Balto, the Wonder Dog

Died: 1933 - Cleveland, Ohio

Balto, the Wonder Dog was once a favorite punch line of Johnny Carson monologues. Honored as a bronze statue atop a rock in New York City's Central Park, Balto is now a favorite stop for foreign-speaking families with kids, who straddle the poor pooch's back nonstop. A plaque on the rock is dedicated to the indomitable spirit of Sled Dogs. Those who want to see the real Balto must travel to Cleveland, Ohio....

In 1925, the town of Nome was caught in a diphtheria epidemic, and completely isolated from the outside world. Dr. Curtis Welch, the only physician in town, put out an urgent radio appeal for lifesaving antitoxin serum. Already several children had died and others were ill with the highly contagious disease. A hospital in Anchorage had a plentiful supply of fresh serum, but how to get it to Nome in the dead of winter, with the ocean iced over and 700 miles from the nearest rail head?

State officials decided that the one sure way to get the serum through was by a continuous dog sled relay.

The honor of delivering the serum to Dr. Welch fell to an Alaskan dog sled master, Gunnar Kaasen, who had a team of Siberian huskies with a rookie lead dog named Balto. After the hand-off from the first dog sled team, Gunnar traversed the hellacious final 53 miles, with temperatures at 60 F below zero and 70 mph winds.

Kaasen was near blinded by blizzard, which at times flipped the sled off the trail. He had to place all trust in Balto. Second-to-last on the relay, Kaasen actually missed the hand-off to the last team -- remember, he was snowblind -- and continued onto Nome. They made it; the serum arrived in time to halt the epidemic.

The heroic dogs toured the US, but their fame soon faded, and the team was sold to a vaudeville promoter. In 1927, a Cleveland businessman visiting Los Angeles discovered the dogs on display, ill kept and in poor health. Cleveland schoolchildren donated pennies and residents chipped in to to raise $2,000 to buy Balto and the team. The money was raised and the team was brought to Cleveland.

After his death in 1933, Balto was stuffed, mounted and put on display at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, where he stands today. The museum runs a film shot in 1925 of Balto and the original team.

While Balto garners most of the attention, modern Iditarod fans point out it was the seasoned huskie Togo who led the legendary musher Leonhard Seppala on the most grueling portion of the the relay, across Norton Sound. The Togo/Seppala team traveled hundreds of miles from Nome and back with the original plan of doing half of the entire relay. A last minute order by Alaska's governor to speed the delivery by adding extra relay teams robbed Togo of his place in dog history.

Togo's preserved carcass is on display at the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Gift Shop/Museum, Wasilla, Alaska.

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