The adventures of Sandy Dixon and Mystic, shown here at the Virginia Foxhound Show, were just beginning. / Lix Callar photoThe Brazos Valley Hunt is back home in Texas now, having returned from this year’s Virginia Foxhound Show. That may not sound like a great achievement, but traveling to hound shows has been one adventure after another over the years.
Returning from the Central States Hound Show in 1995, we drove into a tornado. The hound trailer was flipped over on Interstate 35 in Ardmore, Oklahoma, spilling sixteen hounds onto the highway. We had two kennels strapped down in the bed of the pickup, both of which were sucked out. I actually saw Melody, a pregnant bitch I had just picked up from Tommy Jackson, fall out of the sky and hit the ground running south down the median.
We were able to recover all the hounds, except four: Bashful, Duster, Melody, and Gimlet. Bashful was found the next day when we returned to gather our things out of the pretty much destroyed pickup. We were so fortunate that we had minimal injuries, just tiny cuts from the flying glass and a broken rib from the side view mirror pounding on my side.
An Ardmore resident called me when Duster came to the house to share her dog’s dinner. He had “strawberries” from skidding down the road, but was basically OK.
I searched for Melody and Gimlet for days, driving to Ardmore after work to hunt for them. Bobby finally told me, “They are gone; stop driving yourself crazy!” Then one day, I got a phone call from a shelter. They had seen a female hound that appeared to have had pups. I left work early, and when I arrived in Ardmore I saw Melody on the side of the highway picking up a dead bird. I stopped along the road and tried to catch her, but she was too scared. I followed her to an area with fallen trees where I heard the puppies. The guys from the shelter came with a large humane trap where we put the puppies.
A bad storm blew in, so I checked into the hotel facing the trap. In one of the lightning flashes I saw her eyes in the trap! Melody and her pups came home to Texas. Gimlet was never found.
This year, 2012, we left Warrenton, Virginia on Thursday, May 31 about noon with our sixteen fabulous hounds that had made us proud at the Virginia Foxhound Show. On board was Jett, winner of Best American Unentered Dog Hound (Under 20 Couple); Justice, winner of Best American Unentered Bitch (Under 20 Couple); Moose and Mystic, first and second in Single American Unentered Dog (Under 20 Couple); Molly, winner of Single American Entered Bitch (Under 20 Couple); and Meadow, winner of Best American Brood Bitch. We also had several others.
We drove all day Thursday, stopping somewhere Tennessee to feed the hounds and stopping again later to sleep for six hours. We started driving again at about six on Friday morning, switching drivers every three to four hours. Bobby had just fallen asleep when the trailer tire on the driver’s side blew out.
I pulled off the road as far as I could, but the eighteen-wheelers along Interstate 40 were zooming by at about seventy miles per hour. We had a trailer drive-up jack, which I highly recommend that everyone invest in. It took some “engineering” to get the tire off because the lugs were so tight, but we had a “cheater” pipe in the trailer so Bobby was able to get it off, replacing it with our spare. We saw a truck tire store a couple of exits down from where we blew out. They had a tire at a reasonable price, which they mounted onto our rim, giving us a spare tire again. We were back on the road in about an hour or so.
Arriving in Decatur, Texas about 9:30 p.m., we called Kathy Brown to meet us at the kennel to help unload and feed the hounds. Bobby was driving so he pulled down to the kennel, while I got out to help him back up to the kennel gate. This is when I realized the sliding door on the trailer was open, and half of the hounds were gone! I thought I was going to throw up, feeling weak at the knees.
Kathy and I jumped into her pickup truck to backtrack, with horrible images flashing through my head. However, only about a half-mile from our house we saw the hounds at a stop sign, milling around. I whistled for them, pushing eight hounds into the pick up with Kathy, sending her back to the kennel.
Kathy and Bobby unloaded these hounds, checking to see who was there. All were present, unharmed except Mystic, which we found when we went back.
The sliding door had come open because the “hole” that the spring loaded pin drops into had jiggled off because the welds had broken loose. We found the part along the road, which will be welded back on. I assure you I will never haul hounds or horses again without putting a chain around the door. A guardian angel had saved us from a horrible tragedy.
Posted June 24, 2012
Sandy Dixon is Master and huntsman of the Brazos Valley Hunt (TX).
(l-r) Whipper-in Kathy Brown with Mystic 2010; Joan Jones, president of the Virginia Foxhound Club, and Sandy Dixon with Moose 2010 / Liz Callar photo