Cass County CLOSE-UPS

Name:

Mitzi Francis

Town:

Bloomburg

At the age of three, Mitzi Frances already knew she loved horses, and she even has the picture to prove it: a miniature version of herself in a red frilly dress is perched bareback atop her Grandpa’s plow horse.

“I loved getting on Grandpa’s horse after he plowed – I rode it all over the yard, all by myself,” she recalls. “I don’t know why I’m so dressed up, or how Momma got me into that dress, though!”

Born in McLeod in 1964, Mitzi and her twin brother Marty graduated from McLeod High School in 1983. She played on the girls basketball team, and proudly shows the photo of herself, #21, poised in midair with the ball headed for nothing but net.

Her athletic phase lasted until just a few years ago. Starting out in a local girls softball league, then moving into a co-ed league, Mitzi travelled to tournaments all over Texas and Arkansas, collecting trophies along the way.

“I started playing softball in a league here when I was 13 and I just kept on playing,” she said. “I started out at third base, but when my arm started acting up I moved to second base; then first base, then hindcatcher. When I quit I was the pitcher.”

These days Mitzi chases wayward animals rather than a softball but make no mistake that she is just as passionate about it. She has been known to take pets away from abusive owners, and she isn’t afraid to tell you what she thinks.

As an employee of the Queen City Water Department, she works at the wastewater treatment plant and doubles as dogcatcher. The town of Bloomburg uses her as contract labor to keep their streets free of strays. On weekends, the Queen City calls roll over to the Atlanta Police Department dispatcher. Mitzi is in a state of perpetual on-call duty; the animals do take up a good portion of her time.

Mitzi lives alone in a farmhouse situated among many barns and sheds on a rural blacktop road just outside of Bloomburg. The land belongs to the James Brooks family, who has kept Mitzi continuously hired for many years as caretaker of the old horse farm.

The fences may no longer hold thoroughbreds, but the donkeys and miniature horses she has collected are no less deserving of the royal treatment Mitzi lavishes on them. Shorty, the 23-year old miniature donkey, has his own retirement suite – a roomy fenced-in grassy area with a hayfilled lean-to for shelter on rainy days.

In the pen next door to Shorty lives an unusual white donkey, along with another short donkey. Just across the dirt road a pair of miniature horses have a space large enough to race each other in laps around their shed.

A trio of dogs follows Mitzi everywhere she goes, leaning into her when she stops for even a second. The senior German Shepherd named Adolph has hip trouble that gives the allusion that he is sashaying away from you rather than trotting.

A brown and white medium-sized mixed female is Adolph’s best friend but is currently occupied with babysitting a newcomer to the farm. Lulu, a young female Mitzi recently picked up, appears to be a pit mix with a beautiful coat of maple colored brindle, and sad puppy-dog eyes to match.

“If I don’t find a home for her soon, I’m going to have to get her euthanized,” Mitzi says sadly. “I can’t keep every single one of them. But she’s a good dog and she deserves a chance.”

And that, in a nutshell, is why Mitzi is so passionate about the animals she before giving up on any of them. Sadly, she often has to be the bad guy when pet owners aren’t responsible enough to spay and neuter their furbabies. There is surely no doubt that each of these animals know they were loved and cared for by at least one very compassionate human.