Bass' Tramp Red Boy (Wendell Martin's)

[CYJ]

Ditto EWO. One fellow that wrote his version on the Bass' Tramp Red Boy saga was E.L. Mullins. He was a great writer but with little knowledge on the actual facts,of what really went down at both of Red Boy's matches. His article is written with a lot of imagination added in. I believed I met him once up at Joe Beal's place back in the eighties.

In his article he wrote that Teal's Jeff and Teal's Tramp were the same dogs. Reason most knew Red Boy did not originate out of Teal's Jeff was Jeff was long dead by the time Red Boy was born. The statement that Cable's Fang was in top condition, was not true. The dog had gotten very sick not long after arriving at Mr. Teal's place. Instead of paying the forfeit they went through with the match anyway. So they where without any excuse. Mr. Lester Hughes said after Cable lost. Kelley wrote up the match as Mr. Hughes had worked their dog etc. When he had just come down to see the match.

The Dolly bitch was owned by Mr. Cable not Mr. Loposay. It was Cable and company that made that bitch dog challenge right behind Mr. Teal's restaurant. Mr. Teal and Bass were present and I was standing there also with V. Jackson. Bass told the N.C. dog men to bring a male or a female dog long as it weighed 52 pounds. He did say if the bitch shows up in full heat. The bitch bites Red Boy, Red Boy would do all Red Boy could do to kill the bitch. Red Boy was not a dumb dog,when in the square box, Red Boy was all business.

I do not think Bass won more than two fights with Red Boy or any off the chain matches. Bass was real careful with Red Boy and schooled Red Boy carefully. The one hard test was with that ninety or more pound Great Dane/Pit Bull cross in the dead heat of summer. Red Boy had to be treated for heart worms and was the main reason for not being matched anymore. I believe prior to that Dolly match Red Boy had undergone that heart worm treatment. Back then small amounts of Arsenic was used. Was hard on the dog's heart/liver and kidneys. Mr. Teal's Vet did the treatment.

In the match Red Boy got a good nose hold on that bitch and at times had to lay down in holds. Bass made the remark to Teal that the heartworm treatment had weaken Red Boy some what. Red Boy never looked like he was doing a lot of damage,but was a hard pressure biter. Red Boy stayed in good defensive holds on the head, nose and paced himself. That bitch dog Dolly was the top dog for a good portion of the match. You could see Red Boy slowly and steady massaging that bitches muzzle. Dolly finally broke the hold and ran with Red Boy still going for her. Handle was made real quick and Dolly refused to scratch standing on all four feet. Cheers

[EWO]

In most every pedigree there is a dog in question somewhere. Red Boy no different. Many of the old timers say Jeep died on the night he beat Homer. A jeep son is credited with ROM and all those winners. GRCH Virgil is a straight Panther dog in one version and out of the classifieds in another. And so on and so on.

It is part of the dogs.

EWO

[CYJ]

Ditto EWO. I believe the first two years that Tudor had the Dibo dog. He registered litters sired by Dibo under another very similar bred dog named Tudor's Runt. That information is shown on Randy Fox' site. Just read that article recently and there is a UKC pedigree to show as well. Was why it was a moot point for a former member on this site. To argue with Ca. Jack, and go on and on about Tudor's Dibo's birth date and Boudreuax' Blind Billy birth date contradiction.

This person showed his true colors when he started deleting pedigrees and messing up a lot of other pedigrees. Took all the moderators awhile to fix all of it. LOL Cheers

[EWO]

I understand lineage and ancestry and foundation and all those 'big words' when it comes to pedigrees and breeding and production. The funniest part to me is that the biggest arguments and the most heated debates are about the dogs who lived the longest time ago. Dibo or Red Boy or even Jeep have little to no impact in todays dogs. Of course they made the dogs that made the dogs but it was so long ago. A faked pedigree or hung papers in the 1950's, 60's or maybe even the 70's have very little impact today. I'm no breeder but trying to recreate yesteryear is a no-win battle.

A guy near here is our 'resident pedigree expert'. He knows how everyone's dogs are bred, even more so that the owner and breeder of the dogs. His conspiracy theories are fun to listen to but never go anywhere with him. Odds are you will either be asked to leave or more than likely not invited back. We drove from NC to Clearwater, FL to deal dogs. Our camp had worked out a really good trade off and all was well. Then our expert went to telling the guy how dogs he bred were not really bred that way. From conversation to accusation. Trade went off but it took some time to separate me from him in the eyes of the fellows in Florida.

Pedigrees that are accurate and consistent are really important on site like this as a couple of discrepancies can really toss a wrench into the workings of the database. I get that and if they are in question I don't post. I have only posted mine, and a few just to get down to my dogs.

On that conversation with Mr. Hughes he said the only way to know is stick them yourself. Everything from that point forward is in your control and everything from that point backward is a guessing game. In so many words.

But a great series of posts. Especially on Red Boy. HC always said Red Boy was not bred as advertised. Many thoughts and theories as well. He had some straight off Red Boy,some double bred off of him. He and K. Marlowe were tight back then.

Throws to a funnier story, Older people can remember when long distance rates applied to everything outside your county. People even wrote letters by hand back then. HC was setting up to buy a dog with K. Marlowe and do a match down near where she lived. I remember he and his wife having a knock down drag out over the phone bill. He had a $300 phone bill tied up in a $300 puppy. Sign of the times.

EWO

[CYJ]

Ditto EWO. I learned the hard way about the cost of long distance calling in the 70's. I called Mr. Orbie Coplin to verify the pedigrees etc. on my Young's Tina Marie bitch he had bred,also the V. Jackson's Pokey bitch. We bought both those little Coplin bred brood bitches from Don Mayfield. Don had gotten them from another known dog man. Who had bought these dogs when young directly from Mr. Orbie Coplin. Had quit the dog game.

Mr. Coplin liked to talk dogs like Mr. Carl Mims. I almost passed out when I saw my phone bill, my wife was not too happy about it either. LOL From then on we just corresponded through letters. I let Tar Heel Matt read all of those letters during a visit up at Sonny Shropshires.

If I had known what would become of all my books/pedigrees/dog letters. Would have given those letters to Matt along with some of those books. That extra nice red hard bound 70's era book of Pete Sparks collection. V.J. loaned to a young texas dog man. Was never returned,was told the book got stolen. V.J. has the rest of those soft bound Pete Sparks books and much more. He has no dog man to pass it all down to. His sons have no interest in the dogs. Probably all will be lost when he passes. If so will be a great loss. Cheers

[brokeback]

Ditto EWO. I learned the hard way about the cost of long distance calling in the 70's. I called Mr. Orbie Coplin to verify the pedigrees etc. on my Young's Tina Marie bitch he had bred,also the V. Jackson's Pokey bitch. We bought both those little Coplin bred brood bitches from Don Mayfield. Don had gotten them from another known dog man. Who had bought these dogs when young directly from Mr. Orbie Coplin. Had quit the dog game.

Mr. Coplin liked to talk dogs like Mr. Carl Mims. I almost passed out when I saw my phone bill, my wife was not too happy about it either. LOL From then on we just corresponded through letters. I let Tar Heel Matt read all of those letters during a visit up at Sonny Shropshires.

If I had known what would become of all my books/pedigrees/dog letters. Would have given those letters to Matt along with some of those books. That extra nice red hard bound 70's era book of Pete Sparks collection. V.J. loaned to a young texas dog man. Was never returned,was told the book got stolen. V.J. has the rest of those soft bound Pete Sparks books and much more. He has no dog man to pass it all down to. His sons have no interest in the dogs. Probably all will be lost when he passes. If so will be a great loss. Cheers

CYJ- Because you mentioned VJ and his sons I figured I would mention this.

There is a rumor around my neck of the woods in TX that one of or maybe multiple sons of VJ would steal pups from their father (VJ) and then take them to the flea market "First Monday" in Canton TX and sell them.

Not sure how much truth is in that, just a rumor to me. Just thought of that when I read your comment.

[CYJ]

Ditto Treezbulldogs. V.J. had only two sons and a daughter. That may or not be true,as I believe V.J.'s oldest son might have had a drug problem. His name was Chad or maybe Brad. Pretty sure by now he has long recovered from all that.The youngest one was a super smart intellectual type and had no real interest in the dogs.

I asked V.J. if he had tutored another young dog man along the way. He let a young Mexican dog man live on his place to help watch over their dog yards. This fellow has some of V.J.'s earlier bred dogs and some of his own. He may well end up with any of those dogs left. V.J. himself is down to just a handful of dogs.

Those dogs changed a lot from the earlier dogs we had. Adding the Creel & Bully Son stock to our older family of dogs. Increased the size and looks of the dogs a good bit. It was my understanding from some other dog men, that some years back V.J. got very sick and was laid up in the hospital for close to a year. I was told he lost some dogs during that time.

Jackson's very best years in the dogs was back in the 70's,80's, he was way ahead in conditioning knowledge and feeding methods back then. He won twenty nine shows before losing his first show. Vernon lived close to Don Mayfield and learned some things from him.

When living in Florida he spent time either in Georgia or a Florida Veterinarian college. Asking the Professors all sorts of questions about feeding performance dogs etc. He told me some of those Professors would sit for a good while discussing all sorts of dog topics with him.

V.J. grew up around various known Texas dog men and lived in Florida for awhile before moving to S.C. He was good friends with all those Georgia- Florida dog men like Baker Davis/Hands/Hargrove/Ramsey/McDougal/Divine etc. Cheers

[brokeback]

CYJ- Thanks for the reply and sharing some of the knowledge you continue to share with us. It sure is nice hearing information from a first hand source. That's too bad that sometimes the people who should not be trusted are the closest ones. Family.

Again, thank you.

Take care.

[Sdc]

Thanks!

[EWO]

It is funny because Red Boy has been everything from OFRN to Colby to Norrod to Corvino to some of everything in between.

And after all that they are still one of the, if not the most popular line out there. If a person ran an ad on here for pure Red Boy pups they would sell faster than anything on here that is based on winners and production.

I have tried a lot of the versions and the better all around "Red Boy" dogs are the ones when the families or strains are blended. Seen some good ones mixing the Mims version and the Holland version. Mr. Mims has several strains/traits amongst his Red Boy dogs. Many will say the Holland dogs are game plugs and then all of a sudden a stretch of straight Holland Red Boy dogs biting shit in half. The fact Mr. Holland bought dogs from VJ has never been documented in a registry but go figure.

When TVK made the blend of Eli and Red Boy they were scratching like Red Boy dogs and biting like Eli dogs, to use the myths surrounding both groups. Some say these Russ' Buck bred dogs led to the Dynomite dogs doing work today.

The blend to the Jocko dogs when I first got started was one of the more long lasting. Back then they were Jocko-Red Boy dogs. The Red Boy popularity somehow changed all that. That group became rough and durable like Jocko but all the hairs on the body had to be killed to stop them.

And after all the speculation and 'inside knowledge' (LOL) it all boils down to the dog you are standing on top of today. Pretty much the same as it was way back when.

EWO