– contributed by CCHP graduate assistant Arianna Iliff.
Most of my coworkers here at the CCHP know that I am an animal lover, and that I’ll gladly show you pictures of my cats, Star and Nimbus, if you let me. In fact, I featured my favorite item in the collection in a previous blog post—a chalk drawing created by Molly Harrower portraying her own dearly adored cats. I do not always know why my pets do what they do—why they love playing with leaves but can’t hunt a stinkbug, for instance–which is why I am grateful for the work of John Paul Scott, an animal behaviorist who studied a variety of creatures, including goats, sheep, birds, and dogs.
In the collection, there is a huge variety of materials from Scott’s career, including his famous text Genetics and the Social Behavior of the Dog. Scott also maintained connections with a variety of breeding clubs for breeds such as the doberman, the yorkie, or the unique little creature called the telomian—considered to be a link between a basenji and a wild dingo. One article described these dogs as “The Missing Link With The Worried Look.”
Who’s a scholastically relevant boy? Is it you? It’s you! Good boy!
You can also find memos and correspondence discussing new puppies and answering questions of dog behavior.
“A spoiled, lovable, useless pet.” What more could a dog lover want?
Scott died in 2000 and was described with honor by Bowling Green State University. His relative obscurity to the mainstream is curious, given that so much of what we know about dog behavior is derived from his research. If nothing else, we certainly have a vast collection to speak of, with Scott’s wide-reaching discussions of animal psychology. Now, if only I could figure out why Nimbus is obsessed with my yoga mat?
A four-month-old telomian. The reverse of this photo indicates her name is “Princess.” Precious!
