Split Dogs - [Fearsome Critters]

Split Dogs - aka 'The Reversible Dog' - [Fearsome Critter ]

• About this critter: Just about the most reliable rabbit-hunting dog: Ol' Paul accidentally lobbed his Axe at 'em (mistaking it for a Giant Rat.) resulting in the poor pup being cleaved clean in two!! - Ol' Paul directly stitched 'em back together before it could realize, but in his haste, he had done so incorrectly and the pups back legs were facing up and the other side down. ...Fortunately, the pup didn't seem to mind and with careful nursing, he recovered and became the camp's most efficient hunter! Whenever the pup got tired, It would simply flip over & use its reverse legs to run instead!! So, they named him 'sport' because he was a good sport about the whole ordeal.

• History: "Split Dogs" are a (fairly morbid.) bit of early 19th century lumber camp folklore, and a yarn passed down across North America, Canada and the United States. The story's exact origin is unknown and as such the story is usually unaccredited to anyone in particular (though variants have been re-written and published multiple times over the years its difficult to say who came up with the idea for certain.) – The story typically something like as follows:

[a version of the 'Split Dog' yarn with the pup getting chopped long ways -from 1989's "Favorite Folktales from around the world" ] you can also listen to a telling of this one on youtube here. ]

Details in the story will vary depending on the teller and location. - For instance, in "Tall Tales from British Columbia" [Taft, 1983] they're only able to stitch the dog back up because it was in the freezing cold snow when 'it' happened. - ("it" being whatever cut the dog in half. - usually a tragic accident, the dog running into something sharp. Be it wire, an arrow or sickle or an axe.) Which direction the dog is cut also changes, (its usually depicted 'in half') though as said occasionally a version is told where in a horizontal cut happens instead. There's even a variation where the dogs head is put on its rear end instead!

[split dog stories from Tall tales of BC, 1983]

What type of breed the dog may be, also varies from account to account (Though very commonly it's a beagle - in the earliest 'Bunyan' stories its "part elephant dog, part wolf." which brings us back to the main topic:

• Paul Bunyan's "Sport the 'Reversible Dog" - likely, the earliest record of 'sport' is from "The Marvelous Exploits of Paul Bunyan [W. B. Laughead. 1922.]"

*Later published tellings of the above PB story tend to shift the blame from Paul to "one of the axeman" to make Paul a bit more of a Hero, but the earliest work, it's all his fault!!! - [definitely not the first, nor the last, dubious thing that early Paul did.] - worse yet, in "The song of paul bunyan and tony beaver" [1964], Paul doubled down and mistook another dog "Elmer" for a 'bedcat' or a sidehill winder instead. (in this version the camp inventor, johnny inksliner is to blame for the botched surgery.) –

[elmur as he appers in paul bunyan and tony beaver]

[an old paul bunyan postcard featuring sport, circa 1960's via ebay listing.]

[Statues of sport that the Paul Bunyan Center: Brainerd, Minnesota  used in the 50s (Sport was likely made 'cuter' so that kids could ride it and not be afraid of a "giant wolf", I'd assume the squirrel/chipmunk there has a similar story.) - this version of sport is supposed to come with with his own saddle so you could ride him: a better shot of it here.]

[Sport outside of Pauls cabin, missing his saddle. - [image source: roadside attraction]

['Elmer' the Moose terrier capturing a 'whirling wimpus' in "Paul Bunyan and his Great Blue ox" Wadsworth 1964] (note the men for scale)

Sport & Elmer aren't the only odd dogs in pauls camp! - there are records of at least Four other dogs of strange anatomy which I might draw at a later date, it's a bit of a shame they weren't recorded in "paul bunyans natural history" [1935] ...but i suppose that a dogs is just a dogs end of the day reguardless of their quirks. (and technically speaking there isnt anything 'natural' about this one!)

if you thought that was it, Predating Laughead's story the split dog also appears in the lore of the famous frontiersman Davy Crockett [who, unlike paul, was in fact, actually a real person but is often credited with acts of mythical proportion.] - some earlier versions of the story say that Crocketts "split dog" was apparently revived by him by calling on "forest magic."

["The Split dog and the Fiddler" was an adaptation of this story, published In various newspapers back in 2001 though the actual lore of Crocket's split dog goes back a very long time.]

... Either way, in all tellings of the story it is nice that the dog always survives and never seems to suffer despite the accident, but I do find both Paul & Crockett's apparent knack for necromancy &/or willingness to do surgery on the fly a bit concerning to say the least. - But I suppose that's just how life was back then! a lot of these yarns where probably based off a real incident and then to cope or exaggerated through retellings. (of course, such a surgery would be impossible on the fly) Reguardless if the story has an iota of truth in it or not, I suppose the split dog will live on forever as an obscure part of lumberwoods folklore

[Art Sticker by @Samkalensky - Part of my fearsome critters collection of stickers, follow for more, if you enjoyed this deep dive; consider supporting my work on patreon.]