Krissy Naia and Matt Applegate with their new pup. 
Heather Jennings helps her parents socialize pups so they are ready to go to their new homes. 
Tara Wilson and family picking up their new pup on adoption day at American Rescue Dog. 
An American Rescue Dog puppy ready to head to its forever home. 
Adopting family members getting to know their new pup. 
Most American Rescue Dog pups come from high kill shelters. 
Professor Heather Jennings works to place rescue dogs in the right homes. 
Melissa McCartney, a volunteer at American Rescue Dog helps socialize the pups
Heather Jennings, a full-time Psychology Professor at Mercer says she never imagined that 10 years ago when her husband walked into his job to fix computers at an animal shelter in Toms River their lives would be changed forever.
That experience set into motion a series of events that ultimately led Jennings and her husband to start American Rescue Dog dedicated to dog rescue, adoption and rehabilitation.
She says, “Years ago he would go to the shelter and he would fix the computers and he has always loved dogs. That turned into, ‘when I’m not working could I come back and walk some dogs?’”
Jennings describes says it “kind of morphed into a volunteer program where he brought people in who would walk the dogs and do some training with them.”
Eventually, they could see a pattern emerging. The found that “the dogs that were being kind of trained and walked and exercised properly were not getting returned at the same rates,” Jennings says.
“So he started a dog walking program. And then one day a litter of these little blue nosed [pitt bulls] came in and they were like, ‘Hey can you take them?’ and my husband was like ‘Ok!’ and congratulations you’ve now become a rescue.”
From that moment on, Professor Jennings and her husband, Joe Jennings, were committed to dog rescue, receiving dogs, rehabilitating them, and finding them happy homes.
Jennings says, “Originally we would do some fostering at our house, and then we expanded, we became a 501 C3 so we’re a non-profit organization, and we partnered with a local pet store. They support the rescue mission so instead of going into a pet store and buying a dog, we would have our rescue dogs at their pet store that were available for adoption.”
According to the Pet Statistics of the ASPCA, “Approximately 6.5 million companion animals enter U.S. animal shelters nationwide every year. Of those, approximately 3.3 million are dogs.”
The ASPCA also notes, “Each year, approximately 1.5 million shelter animals are euthanized (670,000 dogs and 860,000 cats).”
This number is actually down from a high of 2.5 million in 2011. Rescues like the ones the Jennings have founded, along with broader public awareness of the need for adoptions, are part of the reason the numbers are going down.
Rescue dogs are gaining more mainstream attention with events like the Hallmark channel’s American Rescue Dog Show, established in 2018 and rivaling the prestigious Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show for pure breds. Categories in the show include “Best in Couch Potato,” “Best in Underbite,” “Best in Kissing,” “Best in Talking,” “Best in Listening,” “Best in Snoring,” “Best in Fetching,” “Best in Special Needs,” and “Best in Senior Dog.”
As the urgency to adopt becomes better known, rescue organizations are able to place more animals in homes.
Ultimately, a spontaneous decision to volunteer to walk dogs at an animal shelter grew to be what Professor Jennings describes as: “A small organization, with a big heart.”
