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Hearne, author who wrote about the intellect and desires of animals, dead at 55

By Associated Press, 8/27/2001 19:18

BRANFORD, Conn. (AP) Vicki Hearne, an author and poet who wrote that animals possess many human intellectual characteristics, died at the Connecticut Hospice on Aug. 21. She was 55.

Hearne, who lived in Westbrook, died from lung cancer, family members said.

Hearne believed that animals have an intellect as well as courage and wisdom. She also believed pets yearn to achieve and be challenged and have a capacity for moral understanding.

Her best-known book, ''Adam's Task: Calling Animals by Name,'' explained her philosophy of human and animal relations and communication. She wrote about real animals she had encountered to explain her beliefs.

Hearne grew up with a love for dogs and horses and went on to train animals and owners at Silver Trails: The Animal Inn.''

She was also an advocate for pit bulls in the 1980s, when the breed was the subject of headlines and urban legends about deadly attacks. She once wrote that pit bulls often were confused with related breeds, and that they bit people less often than common breeds such as Labrador retrievers and cocker spaniels.

Hearne also was known for saving a dog in Stamford that was sentenced to death after biting a burglar. The dog, an American bulldog named Bandit, avoided death after Hearne challenged municipal officials and won custody of the dog in return for training it for three months.

Bandit ended up living with Hearne. Her experience with the dog led to a written account, ''Dossier of a Dangerous Dog,'' published in 1991 by HarperCollins, and a documentary film, ''A Little Viscious.''

She was born Victoria Elizabeth Hearne in Austin, Texas, on Feb. 13, 1946.

In 1967, she began working as a self-employed animal trainer.

She went on to earn a bachelor's degree in English at the University of California at Riverside in 1969 and spent a year at Stanford University as a Stegner Fellow in Poetry. She went back to Riverside and lectured in creative writing from 1980 to 1984.

She was hired by Yale University in 1984 as an assistant professor of English and also taught creative writing. From 1989 to 1995, Hearne was a visiting fellow at the Institution for Social Policy at Yale.

Hearne was the author of numerous books, poems, essays and articles.

She is survived by her husband, Robert Tragesser, her father and a daughter.

-- Anonymous, August 27, 2001

Answers

Damn. There are too few good people like that.

-- Anonymous, August 27, 2001