I’ve spent most of my life surrounded by the collies beloved by my family throughout the decades.
Most of the collies were purebreds with registered papers, with the exception of Mom and Dad’s final mixed-breed collie named Laddie, who died in 2017. It was shortly after my parents’ latest Maine coon feline, Tracker V, arrived at the farm flown in from Dallas, to be delivered in person by his breeder.
While my oldest sister and brother, Carol and Tom, have earlier recollections of the collies who became part of our family, the first collies I recall from my youth in the 1970s are Laddy and Lady, a brother and sister pair, with the male living at my grandparents’ house across the cornfields and the female with us at Mom and Dad’s home.
By the 1980s, the sibling pair had both passed and my parents’ final purebred collie was named Laddy, a constant companion to both Mom and Dad when they were outside for gardening, chores, or even just an after-supper walk.
Collies are working farm dogs by nature and are especially fond of herding. With some of our collies, we had to battle an inherent trait for chasing cars alongside our country road. Most of all, collies are loving and affectionate, as well as very protective. For Mom and Dad, our collies could be likened to would-be babysitters for us as children playing in the backyard or out on adventures in the fields and woods.
There’s a reason the most famous Hollywood dog of movies and television, Lassie, was created in the stalwart image of the collie as a distinct nod to this breed’s devotion to helping humans.
And for the record, despite the popular expression and lore, little Timmy from the television series “Lassie” never did “fall down a well,” to be rescued by Lassie in any of the 17-season incarnations of the television series.
My oldest sister Carol, like all of us in our family, loved watching the movies and TV series starring Lassie.
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In September, Carol, who lives on a farm in Monterey near Culver, Indiana, decided she would gift herself a collie puppy for her 72nd birthday. Her farmer neighbor Larry, who has sheep, cattle and chickens, has a pair of collies and they surprised him with a litter of eight puppies, four males and four females.
Sister Carol purchased a female she named Ladie, and her grandson Laine, who lives near Bass Lake, purchased one of Ladie’s brothers and named him Denver. Another canine sibling went to a Michigan couple who are in their 90s, and another pup was purchased by a family in Ohio.
The puppies were listed for sale in both “The Farmer’s Exchange” and “The Pulaski Journal” newspapers, and now just three of the brothers remain at the farm for sale.
The puppies were born May 4 and when Carol visited the neighboring farm to make her selection, it was a rainy day, and all of the barking brood were wet and covered in mud from playing in the field. Her farmer neighbor suggested a return visit to get a better visual representation of the pups.
Today, Ladie, now five months old, along with her brother Denver, are preparing for their veterinarian appointments this month to be spayed and neutered.
Though Ladie lives in the straw-filled, cozy horse barn with the horses and one pony at my sister’s farm, she spends most of her time patrolling the yard or snoozy in her bonus bed in the garage attached to the home.
Like my sister Carol, my older brother David in Ohio is a fan of slow cooker recipes. Carol has to make large portions to feed her twin farming sons, Billy and Bobby, and the other workers for their excavation business. Slow cooker meals are easy to prepare, serve and even great for transporting in containers to field locations.
Brother David created a new delicious and hearty slow cooker recipe earlier this month that he calls an “all-in-one menu meal.” It’s layered with the meat entrée, a savory stuffing side, the vegetable side and even the gravy, cooked together and served from one pot.
I describe it as sounding like a futuristic kitchen idea such as the spaceship galley food service device featured in the Irwin Allen science fiction series “Lost In Space,” which aired on CBS from 1965 to 1968. Set “way in the future in 1997,” the Robinson Family and their robot are being launched from Earth on a mission to find a new outer space destination that can be colonized.
As a kid, I loved the entire show concept (which our mom despised because she found the show unwatchable), especially the robot and the future kitchen, which, like brother David’s slow cooker recipe (which I’m sharing today), would deliver an all-in-one dinner delivered via a conveyor belt, like magic.
And of course, playing the role of the mom, Mrs. Maureen Robinson, was June Lockhart, who died at age 100 a year ago on Oct. 23, 2025. Before her intergalactic TV travels, she played Timmy’s loving mother on “Lassie” from 1958-64, also on CBS. I met and interviewed June a few times during my writing career, and she was just as kind and gracious as the characters she portrayed during her long career.
Columnist Philip Potempa has published four cookbooks and is a weekly radio host at WJOB 1230 AM. He can be reached at [email protected] or mail your questions: From the Farm, PO Box 68, San Pierre, Ind. 46374.
David’s All-in-One Layered Slow Cooker Dinner
Makes 6 servings
Ingredients
2 pounds boneless chicken breasts (about 4)
1 box (6 ounces) chicken stuffing mix
2 cans (10.5 ounces each) cream of chicken soup or cream of mushroom
3/4 cup sour cream
1/3 cup water
10-ounce bag frozen green beans
Salt and pepper to taste
Directions
1. Spray crockpot with cooking spray and place chicken in the bottom of crockpot.
2. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and top with dry stuffing mix.
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3. In a separate bowl, mix soup, sour cream and water and spread over stuffing mix.
4. After two hours, spread green beans on top.
5. Cover and cook on high for 4 hours.