Handler: The Life of Fred Dileo ~ Chapter One

This is the story of a man who began with nothing and reached the pinnacle of his profession at age forty-six, only to be struck down in a senseless vehicle accident.

His profession was all-age pointing dog trainer-handler, an obscure calling unknown to all but a few. Yet, among the small cadre of field trialers scattered across North America, the profession carries a mystique, and its top practitioners are deeply admired. Why? Simply put, because the profession demands degrees of dedication, sacrifice and insight into the ways of dogs and horses and upland game birds that inspire us. They do it not for money, for there is little in it even for the most successful, and that is part of the mystique in this materialistic time.

Fred Dileo was not a popular man among some in his profession. He was an acerbic Italian-American Yankee working in a world of Southern Good Old Boys. But among his faithful dog owners and close friends he was beloved, ironically because of that same acerbicness but also because of his work ethic. None in his profession worked harder or was more driven in the quest for the top.

What does that quest require for success? Dedicated, faithful owners to foot the costs, talented dogs, good training grounds — north and south, know how, dedication, luck. Of luck there is always both kinds, bad and good. A preponderance of bad always, sick or injured dogs, inattentive or incompetent judges (or so they seem to the handlers), a thousand other hazards in travel, training, competition.

All handlers are afflicted with a certain amount of paranoia, an occupational hazard, and Fred Dileo with more than most. But his dedication to the quest overcame all the negatives in his 2006-07 season, when he won with a dog he co-bred and trained the National Championship, Purina Dog of the Year with record points, and Purina Handler of the Year…the three recognized symbols of the top.

And then in an instant Fred was gone. A week later his dog, Funseeker’s Rebel, won the Quail Championship Invitational, perhaps the toughest endurance test, under a handler who had never blown a whistle over him, ironically the same handler with whom as a beginner Fred had first gone North and through whom he had acquired his first winner, a dog named Texas Hummer, whose blood flowed to his last through two unbroken lines of Champions he developed and mostly bred — Texas Hummer-Chicoan Hummer-Funseeker’s Gem and Double Rebel Buck, Double Rebel Sonny, both lines culminating in Funseeker’s Rebel, member Field Trial Hall of Fame.