Mr. Hall Had An Idea

Thomas Hall poured a cup of steaming hot coffee into his dented and scratched tin mug, walked out his cabin door, and gazed over his family's recently settled cattle farm in the New South Wales state of the Australian outback. The morning sun crested the horizon, blanketing the family’s herd of recently imported Herefords in a damp and misty, blood-orange hue.

Eager to wash the morning out of his mouth, he raises the steaming tin mug to his lips, instantly fogging his bifocals.

“Crikey mother… these damn things,” Thomas grumbles. He reaches out to place his coffee on the window ledge but misses, and the mug falls to the ground, dousing his bare feet in scolding hot coffee…

“Son of a Kanga- fuckin-roooo!” He hollers out, shuffling his feet like a tap dancer on a hot bed of coals. Still blinded by his fogged glasses, he shuffles his right foot straight into one of his Douglas fir porch beams jamming his toe. “Who the hell did I piss off!?” He screams out in agony.

Just when he thought it couldn’t get worse, he manages to hop directly on the tail of his dog, Wooly, causing Wooly to, almost instinctively, and as fast as a rattlesnake, turn and nip the back of the heel of Thomas’ other foot making him trip and finally fall to the ground.

Staring up at the morning sky, Thomas lays on his back to catch his breath. With his tail between his legs, Wooly walks over and licks Thomas’ face and the fog from the bifocals still on his head.

“Hey, Wooly,” Thomas says, scratching Wooly’s neck. “You’re alright, I know you didn’t mean it. If I could only get you to run down there and nip those Herefords like that… I’d be out of a job, mate.” Thomas’ eyes widen, his jaw softly drops, and on an early December morning in 1825, the idea of the Australian Cattle Dog was born – It was a Tuesday.

The origins of the greatest ideas are formed from endless spilled coffee, jammed toes, and blurry vision. Thomas refused to allow life’s daily collateral damage to deter his idea of creating a breed of dog built to withstand the harsh conditions of the Australian outback.

We cattle dog people owe Mr. Hall a great deal of gratitude. Well, most of the time, I feel that way. Sometimes we feel like he created a full-bred Velociraptor, and I am confident I can speak on behalf of other cow-dog owners when I say we wouldn’t mind asking him… “Mr. Hall, just what in the world were you thinking?”