Chip, chip. Hooray!

Did you know there are vin­tage poker chips with Frenchies on them? They are part of the Peau-Doux or Po-Do poker chip series and often pop up for sale labeled as French Bull­dog poker chips. Actu­ally they are near-Frenchies. The logo is based on a Toy Boston Bull­dog (now the Boston Ter­rier breed) once owned by one of the founders of Wal­greens. Click here for the story of how a toy Boston Bull­dog named Peau-Doux influ­enced the mar­ket­ing of Wal­greens in the 20s and 30s. From the book America’s Cor­ner Drug­store: Walgreen’s Pre­scrip­tion for Suc­cess by John U. Bacon.

Hum, take a close look at this joker card from a vin­tage set of Po-Do cards. Frenchie, Boston? Boston, Frenchie?

French Bull­dogs were used in the devel­op­ment of the Boston Ter­rier breed and it does seem odd they gave this pup a French name, those ears do have a bit of round­ness at the tips, Frenchies do come as double-hooded pieds… Gee, just makes ya won­der…

Now to mod­ern times and to dogs who’s chips are down; Frenchies who aren’t lucky enough to be owned by a founder of Wal­greens or even a per­ma­nent family.

Do these Frenchies have any­thing to do with chips? Some­times, such as when they are uncer­e­mo­ni­ously dumped in park­ing lots, the sides of roads, and other less than desir­able places for a Frenchie to be. In these cases, the chip is the prover­bial chip on the shoul­der because no mat­ter the num­ber of scans, very sel­dom does a microchip ID num­ber pop up from a ben­e­fi­cial chip between the shoulders.

Res­cue work­ers at the French Bull­dog Res­cue Net­work have decided to make their shoul­der chip a pro­duc­tive one and they are ask­ing peo­ple to chip in to their $30K in 30 Days drive. They are rais­ing money to cover res­cue expenses of the increas­ing num­ber of Frenchies in their care using a ChipIn wid­get. It’s an easy way to con­tribute, as all you need to do is click and pay with a credit card or Pay­Pal account. The amount you donate is com­pletely up to you.

Don’t let these dogs’ chips fall where they may, change the luck of these Frenchies by donat­ing via the ChipIn wid­get below or by tak­ing one home with you and treat­ing them like the blue chip dog they really are. You’ll both feel a bit more chip­per if ya do!

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Tired of this idiomatic bandy­ing about of the word chip? Ready for some tasty chip puns instead? Enjoy a few good ones from PunoftheDay.com.

FYI: If you have a Frenchie or dog who you haven’t microchipped yet, click here to read a prior blog entry about the impor­tance of microchip­ping your pet. Don’t keep your Frenchie away from this chip!

Update: 12-21-2011

In search­ing for Peau-Doux poker chips dis­cov­ered they have been made of var­i­ous plas­tics over the decades they were avail­able. The first image shows a Bake Lite chip. (Used the hot tap water test to con­firm this chip is Bake Lite. Read more about test­ing vin­tage plas­tics here.) The other pic­ture shows a Styrene chip. Note the Po-Do ver­sion of the name and the more vibrant red color. The chip is also lighter weight.

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