Page 220 - ShowSight - October 2019
P. 220

                Lines From Linda
BY LINDA AYERS TURNER KNORR
HAPPY ENDING — LOST AND FOUND
Do you believe in miracles? As over 2400 dogs
including 179 breeds were competing in the four day Carolina Foot- hills Cluster Dog Shows at The Greenville Con- vention Center on July 28, this story begins. Paula Hightower popped a six foot leash on her 13 inch Beagle, Encores River of Dreams Lynmax to get some exercise. In all of the chaos, Paula
tripped and fell, “River” bolted to explore the area.
Kris Harner, Cluster Chair launched an all out search. The
area surrounding the Greenville Convention Center includes an airport and one of the city’s busiest highways near the expressway entrance. There was no sign of the little show dog! With the enor- mous amount of dogs and people in the area, it would seem that River would find a friend to return her to her owner. Sadly that did not happen. With the tremendous traffic in the area, hopes dimmed for finding her unharmed.
Harner enlisted the help of Kim Lamb, owner of nearby Speedy Paws, a premiere dog training facility. Kim dropped everything join- ing the search immediately covering Greenville with LOST DOG posters. Kris and Kim contacted all of the local shelters, Greenville County Animal Care and the Greenville Humane Society and the news spread though social media. Everyone was looking for River!
Almost six weeks later just when hope was growing dim, busi- nessman Casey Brock, owner of CB2 Consulting, Inc. from Char- lotte, North Carolina was looking over some land not far from the Convention Center. Much to his surprise, he discovered a tiny little Beagle still wearing a collar attached to her six foot leather lead. It was River. She was so entangled in briars that Casey had to call for help. First he tried phone all the different appropriate agencies, but was unable to get though to a real person. So he looked up the address of the Greenville Humane Society and rushed to drive there for assistance.
Rachel Delport, the Adoption Center Operations Manager just happened to be at the reception desk. After hearing Casey’s description, she had high hopes that the dog on all of the posters was indeed River. Although it was not normal that she could leave her job to go rescue a dog, she quickly enlisted the help of Elijah Ackerman, the Vaccine Clinic Coordinator. They would drive the Humane Society van following Casey to rescue River.
When I first spoke with Rachel Delport, she had this to say about the hero of this story, “I am so thankful that people like Casey Brock still exist in this world! I think he is the nicest man I have ever met! He didn’t have to drive all the way over to find the Greenville Humane Society to ask for help. He could have just con- tinued his work and no one would have ever been aware of the situ- ation. Casey is not even from our area, but he took it upon himself to take the extra step to get River help. He was so happy that he even donated money to help out some of the sick animals in our care. Casey was River’s saving grace and Elijah and I will never forget the steps Casey took to save River’s life.”
     218 • ShowSight Magazine, october 2019
Owners Ralph and Paula Hightower, we’re overjoyed to be reunited with their little Beagle after she was missing for almost 6 weeks.
Look closely at how River’s 6 foot leash wash wrapped around the trees when she was found by Hero Casey Brock.
After Elijah Ackerman and Rachel Delport followed Casey into the woods that day, Elijah shared these comments about what they found, “I just remember feeling like it was some sort of true miracle that anyone found her.
River was hidden deep into several acres of totally overgrown woods, not moving a muscle or making a sound. Even once we knew she was out there, we couldn’t find her until being within a few feet of her. We could tell she had gotten snagged on some briars and panicked until her leash was so intertwined with the briars >


















































































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