From a humble lock-up garage to a UK-wide organisation changing the lives of more than 200,000 blind and partially sighted people today, the Guide Dogs charity finds its modest roots right here in Merseyside.
And it continues to help people including most recently a man who hadn't left his home for 20 years and is now finally able to gain independence thanks to one of the incredibly skilled dogs. The story of the Guide Dogs began in 1931 in Wallasey, when two German Shepherd breeders, Muriel Crooke and Rosamund Bond, began training four of their dogs.
They were inspired by ground-breaking assistance animal projects in America, Germany and Switzerland. These dogs - Flash, Folly, Meta and Judy - would become Britain's first real guide dogs, employed to help soldiers blinded by poison gas on the front lines of WWI.
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More than 90 years later, the charity is now the world's largest breeder and trainer of working dogs, but has never forgotten its founders, and continues its good work locally from Muriel Crook House in Knotty Ash.
Joanna Kinrade, from Guide Dogs North West, said: "Every dog that comes to us is different, and some you bond with more closely than others, but the amount of hard work and passion our trainers put in is hard to describe. It takes a trainer two years to be qualified, and it's the only job of their kind.
"They're all so passionate, great animal lovers, and occassionally there will be a dog we'd prefer to keep as our own - but we know the difference they're making to blind and partially sighted people."
The Liverpool training centre is currently home to 10 budding guide dogs in various stages of development. Each fully-trained dog is provided to a suitable blind or patially sighted person free of charge, and its upkeep is paid for entirely by the charity - with the average cost of supporting a single guide dog, from birth to retirement, adding up to more than £56,000.
Joanna said: "Formal guide dog training can take around six months, but for the first year of their life they'll live with a puppy training volunteer, which gets them familiar with the sights, sounds and smells you come across when you're out and about. From the moment they're born to the moment they pass away, it costs around £56k for a single dog.
"At any one time of the year, we're usually responsible for about 5,000 dogs across the UK - puppies, guide dogs, and buddy dogs, which are provided to blind and partially sighted children and are more like companions.
"Around 50% of the dogs we have are golden retrievers crossed with labradors. We also have pure golden retrievers, pure labradors, German shepherds, a curly coat retriever, and a labradoodle.
"Every dog is different, which is great because it suits different people's needs. We always want them to be happy in work and to build a bond with their human. We wouldn't match a strong, fast-paced German shepherd with a little old woman in her 80s, or a chilled out labrador with someone who is busy and active. We always match the dog to someone who we think they will be compatible with."
She added: "You can't put a figure on the worth of a guide dog. We've have people who haven't left their homes in 20 years, who've had horrible or scary experiences with people being rude to them, or getting lost, and as soon as they get the dog, they've got their independence back.
"One man spent 20 years never leaving the house. Now he's able to drop his kids off at school each day, he can do the food shop, he can take the kids to football practice, and he was never able to do that before. People don't like to rely on other people, they want to live independent lives - and this gives them the ability to do that."
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