Cinderella--Our Queen--She is the Pointer Girl
By Larry Lee, BraceBeagling Editor
January 20, 2003

Ralph Gillum posing Fd. Ch. Gillum's Courtyard Cinderella at Border Beagle Club. Duane Root is on Ralph's left.

Someone asked me the other day to explain who the dog is with her hind foot in the air and her nose to the ground that is the pointer emblem for each category on bracebeagling.com.

“Why that is Field Champion Gillum’s Courtyard Cinderella, I quickly answered. I thought you would never ask.” That picture of her was taken as I lay on the slope of a ditch bank as Cinderella was tracking a rabbit out of heavy cover out unto the top of the mowed bank. In reality I was almost eyeball to eyeball with her. Actually, I discovered this is a perfect way to get a picture of a dog. By lying on the low side of the bank you are at the same level as the dog.

My son Darin chose the picture of Cinderella to use as the pointer emblem when he developed this web site—bracebeagling.com. In my estimation he couldn’t have chosen a more worthy animal because Cinderella does it all for Ralph and I now, just as she has for the past several years. She fills the various roles that are required to efficiently train young field trial dogs. She serves marvelously as a puppy trainer and other useful training purposes. The various training techniques we use her for never alter her accurate style of tracking a rabbit. Then on the weekends she raises it up a notch and is able to compete with the best of them in the various trials for older dogs held around the country. She usually comes through and is always in there knocking on the door. I was especially proud of her at the Iames Trial held at Hamilton-Middletown last summer even though she didn’t make the final cut. She ran the back with perfection. She ran the back and displayed complete independence and elegant style with no bumping. She even scored at least twice on the inside but not enough to be declared the winner of the brace. It was one of her finest performances and I couldn't have been happier.

However, it wasn’t always like that with this slender built beauty. When we first brought her home from expert dog trainer Wilburn Fowler’s farm in Kentucky we figured her chances were very slim of making the Gillum Courtyard team. You see our requirements for candidates are very exacting. Fortunately, she had two things going for her at that time. That year we were low on prospects. She also would stay on the last track on a check. There was no paddling around or quick foot movements in this baby. We especially like to see those characteristics in any prospect. Also one time at Border Beagle Club she put together about 30 foot of line and was straight and as soft as silk. These are additional requirements that we like to see in a young dog.

So we decided to give her a chance to make the Gillum-Courtyard team. As it turned out she took full advantage of the opportunity and by early December she was locked in. She had a permanent home in the Gillum-Courtyard kennel. It was on that day in early December that Ralph, Henry Alkema and I traveled to Oakland Beagle Club to run some dogs before the hard Michigan winter set in. Even then it was cold, with patches of snow here and there. Cinderella looked great that day, setting in the middle of the trio, staying where she belonged at all times, while her unworthy brace mates floundered and flopped around.

Like I mentioned previously it had not always been like that. Besides not moving off the point, at times Cinderella would spattered her mouth and jerk her head but now those undesirable characteristics were disappearing and she was turning into an outstanding bitch. During her training she put on some fantastic runs with a male we owned and later sold to the Belchers in Ohio called Silverbrook Clyde. Clyde could pinpoint a rabbit track with the best of them. The Belchers finished him in 13 trials. Her main problem then was that she wouldn’t capitalize on the opportunity to go through and would set on the point. But we knew because of her ability to track a rabbit moving off the point would only take a matter of time to develop.

That next spring she won a Northern Association derby qualifying trial at Oakland beagle club by staying where she belonged on the check and filling in the tracks left out by her errant brace mates in both first and second series. She had finally learned to go through. I figured she had a very good chance to win the association runoff but she lost her rabbit and was eliminated.

We ran her in several licensed trial that summer but she was just not ready to pull off the big wins. She was back in several trials but never could quite get the job done. I remember when Ralph and I ran her in a licensed trial at Detroit Beagle Club. She earned an NBQ for her effort that day. I can remember judge Bill Hays telling us after the trial, “You guys are going to have a lot of fun with that bitch.” We loved her catlike movements and her straightness and pinpoint tracking ability but she was a year away from being ready to finish. So we bred her that winter to an Ace male called Field Champion Bluff Hill Baggs. From her first litter came a bitch we sold to Michigan beagler Charley Green that he named Lowline Cindy. He finished her in her derby year that next summer.

The next late spring we traveled to the Jay County licensed trail in Indiana. Jim Burton was one of the judges. Cinderella was down in the second brace and tracked her rabbit perfectly from the rear defeating her brace mate. Jim Burton kidded me in his usual way during lunch saying that he could never use a dog like Cinderella in second series, all the time with a big smile on his face. I didn’t know Jim that well at the time and I didn’t know if he was kidding or not.

When second series was called Cinderella was called back second in the high brace. She beat her brace mate from the back in second series but left out a little of the line when she stepped out to go around a pile of dog dung. When third series was called Cinderella had been moved down to the third position. It was going to be hard to win now. She had to defeat two dogs ahead of her in order to win the trial. But she pulled it off. I distinctly remember my wise partner Ralph Gillum saying to take the rabbit in the cover where it was first found rather than out on the path where another beagler had also seen the rabbit. Ralph’s judgment turned out to be correct. Cinderella did a perfect job from the back. In my mind’s eye I can still see her feathering the tall weeds for body scent before dropping her mouth down to the ground to claim each track. She moved cat like through the heavy cover and then turned the rabbit perfectly onto the path and won the brace. The win was now within her reach. But it would take one more brace against the top hound.

The next brace for all the marbles was much easier. Her brace mate turned out to be competitive, bumping her repeatedly. Cinderella never wavered from her position, claiming each track despite the distraction. She handily won the brace. She had won her first licensed trial. That same summer she won Border and St. Joe Valley but still needed points to finish. She earned those the next spring in her second trial by placing second behind a bitch owned by Stan Peterson. Lloyd Watson was her handler. She was now a champion.

Anyway, now you know who the pointer hound is on the web page. She appears at the top of each category on the bracebeagling.com web page. She will always have a special place in our hearts.