With everyone talking about the royal wedding of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, and with some people even getting a bit bored of it, there’s a much cooler story underneath it. As the two are preparing to say their vows, one dog is making his journey from the kill shelter to the royal palace.
Meghan’s beagle Guy is going through quite the lifestyle transformation.
“It’s a total fairytale,” said Alison Preiss of Pet Valu – the Ontario pet store where Markle adopted from in 2015.
“Here is this dog that was in a shelter, nobody wanted him, and through this wonderful adoption he’s now living in a palace, running around with the royal family.”
Guy’s story began when an US shelter sent an email to A Dog’s Dream Rescue. Dolores Doherty who runs the Ontario-based organization, works to save beagles from kill-shelters in the US and getting them adopted in Canada.
In this case, a Kentucky shelter was inquiring about a 17-pound beagle that they had found in the woods. Nobody seemed to be coming to adopt him, so he was on the shelter’s euthanasia list.
I always say yes,” said Doherty. “I can’t say no. I’m a sucker.”
Guy made the 500-mile journey north thanks to a network of volunteers and he ended up in an adoption event in Toronto.
“He was just sitting there with those big beagle sad eyes, looking so depressed. He was irresistible,” said Doherty.
Markle was one of the dozens of people that turned up to the event and she immediately fell in love with Guy. Doherty was not aware of Markle’s celebrity status at the time, but she quickly found out about it after the adoption. Needless to say, she was really happy that one of her dogs were adopted by a TV star.
Once news broke of Markle’s engagement to Prince Harry, however, Doherty became even happier that one of her pups is becoming a member of the royal family.
Source: Meghan Markle’s Instagram
“It’s just beyond my wildest imagination,” she said. “How is that for a rags to riches story from a good old Kentucky beagle?”
Last November, it was confirmed that Guy would make the journey east across the Atlantic with Markle. Her other dog, Bogart, however likely won’t make the move as he is too old. Instead, he’ll stay with Markle’s close friends in Canada.
Even though Guy is probably becoming Doherty most famous dog, he isn’t the only pet of hers to achieve greatness. OF the 1,600 dogs saved by A Dog’s Dream Rescue, many have become cancer detection dogs, support dogs for people with depression or panic attacks, or detection dogs on the Canada-US border.
“The dogs that have come up here have really impacted a lot of lives,” she said. “So there’s a lot of happy endings, but his certainly is the most outstanding.”
