Grosse Pointe South is entertained around 9 a.m. every day as Jay Hunter, a graduate of Austin Catholic Preparatory School ’76, and Curtis Fisher, Grosse Pointe South ’76, are outside with their one year old puppies, Angus and Woody. Classes have witnessed these two dogs jumping and wrestling during their second and third hours, but their story makes the scene even more wholesome.

Hunter and Fisher both grew up in Grosse Pointe Farms and have known each other since they were in first grade and lived a couple blocks away from each other. Hunter’s dog had passed away during quarantine leading him to make calls to breeders and shelters in hopes of getting a new dog. After many unsuccessful attempts, Hunter made contact with the breeder of his late dog’s mother. The breeder gave him the contact of a labrador breeder in Harbor Springs, Barb Reisig.

“I got in touch with her,” Hunter said. “She said, ‘Oh, I have a litter coming in, maybe I’ll give you a male,’ because all the females were spoken for. And sure enough, she gave me the first pick and Angus was the runt.”

After Hunter finalized the details with Reisig, through some coincidence he discovered that Angus is a relative of his past dog.

“[Angus] shares a grandparent and a great grandparent with my old dog, Peak,” Hunter said. “So, I got a little bit of my old dog but I love this guy, too”

Hunter had previously owned three black labs, but he still nervously waited two months to collect Angus, his first puppy. Soon after Hunter received Angus, he told Fisher.. Fisher had also lost a dog, Briggs, recently.

“I came over and walked Angus,” Fisher said. “Then I turned to [Hunter] and told him, ‘I gotta get another dog’”

According to Fisher, he took a chance and called Reisig. She had two dogs left, a male and female. Reisig checked and got back to him with a decision in three days. She was going to let him take the male home.

“My fiance and I rushed up there, picked him up and took Woody back to Grosse Pointe a year ago in late November,” Fisher said.

Fisher said he lives a few blocks from South, so he has been walking his dogs to South in the mornings for several years. Meanwhile, Hunter is new to the hobby and only started going with Fisher when they got both their dogs. Following both Hunter and Fisher taking the dogs home, they learned something bizarre about Angus and Woody.

“They’re half brothers,” Hunter said. “Same father, different mother, but they are so crazy about each other, as [students] have seen. They’re not like this with other dogs, they see each other and they just go crazy.”

According to Hunter, the dogs cherish being around one another and he and Fisher love to watch them run along South’s front lawn.

“Even in the winter, we’re here every morning,” Hunter said. “They love to play, I’m not kidding, for hours.”