Carthage Humane Society

A new leader

Glenda Erwin has been in charge of the Carthage Humane Society shelter on Cedar Road south of town before, but this time it’s permanent.

The Carthage Humane Society Board of Directors named Erwin to the post last week, replacing Tish Bentlage, who resigned a little more than a month ago.

Erwin had served as interim director since Bentlage resigned. She had also served as interim director back in 2009 before Bentlage was hired.

“I think this is where God put me,” Erwin said. “There have been too many times when I could have walked away from this place and I didn’t want to. This is comfortable, I understand the paperwork and I think this is where I was meant to be.”

Erwin said she has been involved with the Carthage Humane Society for more years than she can remember.

She guided the shelter when the board was searching for a director in 2008 when Bentlage was hired, but she did not want to be considered for director then because she had another full-time job.

“I was on the committee that hired Tish,” Erwin said. “I was always around this place doing volunteer work. In August of last year, the board hired me to do accounts payable and help Tish out. I did a little bit of it, but I had another job so I didn’t want the job back then. Now it’s different.”

Erwin said she’s quit her other job and plans to put all her energy into the Carthage Humane Society.

“I’m thrilled to help and I can feel this group moving forward,” Erwin said. “It can be overwhelming, you’ve got all the work paperwork-wise and then you’ve got 76 animals back there to worry about. Plus, it’s like they say on the TV show ‘Pawn Stars,’ you never know what will walk in the door.”

Erwin said the staff has been busy dealing with pets affected by the May 22 Joplin tornado. She said her shelter took in 24 dogs and eight cats from the Joplin shelter to help that organization in the immediate aftermath of the tornado.

As people have recovered and started reorganizing their lives, Erwin said more people have been forced to surrender their pets because they’ve moved somewhere that doesn’t accept pets or have no way to care for them.

“We’ve had a number of people come in who said my house is gone, I found my pet, but I can’t care for him or her now,” Erwin said. “It really is heartbreaking.

A BIG, HUGE Thank You to Everyone Who Added a New Furry Friend to ...

Just like I have never seen anything like the destruction of the EF5 tornado that we had on May 22nd in Joplin and just like I have never seen anything like the outpouring of help, love, compassion and donations that followed, I have never seen anything like this past weekend.  I guess the best way to tell you about it is to just do a recap of our day yesterday.

Thursday night, we contemplated whether or not we should even bother going to Petsmart on Saturday for off-site adoptions.  We figured that with Joplin Humane Society and the ASPCA Adoptathon offering FREE pet adoptions Saturday and Sunday, why would anyone come to Petsmart to pay to adopt one of our pets?  We made the decision to go anyway.  What if we missed 1 good adoption because we weren’t there?  Maybe a cat like Reeses who is one of our favorites (my current shelter favorite) who is so super sweet and has been at the shelter for a long time would find a home that day?  Maybe that would have been our only adoption, but it would have made sitting there all day long worth while to find our girl a new loving home.

So, with an adventurous attitude, we set off on Saturday morning to the shelter to pick up the animals that I had picked out on Friday (see blog post to read about that small adventure – the one about ticks, flies and fly holes – don’t read it while you are eating…especially if you are eating rice).  The shelter opens at 11.  While we were loading the cats into carriers, people started to arrive to look at cats and dogs.  At Carthage, not Joplin.  We thought that maybe they were lost and intended to be at the Joplin Humane Society.  The shelter wasn’t open yet, but with all of our condos and kennels overflowing with wonderful pets, we weren’t going to make them wait outside for another 30 minutes until we opened!  We helped the potential adopters find what they were looking for, briefed them on some of the cats, loaded up and headed over to Petsmart, feeling a little better about our decision to go that day.

Upon arrival, we parked at the curb to unload.  I didn’t even have all the animals in the shopping carts when along came a young couple with their 4 kids.  They are regulars at Petsmart.  They started asking about one of the dogs, Muffin, that we had brought with us.  They said that they had been over to the Joplin Humane Society, but that there were so many people there that they couldn’t even drive down the road and figured they would have to wait forever just to see the animals.  I was shocked.  And gleefully happy.  What a waste of worry – I had tossed and turned for several nights worried that all of those 600+? animals would not find homes after the tornado.  It seems that I didn’t need to worry about it at all.

Documents of the Assembly of the State of New York

New York Legislative Documents

Report on vivisecton in America

Report of the American Humane Association on vivisection in America, adopted at Minneapolis, Minn., September 26, 1895

Decisions and Orders of the National Labor Relations Board