Togo (1913 – December 5, 1929) was the lead sled dog of Leonhard Seppala and his dog sled team in the 1925 serum run to Nome across central and northern Alaska. Even though he covered more distance (260 miles) than his co-sledder Balto (55 miles), he didn’t get as much fame.
Togo was one of the offspring of former lead dog Suggen. He was named Cugu [tso`go], which means puppy in Northern Sami language, and later after the Japanese Admiral, Heihachiro Togo. Initially, he did not look like he had potential as a sled dog. He only grew to about 48 pounds (22 kg) in adulthood and had a black, brown, and gray coat that made him appear perpetually dirty.
Togo was ill as a young puppy and required intensive nursing from Seppala’s wife. He was very bold and rowdy, thus seen as “difficult and mischievous”, showing “all the signs of becoming a … canine delinquent” according to one reporter. At first, this behaviour was interpreted as evidence that he had been spoiled by the individual attention given to him during his illness. As he did not seem suited to be a sled dog, Seppala gave him away to be a pet dog at 6 months of age.
After only a few weeks as a house pet, Togo jumped through the glass of a closed window and ran several miles back to his original master’s kennel. This devotion to the team impressed Seppala, so he did not try to give him away again. However, Togo continued to cause trouble by breaking out of the kennel when Seppala took the team out on runs. He would attack the lead dogs of oncoming teams, “as if … to clear the way for his master”. However, one day, he attacked a much stockier malamute leader and was mauled and severely injured. When he recovered, Togo stopped attacking other teams’ lead dogs. This would eventually prove a valuable early experience, as it was difficult to teach a lead dog to keep a wide berth of oncoming teams.
When Togo was 8 months old, he proved his worth as a sled dog. He had run after the team yet again and slept, unnoticed, near the cabin where Seppala was spending the night. The next day, Seppala spotted him far off in the distance, and understood why his dogs had been so keyed up. Togo continued to make Seppala’s work difficult, trying to play with the work dogs and leading them in “charges against reindeer”, pulling them off the trail. Seppala had no choice but to put him in a harness to control him, and was surprised that Togo instantly settled down. As the run wore on, Seppala kept moving Togo up the line until, at the end of the day, he was sharing the lead position with the lead dog (named “Russky”). Togo had logged 75 miles on his first day in harness, which was unheard of for an inexperienced young sled dog, especially a puppy. Seppala called him an “infant prodigy”, and later added that “I had found a natural-born leader, something I had tried for years to breed.”
In October 1926, Seppala, Togo, and a team of dogs went on a tour from Seattle, Washington to California; Seppala and Togo drew large crowds at stadiums and department stores, and even appeared in a Lucky Strike cigarette campaign. In New York City, Seppala drove his team from the steps of City Hall along Fifth Avenue and made a pass through Central Park. The team appeared multiple times at Madison Square Garden, which was being managed by Tom Rickard, formerly of Nome, and where on December 30, Togo was awarded a gold medal by Roald Amundsen.
In New England, they competed in several dog sled races against local Chinooks of Arthur Walden and won by huge margins. The success of Seppala’s races and the celebrity afforded to the dogs and mushers by the Serum Run, allowed Seppala to begin a Siberian dog kennel and partnership with Elizabeth M. Ricker in Poland Spring, Maine. Togo was left to live at the Ricker kennel to enjoy a life of luxury in his retirement from sled work, and was bred over the next several years, laying down the foundation for the modern Siberian sled dog breeds.
In 1928, Elizabeth M. Ricker, of Poland Spring, Maine, wrote and published the book Togo’s Fireside Reflections. Seppala inked Togo’s paw and helped Togo sign some of the books.
After several years of retirement at the Ricker Kennel in Poland Spring, Togo was euthanized on December 5, 1929 at 16 years old. The headline in The New York Sun Times the next day was “Dog Hero Rides to His Death” (Salisbury & Salisbury, 2003), and he was eulogized in many other papers. After his death, Seppala had him custom mounted. The mounted skin was on display at the Shelburne Museum in Shelburne Vermont. Alaskan students started a letter campaign to return Togo to Alaska. Today the mounted skin is on display in a glass case at the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Headquarters museum in Wasilla, Alaska. The Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale University has his skeleton in their collection. Togo has a statue dedicated to him in New York City’s Seward Park.
Togo’s reputation earned him enduring fame. The popular fictional teen sleuth Nancy Drew named a stray terrier after him in the 1937 novel The Whispering Statue. The dog appears in most of the Nancy Drew novels.
Source: Wikipedia
