Ben Jack Larado’s dog "D-O-G"
By Lee Henry

I’ve heard tell a dog was man's best friend. Well, Ole Deeogee was some times my best friend but at other times he would get himself and me in a double-barreled peck of trouble.

In the spring of 1863 I found that dog along side the Black Pool in Ford County, Kansas. He was draggin’ a trap on his left rear leg. He looked starved to near death. At once, I decided to put him out of his misery with one shot from my Colt 45.

Standing on the edge of the rock outcrop, I took dead aim. About that time, one of my sourdough biscuits from breakfast fell out of my pocket and rolled toward Ole Deeogee. Well, that dog came alive, jumped up and snatched that biscuit and in two big bites it was gone. Again, I commenced to draw a bead on his head. Then I noticed what looked like a little grin on his mouth and a slight wag of his tail. I couldn’t shoot him. I wasn’t gonna shoot any man or beast that liked my biscuits! I coaxed him up with another biscuit but couldn’t get close enough to get the trap off his leg. I fed him a couple more biscuits but he wouldn’t come near me. I grew tired of his game so I climbed aboard my chuckwagon. 

I lit out toward Ft. Dodge to a creek crossing  where I was going to fix the evenin’ chuck and set the night camp. Much to my surprise that dang dog was ah following my chuckwagon still draggin that trap. When he started out he had about a 2-inch tongue hanging between two fangs, now it looked like it was 5 or 6 inches long. We had come about 9 mile when he sat down in a wagon track, throwed his head back and let out a howl that was so loud and mournful it sent chills ah runnin’ down my spine. I stopped my wagon and went back to him. This time he looked at me and seem to say" I can’t keep up any more". He let me remove the trap without a whimper. I took a stick, my red bandana and made a splint for his broken leg. I also saw then where the trap had cut two toes off his foot. He sat along side me on the chuckwagon seat till we reached the edge of Ash Creek just west of Pawnee Rock, where I was going to pitch night camp.

The cowboys started comin’ in for supper. They had all heard about this vagabond mutt that had followed the chuckwagon all day with his foot in a trap. They all gathered around tryin' to get a look at the pup that was hid out under the chuckwagon. Well boys, that’s when Ole Rip Roarin’ Rod said, "Hey, Cookie, what’s his name" and I just blurted it out. "Deeogee is his name."

He was a tough little pup. He was hooked on my sourdough biscuits and for the next 14 years he never left the chuckwagon or me.

He could raise a ruckus in camp if he got riled. I recall one evening along about chuck, a new cowboy (greenhorn) not knowin’ the rules of a cow camp, rode his pony inside the 20-yard circle around the Chuckwagon. Of course, this was against all rules (only the trail boss could ride in and tie his horse to the wagon wheel.) Anyway, Ole Deeogee took exception to what the cowboy had done. He charged the cowpony, nippin at his heels. Instantly the horse jumped straight up and came down in the middle of pots, pans and fire. One leg in the coffee pot, 2 legs aimed at the sky, beans goin’ in one direction and biscuits in another. Ole Deeogee was hangin onto the other leg with all his might. What a wreck! With the cowboy takin’ flight about 6 feet above the horse, Ole Deeogee caught a heel just below the right ear. It sure was a late supper that night and the trail boss had to have an extra helping of Whiskey Puddin just to keep him from sendin’ Deeogee to the happy hunting ground.

Next mornin’ at chuck I noticed Deeogee’s right ear was permanently bent down. The last kick from that horse fixed it for good.

In the spring of 1872, we were comin’ into Fort Union on Sapello Creek. It was near "La Junta" the junction of the Mountain Branch and Cimarron cutoff of the Santa Fe Trail. "Col. Craig Conley was in charge." The trail was steep goin’ down. The mules were set back and I had the break as tight as it would go. Still the wagon was slidin’ and dangerously close to turnin’ over. About the time I thought things couldn’t get any worse, they did! Ole Deeogee, seeing the mess we were in, jumped in behind the mules, let out a bark and nipped Ole Ned in the hock. That mule jumped straight up, spookin’ the other mule "Nelly May". They took off down the mountain, pots, pans, and grub was fallin’ off of and out of the wagon. About a mile down the trail I got them under control. I started walkin’ back up the trail, gatherin’ up all my trappings as I went, cussin’ the day I found that dog. But he was nowhere in site. Climbin’ up the steep trail, I rounded that bend where the wreck began and there laid Deeogee, hide gone from his left side where the wagon had run over him. Along with everything else, I toted him back to the wagon. I covered it with bacon grease and bandaged him best I could. In about a week he was back runnin’ along side the wagon. You know his hair was short, kind-o like wire, brown and gray with splotches of black. That one spot on his side never did grow any hair back.

Deeogee stood about 22 inches tall, weighed close to 55 pounds. He was lank and mean. He dearly loved those sourdough biscuits. I got to where after I had crowded a mess "O" biscuits in the Dutch, any dough I had left over would be rolled out thin and flat. I cooked these in the skillet until they were hard as a rock. Then during the day when Ole Deeogee needed a snack, I would toss one down to him from the wagon seat.

You know I called them Deeogee biscuits but I heard tell later some big outfit started makin' them and sellin' them to city folk dog owners. They called them dog biscuits.

Deeogee and I left the trail in about 1880. With the help of Effrem Eligia Henry, we opened a restaurant in the mile high city. We called it the Cast Iron Kettle. This was in the middle of the gold rush days and business boomed. This worked out great, as Effrem, Deeogee and Myself were worn out from many years on the trail.

Sometimes in the spring the three of us would close up the restaurant, load up the chuckwagon and once again camp out and cook up a chuck of salt pork, coffee, sourdough and lick. The grub cooked over an open fire under the stars seemed to have a richer flavor.

I remember one time when we were camped out, a city slicker came along the trail. Said he was a photographer. He had a contraption called a camera. He got all set up ‘fired off this violent flash of gunpowder. Scared the mules and us half to death. We never got to see the tintype. Ole Deeogee and Effrem put him and that new fangled contraption high ballin' it down the trail.

The years seemed to speed up and the Santa Fe Trail became a memory. Deeogee, not having any cows to chase or coyotes to howl at, settled down to a life of livin’ under the porch on the back of the restaurant. He became fat and sassy. One eye brown and the other blue turned to a gray haze as he was getting near 14 years old. One morning he didn’t come out for sourdough biscuits and lick. He had passed during the night.

I loaded Deeogee into my Ole chuckwagon and with the mules headed south to the Santa Fe Trail. That’s where he loved to be and that’s where he was goin’ to be buried. That night I did two things. First I made his headboard from wood off our chuckwagon. Second I made up a batch of sourdough biscuits. I buried him at daybreak along the Santa Fe Trail in full view of the Sangre de Christo Mountains with his sourdough biscuits and lick.