Baltimore-i Értesítő, 1975 (11. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1975-05-01 / 5. szám
THE EVENING SUN. BALTIMORE, TUESDAY, JANUARY 28, 197 AtfSlNG' WTTIÍ PETS' A 1,000-Year-Old Breed At 250-Year-Old Parish By Ellen Hawks The Vizsla is the national dog of Hungary. Its origin can be traced to the Magyar tribes which lived in the Carpathian basin in the Eighth Century. Ancient stone etchings over a thousand years old show the hunter, his falcon and his Vizsla. Nine true species of this ancient breed of dog are living in gentle and loving surroundings, in one of he oldest sections of Maryland. In the parish of St. Thomas, Prince Georges county, just 6 miles southeast of Upper Marlboro at old St. Thomas’s Episcopal church in Crooms, the rector, the Rev. Mr. Edward C. Raffetto and his wife Lisa own a 4-year-old female Vizsla named St. Tamas's Sandy and her eight purebred puppies. A True Vizsla A true Vizsla, Sandy is a rust gold with brown nose and hazel eyes. “She is an excellent mother to her eight look- alikes,*' said Lisa Raffetto. Sandy, like her breed, Is the smallest of all-round pointer retrievers and is best suited for upland game (geese and quail). Her short coat makes her efficient in briars but keeps her from performing her best hunting in bitter weather. The Raffettos agree that Vizsla owners refer to their dogs as “365-day-a-year dogs. They're protective, friendly and good hunters. They don't thrive on kennel life. They want to be with the family at night, and expect a rank higher than that of a dog ”. Sandy’s ancestors survived the Turkish occupation (1526- 1696), the Hungarian Civil War (1848-1849), and World Wars I and II plus the Communist regime since 1945. Lisa Raffetto, referring to breed history, says there was a time when a poll of Hungarian sportsmen revealed there were only about 12 true Vizslás in existence. By 1950 the breed had increased and the first Vizsla was brought into the United States. It was accepted into the registry of the American Kennel Club in 1960. Mr. Raffetto is rector of St. Thomas’s Church as well as of the Chapel of the Incarnation in Brandywine. 250-Year-Old Parish Although his 1,000-year-old breed of dog far outdates the nearly 250-year-old parish that he serves, Mr. Raffetto wouldn't change either one. Briefly, the origin of St. Thomas's church can be traced to 1732 when it was the Chapel of Ease of St. Paul's Parish. It was often referred to as Page’s Chapel after the contractor who built it. Thomas J. Claggett, first Anglican bishop to be consecrated in America, was priest of the chapel for 30 years. He died in 1816 In 1851' the parish split and the chapel became St. Thomas’s Church. Changes and restorations have been made over the years but the chapel location remains the same. He chose Their Dog Mrs. Raffetto says it was her husband who chose their dog and, “He gave Sandy more attention than he gave me when he first got her.” She admits the job of tending has fallen to her now that the puppies are here. Statistically, comparing AKC registrations, the Vizsla is rare. In 1973 the AKC registered 2,233 Vizslás compared to 218,000 poodles The 1974 figures are not available yet. When those figures are available they will include six male and two female purebred Vizslás . . . canine parishioners of St. Thomas’s Church. Soviet leader Leonid I. Brezhnev's attendance at the Hungarian Communis! party’s 11th Congress in Budapest, liis first trip abroad since seven weeks of seclusion, a iso took him — unreveaied — to the garrison town of Szolnok. Actually, Hungary is not a Red satellite state. It is a Soviet occupied country. And Szolnok is the headquarters for the Soviet Red Army in Hungary. Szolnok is 100 kilometers southeast of Budapest in a tight bend of the Tisza River, and I was stopped from entering there by car by the Hungarian AVH secret police. The AVH kept me under constant surveillance and even my attempt turned into an AVH threat of jail, finally overcome by the intervention of our American Embassy. Brezhnev stole off to Szolnok with Hungarian Red leader Janos Kadar, a straight Soviet stooge, infamous for his part in helping crush the tragic, bloody 1956 anti-Soviet revolt in which 32,000 Hungarians were killed aand 200,000 fled their country. Russia's standard Red Army division In Hungary numbers 12,000 men. A mechanized division of the Soviet central reserve is stationed at Szolnok. Another division rings the 1.9 million Hungarians of Budapest. Another confronts the Romanian border Two more face the Czechoslavakia frontier. Eleven airdromes house the Soviet tactical air force, geared to the infantry • nd tanks. Widespread reports about a shift of satellites from rigid Moscow control may impress us at home. They should be tempered by such realities The shift is in form, not substance. Most Hungarians remain intensely anti- Fussian and, on the Kremlin's instructions, you seldom encounter Soviet soldiers in the cities. Even when you drive in Szolnok’s outskirts, they stay largely out of sight. But 1 have driven on the roads to the Ozech and Romanian frontiers. On these it’s different. Road building is a traditional Red Army exercise and I found the Soviet troops at this toughening work — large groups at hard labor. Officers and men alike get four hours of political training a week. Their Szolnok barracks. and allmthers.have a “Lenin Room’’ featuring anti-Western posters, the pci «»i-? nent slogan, “Forward to the victory of Communism,” and Red Army Marshal Su- varov’s maxim, “Train hard, fight easy.” Radar’s dreaded AVH are everywhere, as foreboding as a hostile grove peopled by unseen enemies. The AVH is as Soviet-controlled as the Kremlin's own KGB. In fact, the AVH is trained under the KGB. Young Hungarian officers in the national forces, in turn, are trained at the Frunze Military Academy in Moscow where Fidel Castro’s officers are likewise taught. Like the AVH, the degradations strike everywhere. I have a Budapest friend let me call him “Josef X" — whose brother “resisted’’ by breaking out to neighboring Austria Josef was a lawyer. For five yejirs the only iob the Central Labor Office nas assigned him is as a window washer. The work week is 51 hours, six on Saturday, and such workers get next to nothing. “But,” said my friend, “It could M worse. The people here are never warned when we may be liquidated.” 3a «7 4—Tor oat« <Oal ) Star "He's just a wise guy Hollywood producer wanting rights to our foreign policy for one of those disaster movies. 'Silly, It’s Only The Delivery Bov’ VY Josef and I had to meet secretly. At his former level, the AVH requires Hungarians to report any Western contacts. You can. thank him for a story: A Budapest professor went into n store to buy tea. “Russian or Chinese?” the store-keeper asked. “Make it coffee instead,” the professor said. When you move among the Hungarian people in the cities or countryside — the girl who does the laundry, the old farmer at his pump, the woman who speaks of a relative. in America — the macabre pligh» is plain. Communists do not govern countries, they pillage them — morally, economically, ethically and spiritually. The Kadar government departs from the straight Kremlin line only when it is utterly painless to the Kremlin to do so Surely Brezhnev’s visit further endorsed that. Janos Kadar and his entire cabal would be out of a job in five minutes and would probably wake up in Siberia if they took an independent plunge. Moreover, it would simply be a plui.ee to nowhere — the Kremlin has.seen to th ■'
