Book Review: A Lucky Dog: Owney, US Rail Mail Mascot (1800s, trains)

A Lucky Dog: Owney, US Rail Mail Mascot, by Dirk Wales (Great Plains Pr, 2003, 32 pp HB, ages 4-9, Preschool - grade 3, $15.95) Review by Skye Anderson

A True Story: A Huge Book about a Huge Story

A Lucky Dog: Owney, US Rail Mail Mascot, is a huge book that tells the huge story of a little mutt, many years ago, who jumped onto a box car that happened to be carrying the US mail and that was the first day of the rest of his life - as a mascot for the US mail.

It was a Dark and Stormy Night. . . . For This Mail Pouch Pooch

It was a dark and stormy night, that night in 1887 that our hero-mutt jumped onto the box car to get out of the rain in Albany, New York. He quickly became the pet of the local post office but soon also caught the travel bug. So, he hopped on the next mail train and hopped off at a distant station to stay a while.

Then he took about hop and another until he made his way across the country and into the history books of the US Postal Service for 9 years, guarding the mail. From Baltimore to Washington, DC, to Chicago and even on a ship that sailed round the world, Owney became famous as the pet of thousands of postal workers. One postal worker found him a coat and others affixed mailbag tags to it, starting a collection of Owney's itinerary that rivals Gulliver's travels.

Owney's book is mostly true but since Owney didn't tell his story to the author (the author wasn't around yet) we have only the recollections of postal workers across the county and across the world. Some of the story is what probably occurred to Owney as well as what did happen.

Illustrator of this edition (the book at the top of this review), Diane Kenna, uses brown-tinged water colors to depict a nondescript terrier-type - any dog (and every dog). Her full-page pictures are soft and friendly.

And it is only fitting that Owney now has his own postage stamp! Forever!