History of Hearing Dogs

If one is to take it literally, the history of service dogs will take an eternity to tell, as dogs have been serving and living with humans for thousands of years. What is meant by history here is tracing the beginning and development of professional dog training, wherein many assistance dog organizations and institutions emerge in various countries. During the 18th century, in France, there was a hospital named Quinze-Vingts that employed dogs to assist blind patients in walking down the streets of Paris. In the same period in Austria, there was also a historical literary account of a manual written for the people in Viennese Institute for the Blind, which demonstrates and explains on how to train dogs. Years later, in Switzerland, in 1847, a man named Jakob Birner also published a comprehensive training manual for guide dogs. The first recognized assistance dog institution in the world is the German Association for Serving Dogs, which was established by the Austrian Police and the War Dog Institute in 1916.Many other dog organizations and dog training establishments then began afterwards. But the biggest boom of demand for service dogs started in the late 1970s and consistently grew in 1980s, a decade when veterinary, especially canine, knowledge flourished. While most dogs were only trained to assist blind people at the time, in 1975, Agnes McGrath and the Minnesota Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals came up with a hearing dog program, which paved the way to the establishment of International Hearing Dog, Inc., the first institution to train dogs for hearing-impaired people. --- You can view more information at Hearing Dogs.