Progressive Dog Club – A Recap

BY AMY FERNANDEZ

Progressive had a couple strikes against it as it kicked off the Westminster week festivities on Friday, February 10. The nine inches of snow that blanketed NYC a day earlier was no big deal aside from the incredibly bad timing for thousands of people heading into town for the shows. Thanks to that, the club’s 93rd Toy specialty commenced with melting snow drizzling through the ceiling of the Penn Top Ballroom and half of the judging panel missing in action. Luc Boileau never made it in from Wisconsin and Norm Patton, coming from Arizona, didn’t arrive until Friday night.

Complications like that typically send show committees into a tailspin. Even without those last minute snags orchestrating a major Westminster event is sufficient to test anyone’s sanity. Well, maybe not everyone. According to Progressive’s president, Kathleen Kolbert, “Everything went very smoothly, like it does every year.” She’s been at the helm for 15 years, which somewhat explains the club’s remarkable resilience. Progressive was just the start of her daunting week. After the show wrapped up Friday night she headed over to the New Yorker where setup was underway for the weekend’s back to back Yorkie specialties. She also had a house full of guests for the week. Their departure the following Friday afternoon wasn’t the end of it. “I was up all night delivering puppies. They’re not mine, one belongs to Pam, the other to Laura, but I’m the midwife. They were due a day apart but they both decided to go into labor yesterday.” Seems like the perfect way to round out an exhausting, nerve-racking week. “We’ve got three in one litter and four in the other. The last puppy was born at 10:31 this morning.” About five minutes later I called to ask her about the show.

“Because of Thursday’s snow we didn’t have the usual number of spectators but a lot of people did come out in spite of the weather and there were very few absentees in the classes.” The entry clocked in at 403, just five dogs shy of last year. Cavaliers and Yorkies led the way with 47 and 66 entries respectively. “We used to be up over 500 dogs but we maintain ourselves pretty well considering the crisis going on.” True, every club has been grappling with falling entries in recent years. “Other than that we haven’t had any real problems.”

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Posted by Alex on Mar 16 2017. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.