Growing up in Nome Alaska - part five

My first pet was a cat that we named Nuisance. I loved that cat! I remember when she was a kitten she would climb up the inside of my mother’s pajamas as she was cooking at the stove. Nuisance would put her arms around my neck and give me hugs. I would sit in the living room and she would cuddly with me. But there was a problem. I started sneezing all the time and my parents were afraid that I was allergic to cats. So my dad took Nuisance to the sheet metal shop at the base to see if the sneezing would stop. It did…darn… I was allergic to my pet. Nuisance was very brave and she would scare dogs away. She would jump on their backs and go for a ride. At the shop, one night a man came into the shop in the dark to use the phone and the cat attack him. She was not afraid of anybody or anything.

My second pet was an English Llewellyn Setter named Babe… her brother was named Bo. My Uncle Frank had the mother dog name Duchess. English Llewellyn Setters are breed to be hunting dogs and it was so fun if something fell on the kitchen floor she would run and point at it in the position of a hunting dog. She was beautiful and gentle. She was so funny. I can remember feeding her and if the dish didn’t come off the table she wouldn’t eat it. You had to put her dish on the table then add the dog food and put it on the floor for her to eat. One day I was out in the front yard and she had run across the street. There was a car coming down the street and she ran out in front of the car and was hit. I was so sad. My dad took her to the vet and they sewed up the injury. Luckily she survived but when we breed her with another English Llewellyn Setter she had only one puppy because of her injury. This meant that the owner of the male dog got the puppy.

I still have my autograph books signed by many of my friends. I wish I hadn’t torn out what the boys wrote in my book. Silly me!

Here are a couple pictures of my classes in Nome. See if you can find me.
In the first picture I’m right in front of the teacher.

In the larger picture I’m in a Girl Scout uniform with my eyes closed in the middle of the group.