FAMOUS FACE: Anyone watching the AKC dog show Sunday night on
the Animal Planet may have spotted a couple local faces, one very
furry.

Rex, the canine companion of retired U.S. Air Force technical
sergeant Jamie Himes Dana, received one of only five ACE award for
his career in the military.

The Award for Canine Excellence – only of only five given out –
was presented during the AKC/Eukanuba National Championship in Long
Beach, Calif., held this past weekend.

Each recipient received an engraved silver collar medallion and
$1,000 cash award. Rex took the award in the Law Enforcement
category.

Not only were Rex and Jamie present to receive the award but the
TV show included a video interview with Jamie who detailed her now
familiar (to us, anyway) story about her travails in the Iraq
War.

If you want to check out the whole story, the AKC has a website
with a full list of results from the weekend show, including the
story on Jamie and Rex.

We learned a couple things there we hadn’t known perhaps since
the AKC focuses more on the dog’s point of view: At the time the
IED exploded, Rex had already saved many lives with his
bomb-detecting ability. And, after the smoke cleared, it was
learned that the insurgents’ target that day was not Jamie but
Rex.

Era readers, of course, probably caught our front-page story
Monday on Jamie and Rex which moved on the AP national wire.

And in Monday’s mail came a clipping from a magazine published
as part of the Baltimore (Md.) Sun. “No One Left Behind” included a
story and a couple of color photographs of the famous pair. The
magazine is a publication of life.com which appears to be a
syndicate so we’ll probably be getting a bunch of clippings in the
mail. The Sun article was in the Nov. 24 edition.

Meanwhile, we can’t help but hope that Jamie by now has hired a
literary agent. Her story would make a great book but also a
fantastic movie – kids’ movie, war movie, or a story of
survival.

Jamie, of course, is the granddaughter of Lois Hendrickson of
Mount Jewett, a former longtime Era employee.