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email storyAbout the Dog Writers Association of America
Text taken from www.dwaa.org.
Some 70 years ago, there was no such thing as a dog writer. There were newsmen and newswomen and magazine writers. Most of the papers assigned sportswriters, reporters, and even copyboys, to cover dog shows. Still, these were the ones who made the dog world an indelible part of our popular culture by writing about dogs on the sports pages of most papers.
The Dog Writers Association was born on February 13, 1935, in the Westminster Kennel Club's meeting room in the old Madison Square Garden at Eighth Avenue and Fiftieth Street. Thirty writers, editors and publishers were invited, but all that survives of the first meeting is a crumbling, yellow sheet of note paper reading, "DUES PAID AT FIRST MEETING" followed by the names of eight people. It was decided to set dues and hold a winter meeting in New York City each year just before the Westminster Kennel Club show, which has become an annual tradition.
From its very beginning, the DWAA has been able to secure for dog writers the courtesies and amenities at dog shows so necessary for doing their jobs properly. Press facilities with laptop computers, tables, show results, catalogs and judging programs are now the established rule for large, professionally accomplished shows around the country. But there is much more to the Association than courtesies and amenities.
