WHAT A WURLING WEEKEND!
Oak Park, IL to Millington, NJ and Morristown, NJ to Crystal, MN
January 13 - 15, 2006
What happens when two young wheaten boys need to get to their
foster and forever homes far, far from where they are located?
Wheatens In Need volunteers and other friends of wheatens get in
their cars, open their homes and get the job done!
Wheaten boy #1, nine month old Burney, was at home in Glen Ellyn,
IL. He was running the house and his family, expecting their first
child, was unable to manage him. I visited Burney at 7 months and
agreed that he needed a good bit of remedial training.
Unfortunately, I had a foster much like Burney and was unable to
take him on. Since no other foster homes were available in the
midwest, Mike Marzo in NJ agreed to take him after the first of the
year.
Wheaten boy #2 had endured a hellish life in his two short years
in NJ. Left outside most of his life with no training or
socialization, he was abandoned in the backyard when the family
moved out of state two weeks before Christmas. Concerned neighbors
called the police, however, Sammy, as he was known, had gotten out
of the yard before he could be rescued. After being on his own for
approximately ten days, he was picked up by a good samaritan and
taken to a local shelter. Jean Kuhn, a volunteer at the shelter and
WIN foster mom grabbed him as soon as he was neutered and ready to
go. She knew just who needed this needy little boy; Pam Allen,
another WIN volunteer had just lost her Seamus to illness. Only one
problem - Pam lived in a suburb of Minneapolis, MN.
Burney's WURL was set up for the weekend of January 14/15,
weather permitting. His original family surrendered him to Mary
Summerfield in Oak Park, IL early Saturday morning, then Mary and
her husband, Michael O'Neal drove to South Bend, IN to meet Cynthia
Fett from Sheltie Rescue who delivered Burney to Ann Crowel in
Toledo, OH. Ann, who had to race back from a meeting at the Motor
City Wheaten Club in Detroit to pick up Burney, drove him on to
Parma, OH to Rob Salmon. Burney overnighted with Rob and his family.
Early Sunday morning Rob drove him to the Pittsburgh area to meet
Ellen & Marty Klinzing who had volunteered to come from their home
in the eastern area for the weekend in order to transport Burney to
the PA/NJ border where Mike Marzo picked him up and took him home
into foster.
About four days before Burney's WURL was to begin, Jean started
organizing Sammy's (renamed Declan) WURL. Several folks from the
Burney WURL doubled up and drove segment for Declan too and soon his
itinerary was complete!
On Friday the 13th, Jean drove Declan from Morristown, NJ to
eastern PA to hook up with Ellen and Marty and their two wheatens.
They all set out for Pittsburgh, overnighted at a local motel, then
left early Saturday morning to drive Declan to meet Patty Kelly in
Streetsboro, OH. After a scenic tour of Ohio, courtesy of a wrong
turn on the interstate, they returned to the motel in Pittsburgh to
await Burney=s arrival Sunday morning. Patty drove Declan all the
way to eastern IN to hook up with Mary and Michael who had
previously handed off Burney in South Bend. They took Declan back to
Chicago to spend the night at their home with their wheaten and
husky. Early Sunday morning Dee Robbins and Tina Thomas picked up
Declan from Mary drove him to Madison, WI where he was handed off to
Karen Nelson. Karen had the pleasure of driving him to the Wisconsin
Dells where Declan was introduced to his new mom, Pam and Lynda
Kochevar for the final leg of his journey to Crystal MN.
Both dogs traveled well and arrived at their final destinations
within a couple of hours of one another early Sunday evening. Even
the weather gods smiled down as both WURLs - 2153 miles of WURL -
went off without a hitch! It was quite a start to 2006.
Tina Thomas
Note: Check Wheaten Success Stories for the rest of Declan's
story. We anticipate Burney's story will appear in due course as
well.
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