Truth stronger than fiction...


Conchita Cintron with Eurico De Gifford

... miths, false facts and misqualifications

have during the last decades transformed the history of the PWDs.  Fortunately the memory of the first pure Al-Gharb PWDs placed in the U.S., and the name of Conchita Cintron de Castelo Branco, will privale.

I will always remember what Conchita has told me year ago:

"The true story of the ‘Cao de Agua Portugues’ that I carried on with, does not lie in the silhouettes, the stops or the angles of a breed of dogs. It rests in the human interest behind the scenes. It is a story of mutual understanding, admiration and goals. A story of love and many hours of lonely dedication where nobody, anywhere, was interested in these dogs; a story of much sacrifice to keep them alive; a story of much effort to contact people and send the very best I bred to America, where nobody had ever heard of a PWD...much less want one. .. "

In 1994 Conchita Cintron wrote: (click for doc. 1 / doc. 2)

Vasco Bensaude was a passionate lover of the P.W.D., and its selection was his one and only hobby. The story began with his first magnificent dog called "Leao". His archives, that I possess, are rich in personal comments on all his animals. When "Leao". died he wrote, I do not know if I will ever own another dog like "Leao", but at least I can say he was once part of my kennels and my life.

Vasco Bensaude owned a fleet where females of the breed carried out their secular work at sea, bearing their litter, guarding the ships and aiding their masters. He also owned large kennels, with enclosed pools, in the garden of his home in Lisbon.

When Mr. Vasco Bensaude, owner of the Algarbiorum Water Dogs died, and left me his 15 champions - the reasons are another story - I felt that in spite of my work and experience, my suffix "de Santiago" was not worthy of this honor. So I looked up a title for another suffix and came across the ancient word "AI-Gharb" that later became Algarve, land where the Water Dogs roamed, free to fish with their owners and be truly loved. In other words, a place and time when no money or mud was attached to their boats, nest and breeders. And the AI-Gharb kennel was born.

The fact that I inherited both Mr. Bensaude's dogs and enemies is probably only natural. But then this again, is another story...

Vasco Bensaude's private archives, with all his personal notes, have no reference to blindness, H.D., Addison's disease, baldness, or any other heritable problems of the kind in his Algarbiorum Kennels. Nor did I ever find any such cases in my AI-Gharb dogs. This means that both kennels add up to nearly half a century of breeding with a clean record of healthy products.

Much has been written about Conchita Cintron:

Orson Welles wrote about her when introducing her bull arena memoirs.  Welles said: "Woman who live by the sword have always been rare to the point of nonexistence...Conchita Cintron, the lady bullfighter, therefore, is a very great rarity indeed.  Her record stands as a rebuke to every man of us who have ever maintained that a woman must lose something of her feminity if she seeks to compete with men.  Conchita competed.  Nobody was ever more perfectly feminine, and she triumphed absolutely in the most flamboyantly masculine of all professions."

James A. Michener dedicated his book "Mexico" (written in 1992) to Cintron. He said in his dedication:
"This books is dedicated to Conchita Cintron
La Superba."

 

Conchita Cintron is beautiful, remarkable, legendary.
Thank you Conchita.
Augusto Guimaraes, PWD forever