The Deaf Dog Who Always Knew Which Ship Was Coming

Ships pulling into Juneau, Alaska in the 1930s had an audience of one before anyone on shore could see them coming: a bull terrier named Patsy Ann, who had been completely deaf since the day she was born.

A Dog With No Hearing At All

Patsy Ann was born on October 12, 1929, in Portland, Oregon. She came to Juneau with her owners in the early 1930s and, before long, decided she preferred the freedom of the waterfront to any single household.

She wandered the docks, the shops, and the bars of the small Alaskan capital, picking up food and the occasional candy bar along the way. Locals let her come and go as she pleased.

She Always Knew Which Dock

Juneau had seven different docks where a ship could tie up. Somehow, Patsy Ann knew which one to use before any ship came into sight.

She would get up, walk down to the water, and sit at the exact spot where the vessel would arrive, according to Juneau's LitSite Alaska archive. Nobody could ever explain how a dog who had never heard a ship's whistle managed to be right, over and over again.

The Day the Newspaper Got It Wrong

Her reputation was tested at least once. A local newspaper printed the wrong dock for an arriving ship, and a crowd gathered there to wait, according to LitSite Alaska.

Patsy Ann ignored them. She walked straight to a different pier instead.

The crowd only understood what had happened when they spotted the ship steaming toward the dock where Patsy Ann was already waiting.

Juneau's Official Greeter

By 1934, Juneau had started enforcing licensing rules on dogs, and a new dogcatcher had just been appointed. Residents worried about what that meant for their unofficial mascot.

On July 12, 1934, Juneau's mayor settled the matter. He held a dockside ceremony, timed to the arrival of the steamship SS Prince George, and declared Patsy Ann the "Official Greeter of Juneau, Alaska."

The publicity did some good beyond protecting one dog. Licensing for Juneau's other dogs jumped that year, from 87 to 144, according to Wikipedia.

A Statue That Still Meets Every Ship

A group called Friends of Patsy Ann commissioned a bronze statue in her memory, sculpted by artist Anna Burke Harris. It was unveiled on July 3, 1992, on the same wharf where she used to wait.

Harris mixed something unusual into the casting: clippings of dog hair sent in from owners around the world, meant to symbolically tie every dog to Patsy Ann's memory.

The statue still sits at the downtown cruise ship dock today, at a spot known as Patsy Ann Square. Every ship that pulls into Juneau now arrives to the same welcome she used to give in person, decades before anyone could explain how she knew they were coming.