Belleview pair raise canines to be service companions for disabled veterans
By Glenda Sanders, The Villages Daily Sun
THE VILLAGES — Their names are Honor and Freedom, indicative of the future ahead of them. The golden retrievers, litter mates, brothers, were selected for training as service dogs for veterans with limited mobility. When they turn 18 months old, they will go through six months of intensive training, during which they will learn to open refrigerator doors, turn on lights, pick up a ringing phone and pick up dropped objects for their owners.For the time being, Honor and Freedom are living with loving puppy-raisers who prepare them for the training program.
Belleview residents Julie Drexel and Dianne Farrell met when they were taking puppies to basic obedience classes. Both of their dogs were wearing vests identifying them as puppies in training, so the two women struck up a conversation and a friendship. Drexel was raising a service dog puppy, her second, for New Horizons, an Orange City service dog agency.
Farrell was raising a puppy, her first, for a guide dog agency based in New York. “I was looking for a way to do something for the community, to give something back, and I was drawn into it,” Farrell said. “I’ve loved every minute of it — it’s so rewarding.”
Because the puppies they were raising were about the same age, both women turned their dogs over to professional trainers about the same time. Both were anxious to raise a new puppy. After hearing about New Horizons from Drexel, Farrell decided to raise a service dog puppy. “The founder of New Horizons is a quadriplegic,” Farrell said. “She is really geared to knowing where to place each dog.”
Drexel likes working with a small agency because it is in tune with the needs of the community. “They don’t put more puppies out there than they think they can place,” Drexel said.
Although they are named Honor and Freedom because of the people they are being raised to serve — American veterans — Honor and Freedom are brothers in a litter of golden retriever puppies officially listed as the NASCAR litter at New Horizons. They and their littermates made their television debut as tiny pups when their mother’s owner was selected for a car makeover by the “NASCAR Angels” television program. The pups, each held by a member of the NASCAR pit crew that did the makeover, were shown during the first episode of the auto makeover show.
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