Owney (dog)

Owney, photographed in 1895

Owney (ca. 1888 - July 11, 1897), was a stray mixed breed terrier adopted as the first official postal mascot by Railway Mail Service and Albany, New York, post office in 1888.

Story

Following his death in 1897, Owney's body was carefully preserved. Owney is currently on display at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum in Washington, D.C.

Owney was abandoned by an Albany postal worker (no name was mentioned) in 1888 and was quickly adopted by the other post office workers working there. He usually slept on the mail bags and when they were moved, Owney went with them. He was considered to be good luck by postal workers, since no train he ever rode on was in a wreck.

As his trips grew longer, the postal clerks at Albany became concerned that the dog be identified, and, if necessary returned to them. They bought Owney a collar with a metal tag that read: "Owney, Post Office, Albany, New York" at which point he became the unofficial mascot of the Railway Mail Service.

The dog was later adopted by Railway Mail clerks as their unofficial mascot. They marked his travels by placing tags on his collar. Throughout his life, Owney accumulated an unknown number of tags, tokens, trinkets, and medals; some of which are now on display at the National Postal Museum.

In 1895, Owney made an around-the-world trip, aboard trains and steamships. Starting from Tacoma, Washington, he traveled throughout Asia and across Europe, before returning to Albany.

Owney retired from the Railway Mail Service in 1897 due to poor eyesight and old age. However, as a world-traveled dog he was difficult to contain and slipped out of the Albany post office in June 1897.

The exact details of the incident which lead to his death are unclear, but according to the National Postal Museum website, "Owney rode the train one last time before he died."

Newspapers around the country carried the story of Owney's death. They reported that Owney had been ill, was about 17 years old and had become aggressive in his old age. After attacking a postal clerk and a US Marshal in Toledo, Ohio, Owney was shot and killed on the orders of the local Postmaster.^[1]

On July 27, 2011, the United States Postal Service issued a Forever stamp honoring Owney. ^[2]

References

1. ^ "The Dog Owney Dead at Last". Tacoma Daily News. 12 June 1897. 
2. ^ http://www.stamps.org/cac/owney/index.htm

Further reading

• Mona Kerby; Lynne Barasch (2008). Owney, the Mail Pouch Pooch. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 9780374356859. 
• Lynn Hall (1977). Owney:The Traveling Dog. Olympic Marketing Corp. ISBN 9780811648608. 
• Dirk Wales (2003). A Lucky Dog: Owney, U.S. Rail Mascot. Great Plains. ISBN 978-0963245908. 
• Irene Kelly (2005). A Small Dog's Big Life: Around the World With Owney. Holiday House. ISBN 9780823418633. 
• Carl L. Biemiller (2000) [1966]. Any Friend of Owney's. Putnam Pub Group. ISBN 9780399600326. 

External links

• Owney images from Smithsonian Institution
• Owney at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum
• Video for Owney, the Mail Pouch Pooch