The first Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show…
May 1877 CE
The first Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show is held on May 8, 1877, at Gilmore's Gardens (the Hippodrome), making it the second-longest continuously held sporting event in the United States behind only the Kentucky Derby, which had first been held in 1875.
The annual event begins as a show for gun dogs, primarily Setters and Pointers, initiated by a group of hunting men who meet regularly at the Westminster Hotel at Irving Place and Sixteenth Street in Manhattan.
They had decided to create the Westminster Kennel Club specifically for the purpose of holding a dog show.
The prizes include such items as pearl handled pistols, of use to the hunters and terriermen who work these dogs in the field.
The show draws over twelve hundred dogs and proves so popular that its originally scheduled three days become four, with the club donating proceeds from that fourth day to the ASPCA for creation of a home for stray and disabled dogs.
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