When Rudy the border collie herded three woolly white sheep toward Edie Steiner on Saturday afternoon, she reached down, grabbed the smallest sheep and turned it over so the animal was sitting upright, its behind against the grass, its back against her legs.
“It’s important to keep sheep upright,” Steiner told a few people watching. The wrong position can hurt their stomachs, making them sick.
Steiner trimmed away the excess on each of the sheep’s hooves with what looked like a small hedge clipper. When she was finished, the sheep toddled away across the grass at Perkins Stone Mansion while a jazz band played on the porch.
It may seem strange now to see sheep grazing in the heart of Akron.
But before LeBron James, before tires, even before oatmeal, Akron was known in the world for its fine wool — wool that came from more than 1,300 Merino sheep that called the Perkins property home.
Akron historian and former deputy mayor Dave Lieberth said Saturday he’s wanted to bring sheep back to the mansion — the longtime home of the Summit County Historical Society — for 30 years.
The sheep finally arrived this year with the help of a grant from the R.C. Musson and Katharine M. Musson Charitable Foundation.
They’re Dorset sheep, not Merino. They’re all wethers, or castrated males. And they’re only on loan through September from the Spicy Lamb Farm of Peninsula.
But Lieberth said the sheep, which will likely return to the mansion next year, have accomplished all he’d hoped.
Among other things, the sheep brought history back to land around the mansion, which was nicknamed Mutton Hill after Col. Simon Perkins hired John Brown in 1844 to tend his sheep, said Lieberth, who chairs the historical society’s board.
At the time, wool was an important international trade commodity and Brown — a radical abolitionist whose actions some believe ultimately led to the Civil War — traveled through Europe finding markets for U.S. wool.
When Brown was traveling across the United States, he sometimes brought runaway slaves to hide on the Perkins property, a stop on the Underground Railroad to freedom.
The neighborhood around the mansion is now about 70 percent African-American, Lieberth said, and the sheep have also helped the historical society reconnect with residents who live close by.
The first week the sheep were on the property, Lieberth showed up at the mansion about 6:30 a.m. and saw a car parked between the mansion and the sheep. He first feared something nefarious.
But it turned out a man who lives across the street was worried someone might hurt the sheep and parked his car there to make would-be pranksters think someone was watching.
Some residents from Saferstein Towers — a housing complex for elderly and disabled residents across the street — also visit the sheep daily.
Collies at work
Steiner and her three border collies — Modibo, Rudy and Lincoln — who demonstrate sheep herding at the mansion — live only a couple of blocks away. All Steiner wanted growing up was a border collie, she said, but her parents refused, saying the breed was too smart and a dog would be unhappy if it didn’t have anything to herd.
“My parents were right,” Steiner said.
When Steiner and her husband got Modibo as a puppy 13 years ago, Modibo was determined to “urban herd,” or chase cars, she said.
Her trainer recommended she take him to a farm and, since then, she and Modibo — and now the other two dogs — learned everything they could about sheep and herding and compete nationally.
On Saturday, after Rudy kept the sheep still so Steiner could trim its hooves, she told the dog to get into a tub of water on the edge of the pasture so he could cool off on the 90-degree day.
Rudy obeyed, trotting off and standing chest-deep in the water. But he never took his eyes off the sheep clustered in a fenced corner of Mutton Hill.
Amanda Garrett can be reached at 330-996-3725 or agarrett@thebeaconjournal.com.