BASSET HOUNDS ALREADY ADOPTED

DAISY

I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce the Basset community to Daisy. She is a 6 1/2 year old and this is how she came into our lives. The posting came in the Internet the week before Thanksgiving. "Daisy needs your help" was the listing. Her story begins somewhere in Kentucky. Her early life wasn't easy. She was beaten when her human (or inhuman) didn't like what she did, she was used as an ashtray when they were too lazy to get one, and she was tied up with barbed wire to keep her from escaping. When someone caught wind of this abuse the beast was forced to surrender her to the pound.

Enter Mary Kindred, owner of Wolfrun Wildlife Refuge and also director of the local Humane Society. Daisy was rescued with a male named Flash. On the day that their cards at the pound were turned up (due to be put down), Mary rescued them. Flash was adopted right away. Daisy was very shy and also needed a lot of veterinary work to repair her wounds. As time went on, Daisy never was adopted because she was so shy. Every time a prospective family would come to look for a dog she would hide and never give herself a chance at a good home. Soon Mary had her for over a year. With the demands of the refuge, she could not give Daisy the one-on-one attention that she needed to bring her out of her shell, so Guardian Angel agreed to help. That is how we found her. We contacted Fran Gray away to begin the process of getting Daisy to us. Fran directed the entire process and made all of the arrangements, and this was going to be a challenge. How to get a sweet little dog from Nicholasville, Kentucky to Peoria, Illinois?

The solution was "Rides Across America", a group of folks who do nothing more than move animals across the country to loving homes. All for the love of animals. All at their own expense! We were initially contacted by Bart Rosenberg on December 14, 1998. Bart lives in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was going to drive to Kentucky to pick Daisy up and bring her to us. We decided to meet in Indianapolis on Sunday, December 20. Bart gave us all of the information on himself that we could ever want including his cell phone number to contact him on the road. The plan was to meet him in front of the public library in the middle of Indianapolis at 4:00 p.m.. Bart was to call us on our cell phone when he was about an hour out. The phone rang and Bart said that he was just passing a sign that said he was 54 miles away. At that very moment we passed one that said we were 52 miles away. Talk about timing!

The Delbo's: Frank, Barb, Jessica, & Kristen