Almost two years ago my husband and I adopted a dog from an organization that rescues abandoned animals. His name is Hartley and he’s a Jack Russell / Beagle mix. He’s a tad bit . . . odd. He licks furniture (gross), and he’s terrified of little girls. Little boys don’t bother him at all. The poor dog doesn’t know how to chase a ball or play “Fetch,” but he plays catch by pushing the ball with his nose for a distance of about a foot. We roll it back an
d he’s happy.
More than once, my husband has looked at our beloved mutt and said, “Hartley, you’re no Rin Tin Tin.”
That got me thinking about the famed German Shepherd who starred in the 1950’s TV show, “The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin.” In the show, Rin Tin Tin belongs to a boy named Rusty who’s been orphaned in an Indian raid. The boy and dog are adopted by the soldiers at Fort Apache and the adventure begins.
The series was only one of Rin Tin Tin’s Hollywood credits. His fame goes back to films from the 1920s when he stared in several movies, many of them with western settings. His continued to star in movies up through the 1940s, then moved to television.
The first Rin Tin Tin has quite a story. He was born in Lorraine, France in September 1918 in the thick of World War I. He was just five days old when Lee Duncan, an American serviceman, rescued him from a bombed out war dog kennel along with the pup’s sister. Duncan named the dogs Rin Tin Tin and Nenette after French puppets given to WWI soldiers for luck.
Duncan was fascinated with the abilities of the new breed known as a German Shepherd, and he became acquainted with the man who’d trained the dogs. He worked regularly with the dogs to teach them to perform on command. When the war ended, Duncan took the two dogs to Los Angeles. Sadly, Nenette didn’t make i
t. She died en route from distemper.
Duncan returned to his job as a clerk in a hardware store, but his interest in dogs continued and he took Rin Tin Tin to dog shows. In February 1922, Rin Tin Tin amazed the audience at the Shepherd Dog Club by jumping a phenomenal 11 feet 9 inches. Quite by chance, a man named Charlie Jones asked if he could try out his new camera that made moving pictures by filming Rin Tin Tin. Duncan said yes, and a film company later offered Duncan $350 to film the dog in action.
It took a while for Rin Tin Tin’s career to take off. Duncan tried to a sell movie script starring his dog, but he found no takers. It wasn’t until he happened on a film company struggling to shoot a scene about a wolf that Rin Tin Tin got his big break. Duncan said his dog could do the scene in a single take, and that’s what Rin Tin Tin did. The producer hired him for the rest of “The Man From Hell’s River.” The success of that film saved the studio making it from financial ruin. The name of that littlle studio on the brink? Warner Brothers Pictures.
The first Rin Tin Tin made 26 movies before he died in 1932. Warner Brothers didn’t want to lose their star, so the mantle was passed to the Rin Tin Tin’s son, known as Junior. The two dogs weren’t identical in appearance, so a publicity campaign began. Junior was the first dog to fly in a commerical airplane. Duncan and Rin Tin Tin No. 3 later particiated WWII by training 5,000 soldiers and dogs for the war effort.
Thanks to protected breeding, the legacy of Rin Tin Tin continues today. Every dog that has ever played Rin Tin Tin is related to the original one. The most recent is Rin Tin Tin #11, born July 8, 2009. May the legacy of Man’s Best Friend continue!
The pub date for my next Love Inspired Historical, Kansas Courtship, is Tuesday, March 16th. That’s just around the corner. This is a milestone book for me. When I sold to Harlequin in February 2002, I never dreamed I’d someday have 10 books to my name. Well, Kansas Courtship is No. 10! It’s also the book I most enjoyed writing.
The other thing I loved about doing this book was the research. My hero, Zeb Garrison, is one of the town founders and he owns a mill. I knew zilch about mills when I started this story, buy my husband came to my rescue. We were living in northern Virginia when I wrote this story, and he knew about Colvin Mill. Colvin Mill is a fully restored 19th century mill that turned out to be a 30 minute drive from our house. We had a great day watching the mill in full operation.
is one of the first female physicians in America. I wrote about a lady doctor for Harlequin Historicals, but that book was set in 1899, not 1860. Fashion changed in those 40 years, and so did medicine. I had to start from square one when it came to Dr. Nora’s training. 
On Monday nights my husband and I get together with some friends down the street. They live just eight houses away, so we walk. No big deal, except last Monday it was snowing and my husband was at work. I braved the cold and the wind alone, feeling the sting on my face and the ache in my fingers. In spite of my polka-dot boots, my toes were cold.
the natural grazing, and at times it was so deep cattle could barely move. Thousands of head starved to death. Of the 3000 cattle on the Cook Ranch, only 800 survived. This winter had a secondary impact. Devastating losses forced cattlemen to shut down their operations, which opened the prairie to farmers and new settlement.
snow fell much of December. These storms devastated the cattle industry. Winter began earlier than usual, and the summer had been unusually hot and dry. Some old timers noticed the tell-tale signs of a harsh winter–animals growing thicker coats, eating more food–but these natural warnings were largely ignored until it was too late to prepare.
The winter of 1887-88 offered a bit of a break temperature-wise, but in March 1888, the East Coast got a dose of the winter woes plaguing the center of the country. A blizzard that came to be called “The Great White Hurricane” paralyzed the East Coast from Maine to the Chesapeake and killed 400 people. More than 40 inches of snow fell in New York City. Major cities were isolated for days.
The collected hair had another common use. A woman’s hair was considered “her crowning glory.” As a result, Victorian women had elaborate hairstyles. To get the fullness and volume, they used “ratts” (sometimes spelled rats). A ratt was made by stuffing a hairnet with hair, sewing it shut and inserting it into the elaborate coif. A ratt, roughly the size of a potato, gave a Victorian woman her trademark “Big Hair.”
The hero in my current manuscript is a bad-to-the-bone gunslinger. This guy’s got a terrible past, and frankly, when I started the book I didn’t like him at all. I spend about six months with my characters while writing a book, so it’s a problem if I’m thinking, “I can’t stand this guy. He’s a total jerk.”
y husband picked it and I can’t remember anything about it, except that the hero had a dog. As hard and dangerous as the movie character was (I think he was battling giant snakes), the fact he loved his dog made him totally sympathetic.
ecause they’re so small, they’re less likely to get kicked by an irritated cow. I’m biased here, but I love Corgis. They’re affectionate, playful and intelligent. 
re down the animals they’re herding.
For the sake of this blog, I’m going use the term “cowboy” rather loosely. That’s because one of my favorite Christmas songs is by a country artist who grew up in southern California. He’s more likely to be seen at the beach on a surfboard than on a cattle ranch, but he looks great in a Stetson and that’s close enough for today.
ons I like Christmas music so much. You can listen to it while you’re driving, shopping, wrapping, baking, decorating, etc..
What charms me about Rudolph is the romance in the TV special. Here it is written in what romance writers call a “pitch” for a book: “A young reindeer with a flawed nose must prove himself to Santa and win the heart of Clarice, the young doe who’s stolen his heart.” 
Early Christmas cards didn’t look like the cards we know today.
into “album cards” depicting landscapes and patriotic scenes. These cards were intended to be collected. In 1874 Prang began selling Christmas cards. The trend caught on. By 1881, Prang’s company was producing 5 million cards a year and the designs changed to include fir trees, children and toys. 
Let talk gravy.
Here’s a Bylin family tradition that usually makes people say, “Huh?”
Has anyone here been bitten by the acting bug? Maybe you sang in a high school musical or auditioned for a television commercial.
Among the most well known actresses in the west was Lotta Crabtree.
