, New York. In that place her husband operated an experimental farm where selective breeding of dairy cattle was carried on. The remarkable intelligence and loyalty of her German shepherd dog, Hans, further stimulated her thinking about practical genetics. In 1917, two years after her husband╒s death, she moved to Radnor, Pennsylvania, and in 1921 to Vevey, Switzerland, where she soon established a kennel and began experimenting in selective breeding of dogs. In June 1923 Dorothy Wood married George M. Eustis, who joined in her enthusiasm, as did Elliott S. Humphrey, an American horse breeder and trainer. Gradually they evolved a strain of German shepherd of great intelligence and loyalty and excellent disposition. Dogs from the Fortunate Fields kennel were soon earning great respect for work with the Swiss army and with various city police units throughout Europe. In 1927 George Eustis learned of a school in Germany that trained dogs as guides for blind veterans. An article on the school for the Saturday Evening Post by Dorothy Eustis entitled ╥The Seeing Eye╙ late in that year brought an inquiry from Morris S. Frank, a blind insurance salesman of Nashville, Tennessee. Frank traveled to Switzerland early in 1928 to receive Buddy, a specially trained dog from Dorothy Eustis╒s kennels, and to learn how to work with it, When he returned to Nashville he and Buddy received wide publicity, prompting yet more inquiries from blind persons. In 1929 Dorothy Eustis returned to the United States, incorporated The Seeing Eye, and established a training school for dogs and owners in Nashville, whence it was moved to Morristown, New Jersey, the next year. In 1932 the school settled permanently in Whippany, New Jersey. Dorothy Eustis remained president of The Seeing Eye until 1940; from 1929 to 1933 she was also president of L╒Oeil Qui Voit, a Swiss school for training dogs and instructors. Much of her own fortune went into The Seeing Eye, and with wise management no outside fund raising was required after 1958. From the first she established a policy of restricting the sale of her guide dogs to blind persons of sufficient maturity, strength, ambition, and financial means to support and benefit fully from the freedom thus made possible. She died in New York City on September 8, 1946. By that time The Seeing Eye had already supplied more than 1300 guide dogs to blind persons. &styl ` ! ¬ # 5¬ - 5¬ M !I ÿ !I ▐ ú !I ( 5¬ ) !I ╦ 5¬ ╠ !I S !I h !I * 5¬ + !I link ` HYPR ÿ ú
