History

The Australian Cattle Dog Club of Greater Los Angeles (ACDCGLA) held its initial organizing meeting on April 27, 1988. At that meeting the club reviewed the purpose for having a local Australian Cattle Dog club, the process for becoming recognized the parent club and the AKC, the components of our bylaws, officers, events and activities and a membership drive.

The possible names explored were Australian Cattle Dog Club of Southern California, Australian Cattle Dog Club of Greater Southern California, Great Western Australian Cattle Dog Club and Australian Cattle Dog Club of the Southland. With the input and restrictions of the AKC, the current name was adopted. The interpretation of our borders includes Los Angeles County, the counties contiguous to Los Angeles and the counties contiguous to those counties.

The founding officers were Kim Griffith, President; Cheryl Head, Vice President; Joyce Rowland, Secretary and Virginia Hirsch, Treasurer. Other founding members who continue with the club today in addition to Kim Griffith and Joyce Rowland are Laurie Youmans and Lynda White.

Over those initial years we held numerous ACD “fun days”, supported conformation entries (notably for many years all four days of the Mission Circuit in Ponoma), herding clinics and similar events. We completed our status as a California and federally recognized nonprofit—a 501(c)7 organization and gained AKC recognition.

In 1994 we become the first independent local ACD club to hold licensed AKC herding events. These all breed trials took place in Hemet, California on Saturday and Sunday, February 12 and 13, 1994 with entries on both cattle and sheep. The judges were Roy Sage and Kent Herbel and we had around 55 runs each day. In 2002 we began holding herding trials on an annual basis.

The ACDCGLA has been the host club of the Australian Cattle Dog Club of America National Specialty four times: 1992 in Costa Mesa, CA; 1998 in Oxnard, CA; 2004 in Del Mar, CA; and 2013 in Norco, CA. We have been active supporters of numerous other Nationals with many local members holding key roles.

On March 29th, 2008 we began holding an annual independent conformation specialty. Our first specialties were held in the evening at the Kern County Fairgrounds and our first judge was Cheryl Myers-Egerton of Canada.