Guide dog (seeing eye dog)

Guide dogs, also called seeing-eye dogs, are trained to help people who are blind live on their own. The person, who is often called the handler, and the guide dog work together, which requires training for both the handler and the dog. Highly intelligent, guide dogs are carefully selected and extensively trained. Included among the many tasks they are taught to complete, they must learn to stop at curbs, remain calm under pressure, and disobey commands that might put their handler in danger. While other dog breeds are occasionally trained to become guide dogs, most are Labrador retrievers, golden retrievers, or German shepherds.

Guide dogs are allowed to go into places that other animals cannot, such as restaurants and grocery stores. They can ride buses and travel with their handlers on planes. Permitting them in such establishments is legally required in the United States under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Background

Dogs have been assisting people who are blind since ancient times. A preserved first century CE mural found in the ruins of the Roman town Herculaneum shows a dog assisting a person who is visually impaired. Other records exist in Europe and Asia from the Middle Ages such as a painting showing a person who is blind being assisted by a large dog.

The first formal training for guide dogs began in 1780 at Les Quinze-Vingts hospital in Paris, France, for people who were blind. In 1819 in Vienna, Switzerland, Johann Wilhelm Klein, the founder of the Institute for Education of the Blind, included a method for training guide dogs in a book he wrote about educating people who are blind.

During World War I (1914–1918), thousands of soldiers were blinded in combat by poison gas. Dr. Gerhard Stalling, a German doctor, sought to train dogs to assist them. In August 1916, in Oldenburg, Germany, he opened the first school for guide dogs. He soon opened guide dog schools in other locations and was eventually able to train about six hundred guide dogs per year for servicemen and others who were blind.

Stalling’s schools closed in 1926, but by then another large guide-dog training school had opened in Potsdam, Germany. This school was successful in training guide dogs and able to provide about twelve dogs per month to people who were blind.

Around the same time as the Potsdam school opening, Dorothy Harrison Eustis, an American woman, was training guide dogs in Switzerland for the military and police. When Eustis heard about the guide dog school in Potsdam, she spent several months there learning its methods. She was so impressed with the guide dog school that in 1927, she wrote a newspaper article about it called “The Seeing Eye.”

Morris Frank, a man who was blind, read the article and contacted Eustis about bringing guide dogs to the United States. She invited him to Switzerland and he returned home to the United States with what may have been the country’s first guide dog. In 1929, Eustis opened The Seeing Eye guide-dog school in Morristown, New Jersey. She soon opened a branch of the school in Switzerland and another in Italy.

In 1930, Muriel Crooke and Rosamund Bond, both from Great Britain, contacted Eustis and asked for help in opening a school similar to The Seeing Eye in the United Kingdom (UK). In 1931, Crooke and Bond reached their goal and founded The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association.

Since then, similar schools have opened throughout the world. They provide people who are blind with guide dogs that help them live independently.

Overview

Puppies that are selected to become guide dogs have a calm demeanor and learn quickly. Labrador retrievers, golden retrievers, and German shepherds are the breeds most often chosen to become guide dogs, although border collies, standard poodles, and vizslas are sometimes used. Puppies chosen to be guide dogs often begin training with a volunteer family, who exposes the puppy to a variety of situations such as noisy events. When they are between twelve and fifteen months old, they go to a guide-dog school for evaluation and formal training, which takes at least four months. At first, they work in groups learning or reinforcing basic commands such as “sit” and “stay.” They begin wearing a guide harness in public and learn to stop at curbs.

If they succeed in mastering the basics, they move on to more difficult tasks such as avoiding obstacles and stopping for traffic. Instructors typically wear blindfolds to give the dogs a sense of what it is like to work with a person who is blind. Animals deemed not suitable for guide-dog work become family pets.

Later, the dogs master advanced skills, such as knowing when they pass under an obstacle, such as a tree branch, that their handler could run into. They learn intelligent disobedience, which means refusing to perform a command that will put their handler in danger. The dogs must learn to safely cross busy streets, maneuvering around cars. Some even learn how to press buttons in elevators to take their handlers to the correct floor.

After this, each dog is matched with a handler and begins training with him or her. At this point, training is tailored to a particular handler and where he or she lives. For example, a guide dog that will live in the countryside learns different skills than one who will live in a city. Handlers usually stay at a guide-dog school for several weeks, learning to complete tasks with their new companions.

Guide dogs are able to go nearly everywhere with their handlers. They can go into stores, restaurants, and hospitals. They can travel on buses, on trains, and in planes. In the United States, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) forbids businesses and organizations from turning away guide dogs. The Fair Housing Act requires landlords with a “no pets policy” to allow guide dogs.

A guide dog typically stays with its handler for about seven to ten years. After this, it retires and lives with an adoptive family, so its handler can get used to working with a younger dog.

Bibliography

Eschner, Kat. “The Cuddly Tail of Guide Dogs.” Smithsonian Magazine, 7 Aug. 2017, www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/guide-dog-tail-180964302/. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.

Fidrocki, Meredith. “Woof! 9 Interesting—and Surprising—Facts About Guide Dogs.” Perkins School for the Blind, www.perkins.org/stories/woof-9-interesting-and-surprising-facts-about-guide-dogs. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.

“Guide Dogs and Service Dogs.” National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, 2023, www.loc.gov/nls/braille-audio-reading-materials/lists-nls-produced-books-topic-genre/listings-on-narrow-topics-minibibliographies/guide-dogs-service-dogs/. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.

Kilgannon, Corey. “A Final Proving Ground for Guide Dogs to the Blind: Midtown Manhattan.” New York Times, 6 Nov. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/11/06/nyregion/guide-dogs-blind.html. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.

Linn, Adam. “The Blind Man’s French Dog Problem.” New York Times, 18 Oct. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/10/18/opinion/blind-french-guide-dog.html. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.

Richmond, Mardi. “Guide Dogs for the Blind.” Bark, May 2014, thebark.com/content/guide-dogs-blind. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.

“6 Inspirational Guide Dog Stories You Have to Read.” A Life of Dogs, 24 July 2020, alifeofdogs.com/6-inspirational-guide-dog-stories-you-need-to-read/. Accessed 13 Dec. 2024.