“AKC information and shows create a market and demand for purebred dogs,” says Alan Stern, the AKC’s vice-president for communications. Its Complete Dog Book, published periodically, with frequent updatings, since 1929 and the best-selling canine reference book in America, contains photographs of and detailed information about the 130 breeds that the AKC currently recognizes, while ignoring the remaining 300 or so that exist in the world today. For a fee ($6 for a dog $15 for a litter) it records the offspring of all AKC-registered parents in its stud book and provides them with official certificates of pedigree. FOR MORE THAN A CENTURY THE AMERICAN Kennel Club has presided over American dogdom with a confidence verging on arrogance, proclaiming itself the “principal registry agency for purebred dogs in the United States.” From its headquarters in New York City the AKC sets the rules and regulations, certifies the judges, and publishes the results of the competitions sponsored annually by its more than 3,200 membership units and affiliates.
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