That Dog’s Really Ugly
Elwood holds the title of world’s ugliest dog, but at heart he’s a charmer who loves the spotlight
Elwood, recently crowned “The World’s Ugliest Dog,” a title few would dispute, is a sweet guy who has a special affection for kids.
The media attention is unrelenting.
There have been appearances on CNN, The Today Show and The View. Newspaper reporters call regularly, seeking any new insight, any heretofore undisclosed tidbit.
Even the international press can’t seem to get enough. Stories have appeared in Spain and England and Australia and Chile. A film crew from Brazil spent hours on site, attempting to capture just the right expression, just the right turn of the head.
Weeks after being declared The World’s Ugliest Dog during a hard-fought competition in Petaluma, Calif., Elwood, a Chinese Crested/Chihuahua mix (or something along those lines) now back home in Sewell, N.J., continues to enjoy celebrity status.
He’s swarmed at public appearances (and he’s booked just about every weekend for the foreseeable future), he’s recognized far and wide and he’s even the subject of a biographical children’s book due out at the end of the year.
Is it all too much for a spectacularly unattractive little rescued mutt who makes grown men gasp?
“Too much? Oh gosh no. He thinks he deserves all this attention,” says his owner, Karen Quigley. “When the photographers are around, he really hams it up. He actually gets a little jealous if someone else in the house is getting attention.”
Wherever he goes, whatever he does, he holds his bushy crown of spiky white hair up high. And he doesn’t seem to think his long, flaccid tongue lolling perpetually down the left side of his snout is at all off-putting.
Elwood, with owner, Karen Quigley, was crowned "The World's Ugliest Dog" of 2007.
Elwood, in fact, apparently believes he’s quite irresistible.
“I think he’s proud of who he is,” says Quigley, a marketing manager. “There’s a prance in his step that is very confident, and he’s a huge flirt around women.”
With the blindness that comes with anyone who adores all animals (she’s got eight dogs and six cats, many of them special-needs critters), Quigley insists she has never once, even the first day she saw and rescued Elwood, thought him ugly.
But she does admit thinking, “My God, I think this dog has had a stroke.” Those bulging eyes and slack tongue just didn’t seem right. “I’m going to have to get a neurologist,” she thought.
But her veterinarian checked the young dog out thoroughly, stepped back and announced, “He is what he is, but there’s nothing physically wrong with him.”
The lack of teeth on the lower left side of his jaw is why the tongue slides unfettered down the side of his face, the vet explained – nothing to be concerned about.
Filled with relief, she took Elwood home to join her horde.
He quickly established himself “the king of the pack.” All the dogs respected that.
And as the weeks passed Quigley became increasingly enchanted with Elwood’s outgoing personality, his abiding sweetness and his unerring ability to get kids to ignore the visuals and connect instantly with his essence.
“Pictures just don’t do his spirit justice,” Quigley says. “You’ve got to see him in person.”
Well, maybe.
Men, she admits, often recoil, even when they see him in person, “and call him ugly without hesitation.” The husband of her good friend flinched when presented with photos of Elwood one morning. “He said he couldn’t and wouldn’t look at them before he’d had coffee,” Quigley chuckles.
Women, she says, are usually silent upon first meeting Elwood. They’re thinking he’s not great to look at, but really don’t want to say it. Within minutes, though, they’re won over by his vitality and decide he’s cute.
Kids, though, they’re a whole different matter. “I’ve never, ever heard a child say Elwood is ugly,” Quigley says, nor has she ever met a kid with even the slightest reservation about just accepting the Elwood-ness of Elwood.
Quigley figures kids haven’t been introduced to the concept of ugly yet, and even if they have, they instantly connect with Elwood’s spirit and glide right past the aspects of him that prompted people at the Ugly Dog competition call him “ET” and “Yoda.”
Quigley entered Elwood in the Ugly Dog contest in 2006 after being strong-armed by a friend. Quigley resisted at first, but finally learned that the contest actually celebrates ugliness and is geared toward proving there are no ugly dogs or, perhaps more realistically, even if there are ugly ones, they may have great personalities and are worthy of love.
Elwood pranced away with first-runner-up honors that first year.
Since any pageant contestant knows perseverance is the name of the game, Elwood marched confidently back into the fray again this summer. And this time he got the crown.
Not bad for a guy that very nearly didn’t make it past 4 weeks old.
Elwood ‘s earliest days are a little vague, but it appears that the woman who chose to cross a Chinese Crested with a Chihuahua wound up with a predictably homely littler, but even by those standards Elwood was noticeably unappealing.
Concluding she’d never sell him, she was ready to euthanize him.
Another woman intervened and cared for him for several months until she became the subject of an investigation by the New Jersey Society for the Protection of Animals, New Brunswick, N.J.
At that point, Quigley was then contacted by her boyfriend, an SPCA investigator, who saw something special in the 9-month old dog that he was sure would appeal to her.
“That dog and I, we just have a very, very special connection,” Quigley says.
And it’s an added benefit that Elwood has taught thousands the beauty’s-only-skin-deep lesson, she says.
To spread that message further, Quigley has written “Everyone Loves Elwood,” now being illustrated and aiming for a November release.
Begun last year to help teach kids the importance of looking beyond differences, connecting on a deeper level and that coming in second is just fine, a new chapter with another lesson is now being crafted.
Quigley is adding another message: second-place is great, but sometimes if you work hard and stick with your dream, you can, in time, come out top dog.
What’s your question? Sharon Peters would like to hear about what’s on your mind when it comes to caring for, training and loving your pet. E-mail Sharon@Pets2008.com.
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