654 
FOREST AND STREAM 
November, 1918 
ALL-AMERICA BIRD DOG CHAMPIONSHIP 
THE CANDY KID, AN OKLAHOMA SHOOTING DOG, WINS THE DR. ROWE CHAM¬ 
PIONSHIP CUP THREE SUCCESSIVE TIMES, BREAKING ALL FIELD TRIAL RECORDS 
T HE Candy Kid, an Oklahoma dog, has 
boldly gone “over the top” in the field 
trial world and defeated all competit¬ 
ors on three different occasions in the great 
All-America championship that is run on 
'the prairies of Dakota. He has clinched 
all three legs of the title to the greatest 
trophy in the field trial world—the Dr. Rowe 
Cup. All honor to the game little dog that 
has come out of the West. All honor to 
the sporting parson out in Kansas who 
schooled him. All honor to Chesley Harris, 
his handler, a Mississippi lad now fighting 
with our forces 
abroad, who first 
placed him over all 
the stars in the bird 
dog firmanent. Hon¬ 
or again to George 
Payton, who condi¬ 
tioned and handled 
him in his final race 
for the champion¬ 
ship which broke all 
the records that have 
been written in the 
book of field trials; 
congratulations to C. 
E. Duffield, of Tulsa, 
Oklahoma, the man 
who owns him. 
Ever since the first 
trial, and that L 
nearly half’ a century 
ago, it has been 
preached and argued 
that only a field trial 
dog could win a field 
trial, and that there 
was a radical and ir 
reconcilable differ 
ence between the 
field trial dog and 
the shooting dog. One school of sports¬ 
men has always claimed that a field trial 
dog was of different brain and fibre than 
the useful shooting dog (slightingly re¬ 
ferred to as a meat dog) of the every day 
sportsman and that the field trial winner 
must be bred, trained, and handled along 
different lines. In other words, that a 
shooting dog, no matter how good he might 
be, had no chance to win the great stakes 
and high honors that are awarded every 
year at various important field trials. The 
other school of sportsmen has claimed, and 
claimed rightly, that there was no funda¬ 
mental difference between the two dogs, 
that the best shooting dog in the world, the 
gamest, fastest and most untiring, high¬ 
headed, bird-wise, keen-nosed dog that 
a sportsman ever shot over, was automatic¬ 
ally the greatest field trial dog in the world. 
The late B. F. Wilson, of Pittsburgh, 
must be given the honor of having done 
more for the American setter than any 
man that has ever lived. That quiet sports¬ 
man whose guarded opinions were held in 
such high esteem was first to recognize the 
By WILLIAM A. BRUETTE 
tremendous potentialities of Count Noble 
when that dog as a puppy appeared in 
America. His owner, Dave Sanborn, who 
had imported him from Mr. Llewellyn’s ken¬ 
nel in England, was on the point of return¬ 
ing him as an impossible member of the 
setter family. Had he done so the greatest 
of setter sires would have been lost forever 
to America. It was Mr. Wilson who in¬ 
duced him to keep him and, when 
Sanborn died he willed the dog to his old 
friend and patron. “Dad” Wilson never 
wavered in his belief in Count No¬ 
ble’s sterling qualities, he saw clearly that 
the speed, range and accurate bird work 
demanded in field trial competition were 
the qualities that could be applied with the 
greatest success to every day work in the 
field. Dad Wilson believed in Count Noble 
and placed his progeny in trial after trial 
until his reputation and imprint were irrad- 
icably stamped upon the setter family in 
America. Candy Kid is of the Count No¬ 
ble breed. Ten years ago when the shoot¬ 
ing dog versus the field trial dog contro¬ 
versy was in full bloom and such celebrat¬ 
ed field stars as Champion Jessie Rod- 
field Count Gladstone, Lanark Lad, Prince 
Rodney, Caesar, and Fishels Frank were in 
their prime, there appeared at one of the 
Quail Trials a keen eyed rangy man from 
Tennessee named Tom Pace, and a big, no¬ 
ble, soft eyed, silky haired setter named 
Prince Whitestone—Tom Pace mined coal 
for a living and shot partridges for pleas¬ 
ure. He said that he was plumb crazy over 
partridge-shooting and that Prince was just 
as crazy over the birds as he was. He had 
never been to a field trial before but wanted 
to see one and find out if anyone had a 
better dog than Prince. He started his dog 
in fhe trials. He started him again at the 
big championship at Grand Junction, Ten¬ 
nessee. The way that old dog found birds 
and handled them was a caution. The 
shooting dog from Tennessee swept the 
boards and defeated the greatest bird dogs 
of the day. That story has all been tolc 
before. It is sufficient to say that Prince 
was of the Count Noble breed. Prince came 
back the next year and tried to repeat his 
performance but he failed to so so. Youngei 
dogs, better conditioned dogs, keener hai 
dlers, fortune or fate call it what you wil 
Prince’s day had passed—he was defeatec 
P RINCE WHITESTONE was a shoo 
ing dog. The Candy Kid is also 
shooting dog, but he came back. It 
the ability to come back that has stampe 
him as the greatest dog of his day, and tb 
days that are passed, for it has been wri 
ten in the field trial book that champion 
cannot come back. To be sure there ai 
iron dogs that have won two championshij 
but that has been the limit until this dc 
came out of the West. The sportsmen wb 
have seen his performance in three sui 
cessive years, who saw him win the chan 
pionship in 1916, defend it in 1917 and clinc 
it in 1918, have witnessed what field tri 
men have never seen before. The story c 
Candy Kid is unique in the history of fie 
trials and of more than passing interest 1 
sportsmen. He is a shooting dog pui 
and simple. He received his early schoo 
ing under a bird hunting parson, a Methi 
dist divine out in Kansas, who is devoted 1 
Candy Kid, winner of the All-America Championship 
Illustrations by courtesy of the American Field. 
