When I was a little girl, my aunt was in college and still lived at home. Her dog, the family dog, was an English Springer Spaniel named Sandy. That dog had bitten me near the eye when I was a baby so everybody was always warning me not to go near the dog and to be careful of the dog. In kindergarten, my grandmother babysat me and I had to negotiate my way through the house with Sandy. I tried to make peace with him by making him a meat pie (with Grandma’s help) for his birthday.
What I didn’t realize was that dogs had been part of the family for generations.
Grandpa shared these photos and told me which dog was which. They belonged to Richard DeKorn, and Grandpa and his parents lived for some time with Richard (Grandpa’s grandfather). It means that they lived well over 100 years ago. I’m sorry the quality of the following photos isn’t better.
TOM AND CARLO DEKORN
BOBBY DEKORN
Is the dog running toward Richard DeKorn? Adriaan Zuijdweg in the background.
The dogs with Cora, Adrian, and Alice
That’s Grandpa as a baby in his mother’s lap, so he grew up with the dogs.
Bobby in the yard
For those of you who know about dog breeding or shows, can you tell me anything about the following?
I’ve owned dogs, too, but now I have four cats. Did my family have cats 100 years ago? Here’s the answer:
Is that baby Alice playing with the kittens?
I sense that you want to know about my cats ;), so here is a slide show of my beautiful cats, as well as my grand-cats.
The Family Kalamazoo 
Pets they are so much a part of our life. They give us so much pleasure.
I agree. They make life good even when it’s a bad day!
I thought it was funny to see all the cats when it was a post about dogs. I do love the pics. It is obvious that your family enjoys pets.
That’s what happened to us! We started out as dog people and ended up with cats!
Family Dogs are so fun. I had some in my post yesterday and also last June: http://bramanswanderings.wordpress.com/2013/06/16/family-dogs/
I like the picture of Bobby in the Yard.
Bobby’s got some personality. I did catch your post! Such cute little dogs! I’m not sure why a dog would be good for asthma either (hah), but maybe better than other types of dogs or animals?
I love this idea! But if I start posting all the family pets, I will never get back to the people! But maybe it’s a good way to get cousins to participate—have them send photos of family pets. People have fewer privacy concerns about showing off their pets, as anyone who sees all the cat and dog videos on YouTube knows!
Amy, yes, that’s a great idea! I love it! I’ll be watching for it!
I will first have to post all MY pets—so stay tuned!
I will!
You sound like me. You’ve probably heard me say that I’ve had dogs my entire life — never a cat. Until about 2002 when I suddenly “inherited” three kittens. It’s been chaos ever since! I am now down to two dogs and five cats (if you don’t count the outside neighborhood ones)!
Linda, yes, exactly. Seven animals and counting! Wow, haha Four seems like a lot to me, but then when the grand-cats come to visit . . . .
I enjoyed this post. I also have lots of old photos that contain pictures of pets. Until I read this post, I never thought about identifying them and telling the story their relationship to the humans in the picture.
[…] was inspired by a post on one of my favorite genealogy blogs, The Family Kalamazoo, a while back. Currentdescendent, the blog owner and author, posted a series of photographs of […]
I finally got my pet post up! Hope you enjoy it. http://brotmanblog.wordpress.com/2014/05/02/the-rest-of-the-family-four-legged-variety/
[…] so I always like to see evidence of animals in the lives of my ancestors. I wrote a post called Dogs in the Family that showcases some photos of pets from 100 years ago, as well as my own four […]