Age: 12 years
Shares farm with: Tricia and Dennis Bowers ’03, their son, Lafe, daughter, Eliza, and Tricia’s parents
Favorite activities: Playing with kids, playing fetch, hanging out with Dennis during “arduous tasks”
Pet peeve: She (yep—Wally’s a female) hates sitting still for photos!
About 12 years ago, Dennis Bowers ’03 and his wife, Tricia, returned to Indiana to live and work on Tricia’s family’s farm. The couple is helping return the Plumer & Bowers Farmstead to the sustainable practices of the past. They’re “taking a paycut,” as Dennis puts it, so that the next generation—the seventh in Tricia’s family—will have healthy soil and a farm to work.
A year after they returned, a dog showed up.
“Sometimes people abandon their dogs here in rural Seymour, but this one was unique,” Dennis recalls. “After a few days we could tell she had a good temperament, so we decided the dog could stay. We named her Wally.
“We would play fetch until my arm felt like it would fall off. When I’d start my day she would be so excited that she’d jump and do full 360-degree spins in the air. She could jump into the bed of my International truck, and that’s five feet off the ground.
“Though Wally has slowed down a bit, she still has boundless energy. These days she spends most of her time playing with my son, Lafe, on his adventures.”
Farming has put Dennis’ Spanish major and liberal arts background through its paces.
“There’s biology, of course, and economics and the business side,” he says. “There is always something new to learn.”
And that major in Spanish?
“I taught high school for seven years, and I still coach the local swim team, where almost half the swimmers are Spanish speakers,” Dennis says. “They like that I can speak to them in their native language.”
Among his least favorite tasks: repairing the numerous farm implements that require constant maintenance. And that’s where Wally comes in particularly handy.
“I’m not fond of ‘mechanicking’.” Bowers smiles. “Last week I was under that seed drill fixing a part, and it was muddy and miserable, and I was frustrated. Wally crawls under there with me, trying to lick me to make me feel better. Makes me pause, collect myself, realize it’s not that bad. Thankful for the moment.”