Some history of the sport, and Lonnie Olson's part in it (She founded Dog Scouts of America too!)

Flyball is a sport that was created back in the late 1970’s. It gained popularity throughout the 80’s and 90’s, and continues to be a mainstay sport for dog lovers all over the planet.

Lonnie Olson wrote the first book anywhere on Flyball back in 1985. She had several instructional articles published in various dog magazines, and people were constantly writing to her for more information. Tired of copying the individual articles and mailing them to people, she decided a book was needed on the topic. She had contacted some publishers about taking the book, but they said, “Flyball? Nobody knows what that is!” They weren’t interested in publishing a book about something that no one knows anything about. It seems that publishing a book would help people learn something about the topic. Go figure.

Rather than write a book from scratch, she simply took the compilation of articles that she had been writing for the magazines, and bound them into a manuscript that she called: Flyball: A Dog Sport for Everyone. She published and sold her own books (illustrated, printed, bound, and distributed), in the beginning. After selling a few thousand copies, she started having it printed and bound elsewhere, but continued to market the books herself. Several thousand copies were sold over the next ten years.

Finally, Howell Book House (the premier dog book publisher) contacted Lonnie about writing a book about flyball. A lot had changed about the sport in the past 10 years, and some of the technical information in the original manuscript had been outdated. Lonnie agreed to let HBH publish her new flyball book, and began writing about every aspect of the sport, based on her experience training, managing a team, building equipment, hosting tournaments, judging, and being on the founding Board of Directors for the North American Flyball Association.

In the mean time, a couple of other books had appeared on the scene on the topic of Flyball training. One was similar to Lonnie’s original (outdated) manuscript, and the other was fairly good, but did not include a correct depiction of how to properly back chain the training steps for optimum performance. Lonnie was a student of operant conditioning, shaping, and clicker training before the world was ready for these methods.

With the help of a well-known publishing company, the second book did quite well, in spite of the competition of the other new books. One serious drawback was that the publisher insisted on the title of the book. They wanted it to be almost the same as the last book’s title. They agreed to: FLYBALL RACING: The Dog Sport for Everyone. This was only two words different from the original book. But the book was entirely different. Everything was new, updated and re-written. However, people assumed that the book was just a fancy, re-bound version of the old book, which kept many people from purchasing it. It didn’t help matters that the editor ran the old “teaser” for the original book, which made it look like it was, indeed the same book. This was all very frustrating for Lonnie.

In spite of the slow start for the second book, Lonnie had become the “flyball maven” of the universe for many people around the world. She had helped get teams started in England, Australia, and Japan with the help of her first book. When Japan and Australia decided to have their first flyball seminars, of course they sought out the person who had originally helped them get started. A few other famous names in flyball competition got their noses out of joint because they did not get asked to instruct, as a foremost expert in their field.

Japan asked first. Earlier, Japan had contacted the North American Flyball Association, and asked for some videotape footage that they could include on an instructional video about dog training. The Board (except for Lonnie) was against the idea. The president of the association said things that you’ll never find on the official minutes of the NAFA board meeting. Things like, “What have the Japanese ever done for us, except ruin our car economy” and things like that. Or, “Let’s see some money, and then we’ll think about it.” These short-sighted people lost the opportunity to help expand the sport of Flyball in other countries. Disappointed about the board’s unwillingness to share information, Lonnie sent the Japanese some of her own footage of flyball teams racing in tournaments. This is the footage that appeared on the Japanese video. Later, when they wanted an American flyball expert to come and do several seminars in Japan, they went back to the person who was willing to help before. Lonnie conducted several flyball, agility, and clicker training seminars in Japan. She presented instructional seminars on three different occasions, and helped the host’s flyball team to become the best in Japan.

Lonnie’s trip to Australia was a memorable one. One of the hosting teams presented her with a scrapbook, documenting flyball in their country from the first they had heard of it, starting with the help of her book, years ago. Some of the photos were familiar, as the Australian teams often sent shots back to their “mentor” in the states. Lonnie pretty much kept in contact with the Aussies over the years. So, once again, her generosity and willingness to share information and mentor these budding enthusiasts made them choose her, over any number of other successful flyball trainers elsewhere in North America, to conduct several training seminars through out Australia. The Australians had good teams, but by the time Lonnie left, they had great teams. They shaved about 4 to 6 seconds off their team times with her pass coaching instruction, and swimmer’s turn techniques.

About this same time, Lonnie was developing Dog Scouts of America, and had been having camps in Michigan for several years. Then, Lonnie’s mother came down with Alzheimers disease. This caused a chain of events that would dramatically change Lonnie’s life. It became apparent that she would go stark raving mad if she had to share the same domicile with her mother (who needed the heat above 85 degrees, fed the dogs from the table, and had a nasty little dog of her own). In searching for a place that had property with two houses on it, Lonnie found 80 acres in Northern Lower Michigan, which she turned into a beautiful camp, where she would host the Dog Scout Camps for many years to come.

Regarding moving to Northern Michigan, Lonnie says, “I feel like I’ve joined the witness protection program! All of my friends are down state. There are no dog clubs up here. No flyball teams, no competitions. The move has carved a big hole out of my life. I miss flyball more than anything.”