Old Style Shepherd?

It's been a while since I've done a Leo update, and I've got a short one to share. :) I thought it would be interesting because one of the things we mention when we talk about Shilohs is that they are bred to be similar to "old style" German shepherds. :)

A few months back a friend of mine sent me a link to a dog-related antiques site she'd found. Normally I don't have much interest in that type of thing. But I DO have interest in pedigrees, and she'd found a real curiosity for me--an antique German shepherd stud card! I decided to purchase it.

This dog belonged to a kennel in Lake Mills, Wisconsin, called Rock Lake Kennels. The reverse of the stud card has his kennel and owner information and a four-generation pedigree. From the information I've been able to find on those ancestors, he was probably born in the mid-1920's, and his sire may have been brought back to the US after World War I (as all the previous dogs on the pedigree seem to have been born in Germany). When this dog existed, the German shepherd breed was not even as old as our Shiloh shepherd breed is today! In his fourth generation he has some of the foundation dogs of the GSD breed: Flora (Berkemeyer) and Roland v. Starkenburg. So we are really talking "old style"!

NOW look at this dog. He is an ISSR Shiloh Shepherd, born in the early 2000's, out of the Honey/Grizz litter. He is full brother to Leo's dam Holly. Compare him to the dog above. :)

The resemblance would be better if Leo's uncle Zeus was stacked, of course, but when I shot the photo we had no idea we'd be comparing him to a dog from almost a hundred years ago someday!

Pretty darn cool, huh? :D