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Hachiko was brought to Tokyo in 1924 by his owner, a college professor named Hidesamuro Ueno. Each day, when Ueno left for work, Hachiko would stand by the door to watch him go. When the professor came home at 4 o'clock, Hachiko would go to the Shibuya Station to meet him. Though this simple act alone shows a tremendous amount of loyalty, that's not the end of it: The following year, Ueno died of a stroke while at the university. Hachiko didn't realize that he was gone, and so the dog returned to the train station every single day to await his master. He became such a familiar presence there, in fact, that the station master set out food for the dog and gave him a bed in the station. Even so, Hachiko never shifted loyalties – every day at 4 o'clock, he hopefully waited by the tracks as the train pulled in, searching for his best friend's face among the people getting off. Hachiko's love for his master impressed many people who passed through the station, includi

Watch Video CARLSBAD, Calif. -- For the parents of Autistic children, an afternoon outing can be nearly impossible. But that has changed for one Carlsbad family. Five-year-old Jolena Gonzales has a special bond with “Muffit,” one that has changed her life. "Her communication skills have tripled in the 3-months since Muffit’s been home with us. Her personality is coming out, she’s much more social," said Jolena’s mother, Rebecca Cook. Before Muffit, leaving the carousel at the mall would have created a scene. "Kicking, screaming, tensing up. Flattening herself out on the ground, what most people would call a tantrum, but take a tantrum and multiply it by ten," said Cook. But a new program called "Leash On Life," uses volunteers from “Tender Loving Canines” to help families learn how to make service dogs like Muffit, a part of their lives. "I've been involved with this family for a good six months. I've probably been to 20 doctors appointments,

BAXTER, Tenn. (AP) -- A pair of Putnam County lawmen were warning a dog owner to control his pet when it raced over and bit them on the leg. Now, the pooch is in the pound and the owner is in the doghouse. Deputy Sonny Farley says he and Corrections Officer Will White went to Nathan Ray Smith's house March 15 after a neighbor complained Smith's dog, which appeared to be a Jack Russell terrier, growled at his grandkids and tried to bite him. Smith was out when they arrived, but a family member called him and he headed back home. "While we were waiting on him to return home, the dog tried to bite C.O. White," Farley says in his report. When Smith got there the deputy told him he needed to control his dog and that he was going to write him a ticket for letting it run loose. Just then the dog ran up and bit Farley on the lower leg, ran around the squad car and bit White on the leg, then ran back around the car and bit Farley again. "I told the owner to catch the dog,

The words that come to mind when I think of Grandma are: strength, character, stubbornness, crafty, frugal, chef, Christmas, family, home, comfort, funny... She taught me many things. She taught me how to choose a husband, how to be a wife, how to stretch a dollar, how to relax and enjoy life, and how to tell a dirty joke. She was the strongest woman I knew. She taught me how to be strong. But her body wasn't the strongest part of her. And in the end, it was her frail body that failed her. Her strength is still around me. I still feel her here. She gives me peace.

FRONTLINE From the horror of 9/11 to the invasion of Iraq; the truth about WMD to the rise of an insurgency; the scandal of Abu Ghraib to the strategy of the surge -- for seven years, FRONTLINE has revealed the defining stories of the war on terror in meticulous detail, and the political dramas that played out at the highest levels of power and influence. Now, on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion, the full saga unfolds in the two-part FRONTLINE special Bush's War. Veteran FRONTLINE producer Michael Kirk draws on one of the richest archives in broadcast journalism -- more than 40 FRONTLINE reports on Iraq and the war on terror. Combined with fresh reporting and new interviews, Bush's War will be the definitive documentary analysis of one of the most challenging periods in the nation's history. "Parts of this history have been told before," Kirk says. "But no one has laid out the entire narrative to reveal in one epic story the scope and detail of how

An expert illuminates the interesting psychology behind this odd behavior Shocking but true: Earlier this week, 800 small dogs were seized from a filthy triple-wide trailer in Tucson, Ariz., where the elderly residents were overwhelmed trying to care for the animals. Also this week, Kentucky police found 117 starving and diseased dogs during a raid of a local animal shelter. What explains behavior like this? Is there malicious intent involved, or are these cases of well-meaning people simply getting overwhelmed? Dr. Gary Patronek of the Animal Rescue League of Boston helps explain this unusual behavior. Q: Why do people hoard animals? A: We do not fully understand why people hoard animals. It is quite common for animal hoarders to report very dysfunctional childhoods, characterized by inconsistent and unstable parenting if not outright abuse, during which animals were the only stable fixtures. A dysfunctional childhood is correlated with a disordered attachment style. This can result

Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight

Woman faces fine for dyeing poddle pink BOULDER, Colo. (AP) -- A Boulder woman facing a $1,000 fine for dyeing her poodle pink has hired a lawyer to fight the charge in court. Joy Douglas says she dyed Cici, her white miniature poodle, to call attention to breast cancer. She says she used beet juice and Kool-Aid. She was ticketed March 1 under a Boulder ordinance that makes it illegal to dye animals. The ordinance is designed discourage people from dyeing rabbits and chicks for Easter. Douglas had a court hearing scheduled Tuesday, but the judge postponed it until April after she said she has hired a lawyer. Douglas took Cici with her Tuesday but had to leave her outside the courthouse. --- Information from: Daily Camera, http://www.thedailycamera.com

CORE, W.Va. (AP) -- Life jackets are made for people, not dogs. So, when Randy Earl's small boat capsized while he was fishing with his dog Lacy, a black spaniel mix, he stayed in the water with his life jacket while making sure Lacy was OK. "When the boat flipped over, I put the dog on top of the boat," Earl told The Dominion Post of Morgantown. While waiting for someone to rescue them on Mason Lake in northern West Virginia, Earl clung to the 12-foot boat's hull. The water temperature was about 50 degrees, said J.M. Crawley, a senior conservation officer for the Division of Natural Resources. Another fisherman, Jan Thorn, watched from shore as a state trooper paddled out to rescue Earl and Lacy. "He asked the state trooper to take the dog first," Thorn said. "It was very touching." Earl, 53, said Lacy means a lot to him and his wife since they lost both of their children in a car accident 15 years ago. "That dog is like a child to us,"

CORE, W.Va. (AP) -- Life jackets are made for people, not dogs. So, when Randy Earl's small boat capsized while he was fishing with his dog Lacy, a black spaniel mix, he stayed in the water with his life jacket while making sure Lacy was OK. "When the boat flipped over, I put the dog on top of the boat," Earl told The Dominion Post of Morgantown. While waiting for someone to rescue them on Mason Lake in northern West Virginia, Earl clung to the 12-foot boat's hull. The water temperature was about 50 degrees, said J.M. Crawley, a senior conservation officer for the Division of Natural Resources. Another fisherman, Jan Thorn, watched from shore as a state trooper paddled out to rescue Earl and Lacy. "He asked the state trooper to take the dog first," Thorn said. "It was very touching." Earl, 53, said Lacy means a lot to him and his wife since they lost both of their children in a car accident 15 years ago. "That dog is like a child to us,"

WEST MONROE, La. (AP) -- A firefighter performed CPR on a dog, saving its life after responding to a mobile home fire. When firefighters arrived at the scene Friday, a resident of the house approached firefighter Stephen "Odie" Odom and told him two dogs were trapped inside the burning house. Odom put on his air pack and headed for the room where the two small dogs were kept. After searching through a smoke-filled bedroom, Odom located the two terrier dogs in carriers underneath some blankets and removed them from the burning home. When Odom removed one of the dogs from the carrier, he noticed it was not breathing and his tongue was hanging out. The firefighter removed his face mask and placed the dog's head inside so the oxygen could blow in its face. When this didn't work, Odom began performing CPR on the dog by "cupping my hands around the dog's snout and blowing until I could feel his chest expand," he said. "I then did chest compressions simila

* House trashed, dog in coma after party * Parents find handcuffs, underwear in child's bedroom * Teenage host unrepentant, in hiding A BRITISH teenager has made Corey Worthington look like an amateur after her internet advertised party got so out of hand her dog was comatose and her house completely trashed. 15-year-old Gemma Anscomb told her parents she was having a few friends around for a video night. But instead she had advertised a party on social networking site Bebo and invited everyone she knew. When Robert and Julia Anscomb arrived home the next day they found their dog Bailey unconscious. He had overdosed on ecstasy tablets. Their dining room floor was covered in four inches of beer, their lap-tops, iPods and jewellery had been stolen and they found handcauffs and underwear in their eight-year-old daughter's bedroom. Mrs Anscomb told the Daily Mail : "We found underwear between the sheets and a pair of handcuffs." "What were they thinking? This

ScienceDaily (Mar. 2, 2008) — Cancer researchers at the University of Minnesota and North Carolina State University have found that humans and dogs share more than friendship and companionship -- they also share the same genetic basis for certain types of cancer. Furthermore, the researchers say that because of the way the genomes have evolved, getting cancer may be inevitable for some humans and dogs. Jaime Modiano, V.M.D., Ph.D., University of Minnesota College of Veterinary Medicine and Cancer Center, and Matthew Breen, Ph.D., North Carolina State University's Center for Comparative Medicine and Translational Research, collaborated on this research study. Their findings are published in the journal Chromosome Research, in a special edition on comparative cytogenetics and genomics research. Genomes are divided into chromosomes, which act as nature's biological filing cabinets with genes located in specific places. "Many forms of human cancer are associated with specific

PUTRAJAYA, Malaysia (AP) -- Malaysian authorities said Monday they hope two specially trained dogs will help police sniff out pirated DVDs and clean up the country's reputation as an abuser of intellectual property rights. Two male Labradors from Northern Ireland, named Paddy and Manny and trained to smell chemicals used in DVD production, will become the world's first permanent canine national anti-piracy unit when they go into action next month, according to Malaysia's Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs. Two labrador dogs Paddy, right,and Manny are shown to the media as Malaysia government introduces DVD sniffler dogs to fight movie piracy in Putrajaya, Malaysia , Monday, March, 3, 2008. Two labradors trained to sniff out discs made their debut in Malaysia Monday to form the world's first canine unit to target movie piracy. The dogs can't distinguish between real and pirated DVDs. What they do is point officers to hidden caches of discs. Mohamad Rosla

Severe weather season is just around the corner and the people of one Kansas town nearly wiped off the map last year are still putting their town back together. Now, storm chasers are using pictures and video from last year's storm season to spur the rebuilding process in Greensburg. It's a DVD with some of the biggest storms of 2007 on it, including the Greensburg tornado. Now the storm chasers who put it together are taking the money from the DVD sales and putting it towards Greensburg to help the town rebuild. "We're just interested in the power of the storm and how that formed," says Greensburg survivor Wilma McChristian. "It was so powerful." "Instantly we knew how bad it was and how badly they needed help. It has really become a mission for all of us to really give everything we have to help them out," said Darin Brunin, a storm chaser. It's two hours of the worst storms of 2007, just a fraction of what these

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A paternal dog has adopted an abandoned baby goat as his surrogate child. Billy the boxer has become the constant companion of the 12-day old kid called Lilly. He sleeps with the goat, licks her clean, and protects her from any dangers at Pennywell Farm wildlife centre at Buckfastleigh, near Totnes, Devon. Billy and Lilly have formed a close bond The kid was abandoned by her mother when she was only a few hours old and adopted by paternal Billy when his owner Elizabeth Tozer began hand rearing the goat. The unusual bond has developed over the last month and the pair are now inseparable. Elizabeth said: "Lilly follows Billy around which is really quite amusing to watch and Billy sleeps with the goat and cleans her mouth after she feeds." Billy the boxer protects his little kid Lilly was the smallest of a litter of three kids and her mother abandoned her because she could only care for the two stronger ones. The pair have attracted quite a crowd at the animal centre and the sta