On a Mission

Colorado woman passionate about saving mill dogs

By Sandy Miller

Italian greyhound was No. 251. Her auction number. Theresa Strader had read about puppy mills, but she'd never actually seen one until that February day in 2007, when she went to a 500-plus dog auction at a commercial breeding operation. The town was Lamar, Missouri, birthplace of President Harry Truman.

Catalog in hand, Strader walked through the building and locked her eyes on dogs crammed into three-by-three-foot cages stacked three high.

"To see dogs living this way, for absolutely nothing but profit, was the most disturbing thing Ive ever seen," Strader says. "Until you've seen one, you can't even begin to feel the pain of what's going on inside these places."

She walked up to one of the cages in the middle row and peered through the wire. That's when she first saw No. 251. "She was plastered to the back of her cage and sitting up on her haunches," Strader says. "Her feet were tucked into her tummy. She looked right into my eyes. It took my breath away."

No. 251's lower jaw had been eaten away by infection. Commercial breeding is all about profits, and veterinary care bites into the bottom line.

Strader drew a big purple star next to No. 251 in her catalog. "I told her, 'This will be your last day in hell.'"

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