Dogs were first used to guide people who were blind in 1819 when Herr Johann Whilhelm Klein founded an institute for the blind in Vienna, Austria. His ideas were later put into practice in 1916, when Dr Gerhard Stalling established a school to train dogs to assist German soldiers who had been blinded in the First World War. By the late 1920s, a school had been established in the USA and by 1931, in Italy and England.

The First Australian Guide Dog

Australia's first Guide Dog Training School was established in Perth in 1951. The first working Guide Dog in Australia was Dreena, who was brought to Perth from England in 1950 by Doctor Arnold Cook.

Dr Cook had become blind at the age of eighteen with the eye condition retinitis pigmentosa. He learned Braille and then studied at the University of Western Australia (UWA) where he gained a degree in Arts, majoring in Economics, and later gained a doctorate from Harvard University. He was awarded a Hackett Scholarship and studied at the London School of Economics.

On his return to Western Australia, Dr Cook lectured in Economics at UWA and established Australia's first Guide Dog organisation in Perth in 1951. Within 12 months, the first Australian trained Guide Dog, Beau, was working with its owner Elsie Mead.

Ten years later a national organisation was established and a Guide Dog and Mobility Training Centre was opened in Kew, Melbourne, in 1962.

To find out more about the early history of Guide Dogs in Australia, download: