Don’t worry son, you’re in the Army now!

Fellow author member of AIM (Authors Innovative Marketing), Constance Frankland, sent me a link to this news item over on Californian station KSBW. Here it is:

and here are the details that were presented on KSBW’s website:

MONTEREY, Calif. —Private First Class Lingo is in the Army now.

The 8-month-old shepherd mix enlisted in a formal doggy ceremony in Monterey on Tuesday, signing up to be treated like any other member of the service.

“He will be uniformed, he will be tracked, he will be documented,” said Defense Language Institute commandant Col. Philip Deppert.

The Private First Class will go down in DLI’s history books as its first-ever mascot. The Presidio of Monterey had a canine mascot back in the 40s, before DLI existed, and his name was Sgt. Tippy.

Lingo is starting at the bottom in his military career, but Deppert said he will have opportunities to move up in rank if he behaves.

“He will also have the opportunity to lose rank, should he misbehave, and not perform as we expect the rest of our service members to,” the colonel said.

But so far the pup has been toeing the line: getting up early for walks, exercising out on the field with the students, and most importantly learning the art of obedience.

Part of Private Lingo’s training is learning how to run in formation because in February he is scheduled to lead the commandant’s run with all the 2,000 plus service members at DLI.

Aside from his normal duties, the rescue dog was brought to the Presidio of Monterey for a special mission, to be the mascot, and so far he is knocking it out of the park.

“He has made about 2,000 new best friends; he is a magnet any place he goes, and it is exactly what he was intended to do,” Deppert said.

Lingo was adopted from the SPCA for Monterey County in November.

Here are two photographs from that story.

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Another example of our incredible dogs.

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