Personal Facts and Our Club Affiliations

Steve & Marieann Gladstone have bred Cardigans under the Aragorn prefix since 1974, having bred well over 50 AKC Champions of the breed. We are both approved to judge the breed by the American Kennel Club, Marieann is approved to judge the Herding Group and many other dwarf breeds and Steve judges the AKC Herding group as well as some Hound and Working breeds.

We have been members of the Cardigan Welsh Corgi Club of America since 1973. Steve served as an AKC Delegate and Board member for the CWCCA and Marieann served on the Board,  Both have served on the Judges Education Committee and are breed Mentors.  We are members in our local all-breed club, Pocono Mountain Kennel Club (since 1980), where Steve has served as Board Member and Show Chairman and Marieann was Secretary and Obedience Trial Chairman, and has been head trainer for Allentown Dog Training Club and for Applecross Training Center.  We are members of the Penn Ridge Kennel Club and both are AKC Delegates, Steve for Reno Kennel Club and Marieann represents the Penn Ridge Kennel Club.  In March 2001, Steve was seated on the Board of the AKC.

Presently, our family consists of  4 Cardigans - Windy, our tri-color bitch, Daphne, our blue bitch, a black bitch, Raven,  and the blue boy, Elwood. Our Australian Shepherd, Music, a red merle, will celebrates his 16th birthday this Christmas and we also have a German Shepherd bitch, Fanny. We also have Katy our orange house cat.  Rusty, our chocolate merle, is nearby with Barb Miller working on his agilitiy and obedience titles. We believe keeping to a small number to ensure in the development of that wonderful outgoing temperament for which we strive and guarantee.   Recently, we have a litter of puppies from our blue stud,  Elwood, bringing the line forward another generation.

How did we get the name "Aragorn"?

Steve and I are longtime fans of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit and the Trilogy of the Lord of the Rings. The description that J.R.R. Tolkien gives for a hobbit truly fits that of a cardigan in our opinion. Steve and I chose "Aragorn" as our kennel name because of this trilogy of Tolkien's.   "Aragorn" is the high title and surname of Aragorn son of Arathorn. It was long foretold that he would take this name; it was given to him by Galadriel. She granted him a gift of a green stone set in a silver brooch in the shape of an eagle as he and the Company of the Ring left her land. 'In this hour,' she said, 'take the name that was foretold for you, Elessar, the Elfstone of the house of Elendil!' 

Our earlier dogs had names from the Hobbit and trilogy - Galadriel, Gandalf, Arwen, Strider. As Tolkien explains, Hobbits are a very ancient people. Peaceful and well ordered. They love food and are never in a hurry. Smaller than dwarves, ranging between two and four feet tall. They seldom wore shoes because their feet were covered in thick curly hair, and have tough leathery soles. They loved parties and presents, you would never ask for a better host.  Here at our house, we have always felt that corgis were just hobbit dogs -

I hope you enjoy our web site and welcome your comments, so send us some email!  I have included some fiction and poetry for your enjoyment, though it may be meshed with factual material. I hope to be able to add a video of Alden at Westminster and of Rusty in the coming months, so keep an eye out.

We always welcome scheduled visitors to meet our dogs. We are located in Northeast Pennsylvania in the beautiful Pocono Mountains, 90 miles due west of New York City. ( Please click that link to view my photos of this scenic area.)

"Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole." -- Roger Caras

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Once again, thank you for your compliments on our web site.  Our next few litters have been reserved, and we are unable to offer puppies at this time.  I cannot respond to the high volume of website emails concerning availability of puppies at this time - we do not have puppies available.  Please check the CWCCA website for the Breeders Directory. Thank you for your understanding.

Our site is faithfully updated and always under construction.