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➢ Rambles By Date
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➢ Random Ramble!
⊹ George - The dog who inspired this ramble, so I wanted to go a bit more in depth. He was owned by a widower named Alan Gay who was given to Gay after George's previous owners moved away since George had taken such a shine to Gay. They lived in Manaia, Taranaki, Aotearoa New Zealand. George's age is up for debate, but he was either 9 or 14 years old when in 2007 five children (aged 3-12) were walking home when two dogs attacked them. George defended the children successfully, but was severely injured. When he was taken to the vet, it was decided euthanasia was the best course of action for him. The two dogs who attacked the children were also euthanised and the owners also faced prosecution. George faced many accolades for his heroism after his death from all over the world. The Royal New Zealand Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals awarded him a medal for bravery, the first dog to ever receive one who wasn't a police dog. A United States veteran who was given three Purple Hearts named Jerrell Hudman sent one of his Purple Hearts to Gay in honor of George. George was also awarded the PDSA Gold Medal, which honors the bravery of animals, in 2009, which was hung around the neck of a statue of George. The statue was built in Manaia in Spring 2007 and still stands to this day.
⊹ Terry - This Cairn Terrier is perhaps one of the most famous dogs of all time and almost everyone who reads this ramble likely has seen her. You'll know her better, though, as Toto! She was born during the Great Depression under the dog trainer Carl Spitz (who has an interesting history of his own, but we don't have time for that) who then trained her to star in films. She first appeared in Ready for Love in 1934 and subsequently starred in 22 more films, including, of course, The Wizard of Oz in 1939 as Toto. She was credited as Toto in the film's credits and her name was actually changed to Toto after the film's success. She also got to attend the film premiere! During filming, she was reportedly making $125 per week (about $2,900 in 2025 USD), which was more than many of the human actors. She also did all of her own stunts, which caused her to be injured when an actor playing a Winkie stepped on her paw and nearly broke it. Judy Garland took her in for two weeks while she recovered and grew very close with the dog, however Spitz refused to sell Terry to Garland when she offered to buy the dog. Terry acted all the way up to her final days, appearing in Easy to Look At which released only three weeks before her death. She was11 when she passed and was buried on Spitz's ranch. Unfortunately, her grave was destroyed when a freeway was built in the area in 1958, but a permanant memorial was created for her at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in 2011 bearing the name Toto.
⊹ Soccer - Already the second Jack Russell Terrier on our list, Soccer is the very good boy who played Wishbone in the appropriately named Wishbone PBS series. He had already been in several commercials before trying out for the role of Wishbone with his trainer Jackie Martin Kaptan. He landed the role against the stiff competition--nearly 100 dogs tried out! Apparently this was due to his expressiveness. He did almost all of his own stunts, but did have doubles for certain occassions. Slugger and Shiner were stunt doubles, Phoebe did swimming scenes, and Bear did some publicity shots. The series was filmed on the ranch Kaptan owned in Princeton, Texas through 1998, when the series ended. He was also buried there in 2001 when he passed of natural causes at age 13. As an additional bit of sweet trivia, apparently his favorite treats were dry dog food and skinless grilled chicken, according the Wishbone wiki.
⊹ Capitán - This faithful German Shepherd doesn't get a full article, just a mention in the "Faithful dogs" section, but he caught my attention regardless. After the death of his owner, Miguel Guzmán, in 2006, he ran away from home and found his grave all on his own. Guzmán's family found him standing vigil at Miguel's graveside a week later and attempted to bring him home, but Capitán merely ran away again to Miguel's grave. Guzmán's family relented and Capitán was allowed to stay by Miguel. The cemetery staff gave him food and water until Capitán's death in 2018.
⊹ Kostya - In Tolyatti, Russia, a German Shepherd dog began to be spotted along a side road in 1995, rushing at cars. Curious about the dog, residents eventually discovered that he had been in the car with a little girl and a man when it crashed earlier that year. Neither of them had survived. The car had crashed somewhere along the same road that the dog now insisted on patrolling. Due to this, the town took to calling him Kostya, which is an affectionate diminutive of Constantine (a name which means "constant"). Some residents attempted to take the dog in, but the dog was insistent on staying at the roadside. Attempts to build him doghouses for shelter also failed as he wouldn't stay in them. The only thing he seemed to accept was food. No matter the weather, he waited in the same spot and approched the cars that came by. He kept this up for 7 years until his death in 2002. In his honor, a bronze statue was built in 2003. The statue has since become popular with newlyweds for its symbolism of loyalty, and his nose is shined by people rubbing his nose when making commitments to each other.
⊹ Taro and Jiro - If you happen to remember Eight Below and always wondered about the true story behind it, then today's the day! This is that true story. In 1958, a Japanese research team were made to leave behind a team of Sakhalin Huskies in Antarctica when plans for a second research team to replace them were abandoned. Due to the situation, the dogs were left chained up with only days worth of food over the winter. A white female husky and her 8 puppies were airlifted out with the humans, but the other 15 were left behind. 7 of them ended up dying while still chained up and 6 of them were never recovered after escaping their chains, though it is expected that they died in the wilderness. 2, however, survived the entire winter. Taro and Jiro were brothers and the youngest of the team. Since the dogs who remained chained showed no signs of cannibalism, it's theorized that the brothers surivived by learning to hunt penguins, seals, and the occassional frozen sealife that surfaced in the area. The survival of the two dogs was huge news at the time, and they become instant symbols in Japan. Jiro remained a sled dog in Antarctica until his death only 2 years later in 1960 at 4 years old. Taro was relocated to Sapporo and lived for the rest of his life at Hokkaido University. He died a decade after his brother in 1970, aged 14. Both were stuffed and are on display alongside Hachiko (a famous dog that I assume needs no introduction) at the National Science Museum of Japan. In 1983, a Japanese film named Antactica was made based on their story and that film was remade in 2006 into the American film Eight Below. The former is much more accurate to the true tale, though having to rely on speculation for what occurred during the months that they survived.
⊹ Seaman - Before setting out on his famous expedition, one Meriwether Lewis purchased a Newfoundland to join them for the trip. The dog was chosen because it was a breed that was strong, easy to handle, could swim, and would do well on a boat--the soon named Seaman lived up to all of those expectations and more. He became a favorite among the entire team, but Lewis was seemingly particularly close with the animal with scholars Stephanie Ambrose Tubbs and Clay Straus Jenkinson saying, "Lewis seems to have been happiest when he was alone on shore with his gun, his notebook, and his dog Seaman." Seaman survived the entire trip, despite several threats to his health. Once, Lewis and Clark had to perform surgery on the trail when Seaman's artery was severed by a beaver. On one occasion Seaman was also "stolen by Indians and Lewis sent three men to retrieve the dog." Over the course of the journey, Seaman protected the camp at night and helped to hunt, retrieving prey and occassionally killing creatures as large as an antelope on his own. When they returned back to Missouri, Lewis took Seaman back home with him to St. Louis. Unfortunately, when Lewis died some 3 years later, Seaman was devestated. He reportedly refused to leave the side of Lewis's remains, and even after he was buried, he would not leave the grave. No one could get the dog to eat after his master's death, and he passed very shortly after his Lewis at his graveside. I am uncertain where Seaman was buried, if he was buried, though there is a listing on Find a Grave so if he was, it's likely there. There are also several ways his memory lives on today, including many monuments and as the mascot for a college. At one point between Seaman's death in 1809 and the year 1814, his collar was also donated to the Alexandria museum in Washington D.C., likely by William Clark, though unfortunately it doesn't seem that the collar is still there today.
⊹ Pompey - William the Silent was a Dutch nobleman and revolutionary who rose up against the infamous Habsburgs in the late 1500s. Sometime, during this history, he had a dog named Pompey. The breed of dog is under some debate, some believing it to be an ancestor of the pug, others think it's a Kooikerhondje, and once it was called it a spaniel in a U.S. court. Whatever breed Pompey was, we all know that he was a certified Good Boy. One night, while William slept, assassins approched his tent. Pompey barked to alert his master to the danger, and then jumped on his face when the sound didn't wake him. This apparently detered the assassins and William lived for several years more until he was killed in another assassination attempt in 1584. Nothing else is known about Pompey, but there is a monument to William the Silent in the Church of St. Ursula in Delft, Netherlands, where Pompey is sculted resting at his feet.
⊹ Old Drum - Old Drum is a dog that become famous not in life, but in death. In Missouri, 1870, a foxhound named Old Drum found himself on the land of Leonidas Hornsby and was shot dead by either Hornsby himself or his ward, Samuel “Dick” Ferguson (the sources I found differed). Hornsby, a farmer, had recently been losing sheep and vowed to kill the first dog he saw on his land, and Old Drum happened to be victim to that vow. Old Drum's owner, Charles Burden, either saddened by the loss of his companion or the loss of a hunting dog, sued Ferguson for damages. It wasn't until the case was tried for a fourth time in front of the Supreme Court of Missouri that there was a ruling in his favor. He took on a lawyer by the name of George Vest--who I was rather dismayed to find was a staunch supporter of slavery, having fought for the Confederacy during the war and even served in the Confederate Congress, but I digress--who ended up being the key for winning the case. In his closing arguments, Vest spoke not of any of the arguments the opposing side had made, but instead spoke passionately about the unique relationship man and dog have--of the devotion dogs have to their humans--and the argument so affected the jury that Vest and Burden won the case. A statue of Old Drum accompanied by a portion of Vest's "Eulogy of the Dog", as it is often known, was put up in 1958, the same time that Old Drum was made the official historic dog of Missouri.
What does this have to do with music? Everything! 47 and Lucas were created in the 60s. Explicitly, 47 was born on September 5th, 1964. Lucas's birthdate is less clear--he's almost certainly older than 47 due to his number designation, but other than that it's not really known. A fake passport shows Jan. 1963 so many fans, myself included, have adopted that as his rough date of birth. I decided on January 1st, 1963 becuase the weird Nazis who made them likely would've chosen a date like the New Year for this kind of project. It also just makes logical sense. (Again, I promise, all this waffling about birth dates is relevant.) Now, because of their birthdates, and because they were born around weird Nazis in weird old fashioned facilities, I think it's quite likely that 47 and Lucas grew up listening to old standards from the 30s~early 50s and classical music, almost exclusively. Anything considered too modern--think even Elvis who became a hit in the mid to late 50s and of course was quite controversial in his day--would've been devil music to their weird fathers. Now we have two divergent paths for the two of them. 47, who has a history of being more open to embracing that time, I think actually has a fondness for that era of music. He likes the jazz standards and classical music like "Ave Maria". Obviously there's songs he didn't hear as a child that he enjoys--maybe there's a even a few Elvis songs he likes lol--but that's where his tastes largely lie. That being said, it's hard to imagine 47 being particularly opinionated. He's not the type to grimace if a pop song comes on the radio, I think. Just if I were to say which playlists he puts on in the Safehouse, canonically, I think it's the Classical and Jazz ones. Perhaps that's biased a bit becuase I like the Jazz one, but then again, maybe it isn't because classical isn't my thing.
So where does that leave Lucas? Well, as mentioned before, he doesn't seem to embrace his past the same way 47 does, so as opposed to 47, I think he rather hates both eraa of music. They're boring, overplayed, and he probably even brings out phrases like classist and racist when he's feeling particularly like picking a fight about his superior music taste. So what would he like instead? Well now I must bring in some more birth dates math. Unlike 47, Lucas is able to escape the facility he was made in on November 10th, 1989 when he was 26 by my personal headcanoned birthday. In that week in Europe, the top artists on the radio were Kaoma, Milli Vanilli, and Jive Bunny & The Master Mixers. Unfortuantely, I can't imagine Lucas taking a shine to any of the groups, especially the latter as they tended to remix jazz standards. But! Just a little lower in the charts we get Tears for Fears with "Sowing the Seeds of Love" (#9) and Depeche Mode with "Personal Jesus" (#12). The latter I can't get out of my head imagining Lucas walking into a seedy bar, newly free, and immediately having his entire music taste defined lol. Tears for Fears and Depeche Mode likely stay some of his favorite groups through his life, in my opinion. Another strange choice for a favorite, though, is Chinese rock artist Cui Jian. Lucas obviously was someone who stayed up on the news and while the Tiananmen Square Massacre happened earlier in 1989, I think it would've been something he cared about and kept tabs on as the fallout occured (it's also not unlikely that he knew about it even within the facility given how it ran). Cui Jian's song "Nothing to My Name" was something of a theme song to the protests and the whole album fits well the style I think Lucas would like. That plus the politcal background would make it important to him, I think.
As a side note, I like to think that, if Lucas somehow survived and got a chance to live in the Safehouse with 47, he'd of course be rather appalled by the state of his music. He'd also be a total vinyl snob so only digital music? Ugh, yuck, how dare. Thankfully, 47 has a noted kleptomania issue, so very quickly 47 comes back from missions with a copy of Violator (original pressing) by Depeche Mode and even eventually a copy of Nothing to My Name after a trip to China. So he steadily builds up a collection of vinyl specifically for Lucas's music tastes and it's his entire dream come true. In exchange Lucas will sometimes, sometimes let 47 listen to his lame, classist, racist music.
If you're interested in other fonts that are considered more friendly to those who may struggle reading large swaths of text for one reason or another, there's a few things to know and consider. 1) No one font is going to be best for everyone. If possible, the best you can do for those who struggle with fonts is options, not just in font, but in font size, kerning (space between letters), and color of both text and background. That's well beyond my coding skills at the moment, but if you feel able to do it, it's certainly the ideal! 2) The biggest considerations to make are that the things that cause the most problems is poor kerning, confusion between characters that can be visibly similar (i.e. 1, I, and l or O and 0), and poor color contrast making it difficult to read. Now, these are not invlaid artistic choices in a font or a website, but if your goal is to make your site very legible for as many people as possible, then designing it and choosing a font with those things in mind should be the goal! Now, for some fonts that are known to be better for those with dyslexia, ADHD, and low vision: Arial, Verdana, and Open Sans are considered good! Comic Sans is also famously easier for some to read, though harder for others (and unfortunately, unavailable via Google Fonts or CSS's generic fonts regardless :c). Anyway, unnessecarily long spiel about my font choice over. I just wanted to talk about it becuase I found it all quite interesting and fun to learn about.