Guide Dogs for the Blind

Guide Dogs for the Blind is a guide dog school located in the United States, with campuses in San Rafael, California, and Boring, Oregon. It was founded in 1942 by Lois Merrihew and Don Donaldson to help veterans who had been blinded in World War II. Guide Dogs for the Blind has about 2000 Guide Dog teams across the United States and Canada.

Guide Dogs for the Blind (GDB) was established in 1942 in response to the need for service dogs to help wounded servicemen that were coming back blind from World War II. The first building it operated in was a rented house in Los Gatos, California. The first dog to graduate through the program was a rescued German Shepherd named Blondie, she was paired with Sgt. Leonard Foulk. In 1947 the organization moved to their current location in San Rafael, California and in 1995 started a program at a second campus in Boring, Oregon. Today GDB is the largest Guide Dog school in the United States. This non-profit organization provides services to blind and visually impaired individuals from the United States and Canada for no cost including well trained service dogs and the veterinary care that goes with them.

Over the years Guide Dogs for the Blind has worked with different breeds of dogs in order to find the best for training as well as being a lifelong partner. They started off with rescued dogs and in the 1940s started their own breeding program.At the time they were mostly German Shepherds which became the breed of choice for many guide dog organizations and GDB used them all the way until 2007 at which point they reevaluated the success of the breed. Today they have a healthy breeding colony consisting of Labrador Retrievers, Golden Retrievers and Lab/Golden crosses. Guide Dogs focuses their breeding on the qualities needed in a guide including excellent health, willingness to work, high desire to please, intelligent, and easy to work with temperament.

Guide for the Blind also participates in an international program in which guide dogs schools from around the world work together to diversify the gene pool in the breeding colonies by providing puppies from high success parents to other schools. This creates a healthier breeding colony for all who participate.

Puppy raising is one of the dog programs in which volunteers are needed. These volunteers sign up to receive a puppy who is about 8 weeks old and will take care of, train, and socialize their dog until they are about 13-15 months old. Puppy raisers belong to a local club where they get support and training on how to best work with their puppy. They are responsible for teaching the dog basic obedience and good manners while home and out working. The puppy raising program currently exists in nine western states (Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Texas, and Washington) and in November 2014 will be starting in New Mexico. There are currently more than 1,400 families who are participating in this puppy raising program.

...
Wikipedia