In 1977, my mother purchased a basenji for my father, fulfilling a long time dream.  He boasted about the breed’s fearless nature, lion hunting dog, fast and agile.  I suspect he was influenced by the novel and subsequent movie, “Good Bye My Lady, though I doubt he would ever admit such. 

Lady was a very typical basenji and very loyal to my father.  He would roughhouse with her, resulting in ferocious battles, as she was a very vocal basenji.  She was always gentle using her teeth during these play secession, yet not so gentle with strangers.  Dad would ultimately play dead, and her mood went from play to concern as if someone flipped a switch.  It was like Lady felt as if she did something to cause this condition, dad was no long moving.   Lady loved the hunt; one of her favorite games was to attack the water hose.  We had a lot of water pressure which made the end of the hose wiggle, a snake which needed to be attacked.  The result was water sprayed everywhere, better than any sprinkler on hot summer day in Southern California.   And when the day was done she took great care in keeping my Dad’s feet clean, a trait she reserved for only him.

But like many basenji she had other traits which were not so amusing.  Lady chewed on the window sills and other moldings around the house.

 She destroyed the door jambs and cabinet in the bathroom, as dad tried to secure her there when we were gone.  He did not have the heart to cage a dog.  She was impossible to catch if she got loose.  As kids, we no doubt created this game by chasing her.  She would tree any cat she found, not making our neighbors happy.   

She did have only one fear, the broom.  As a puppy, she was racing around the house as basenjis do, finding the circular path which lead through the kitchen. She bush up against the broom which was leaning against the wall and knocked it over, resulting in a loud bang as it hit the floor.  The noise startled her, and from that day on, she believed the broom to be an evil thing out to get her.  

These are the memories of a basenji which influenced me in choosing the breed when I was in a position to own a dog.  Nothing less than a basenji would do. 

My first basenji was Tesseract Mountain Music, by Ch. Sunhue Tony Vikentor x Tesseract Wild Fire at Tennji who I purchase for $125 from Yvette Smith Walker, in the late summer of 1981.  Mounty was 10 months old and was sold to me by Sheila H. Smith.  Yvette, her daughter had recently moved out of state and place Sheila in charge with placing Mounty.

 I bought Mounty strictly as a pet with no interest what so ever in dog shows.  As Monty matured, he became overly protective of me, a problem which I discussed Sheila Smith.  She advised me to meet with Melody Russell, who owned Mounty's sire, Tony.  Melody and I meet and became good friends.  I was quite impressed with her dogs’ good nature, she also had a Pembroke Welsh Corgi at the time and a Rhodesian Ridgeback who she warn me that had a wild tongue.   Melody recommended that classes from Jane Anderson to resolve Monty’s issues.  They were handling classes for conformation showing.  It was at these classes I was bitten by the show bug and first meet my future wife, Laurie.