Smokey was a lab/shepherd/ border collie mix. I got him from a farmer whose collie mix dog had puppies in 1991. Smokey was one of those dogs that seemed to have a good sense of who was bad and who was good. He was the perfect dog for a single female. I always felt safe with him around. I have several stories to share about how he protected me from strangers but the best one was from our trip to the Grand Canyon. It was just him and I on this trip and it was a road trip. We met several people along the way. One person I met was at a campsite. Because it was a weekday, the campsite was virtually empty. It was after dark and a man was walking by. He saw me sitting at the campfire by myself and decided to stop by and talk to me. Smokey did not like him one bit. It was not a territorial thing because the park ranger came by our campsite earlier in the day and Smokey had no problem with him. I don’t know if that man that Smokey didn’t like was up to no good or not, but the fact that he came to my campsite after dark tells me that he was either thoughtless or he intended to take advantage of me. Smokey died in 2005. I really loved that dog and have not had a dog since that seemed to have the same senses of people.