Franklin, Wonder-Dog and My Best Friend. Franklin is a 68 pound male Portuguese Water Dog or Cao de Agua(PWD for short). This is a rustic breed that originated in Portugal. In modern times, the Portuguese Water Dog was so highly prized that breeders did not sell them, they only gave them away to relatives, friends, and acquiantences that were well respected and beleived 'worthy' of the dog. To receive a PWD was a great honor. In more ancient times, the PWD was the valuable work mate of the famous fleets of Portuguese fishermen, boat captains, Light Houses and other warf operations. They assisted fishermen by retrieving nets and bouys, taking and retrieving objects from shore and boat, and courioring messenges between ships.

PWDs, their feats and roles became legendary. Two of the best examples attributed to PWDS were their role on-board the smaller fishing workboats that hauled in the nets and stories of them saving sailors from drowning at sea. When the workboats hauled in the nets of that day's catch, one or two PWDs would be station at the bow where they would watch for fish escaping the nets when they would dive into the icy waters, catch the fish and bring it back to the boat. This feat is not considered to be beyond a reasonable expectation of today's modern PWDs and is further considered likely to be true because records indicate that PWDs onboard fishing vessels received a 'share' of the catch just like all the ships crew itself. The other notable feat of legend was that of saving sailors from drowning. There is but a single painting that suggests the truth of this tale, however, many fishing stories and songs make reference to it, and it is clear that sailors, being an especially suspersticious lot, paid great respect to PWDs just in case it might save his life one day.