The Ritter kennel was only in existence from circa 1988 until 1993, but its influence has been far-reaching long after the kennel closed. Carolyn was active in middle distance racing in the northern midwest. She was a close friend of Deborah Serbousek (Windigo Kennels and Outfitters) who bred a small number of Seppalas that were crucial to genetic breadth in the post-Markovo period. Among these were KARCAJOU'S DREAMA OF WINDIGO, whom Carolyn acquired as a brood bitch, and JAZZ OF WINDIGO whom she used at stud. Carolyn associated her kennel with Sepp-Alta and acquired POWDER OF MARKOVO, also as a brood bitch. POWDER came to River View already bred to UELEN'S BEOWULF OF SEPP-ALTA; the first Sepp-Alta Z-Litter (ZORRO, ZEUS II, ZODIAC, ZIRCONIA and Z-Z-Z'S) were Carolyn's dogs and were whelped at her kennel.
In November 1991 I took a transatlantic flight from northern Spain and flew to Wisconsin to visit Carolyn Ritter's kennel in Mercer on a dog-buying excursion. At that time, the height of River View's activity, Carolyn had a significant number of Sepp-Alta dogs, all of them (except for her old leader MERCURY) Markovo Seppalas. In addition to MERCURY and the Z-litter, she had XPACE OF SEPPALTA, ADOLPH OF SEPP-ALTA, YOGI OF SEPP-ALTA and PETER OF SEPP-ALTA, the latter a fine command leader.
She also had several litters of promising young stock of her own breeding. Unlike virtually all other Sepp-Alta satellites, Carolyn's breeding programme was exclusively Markovo Seppala. Her first two litters (1988) were sired by JAZZ OF WINDIGO, out of KARCAJOU'S DREAMA OF WINDIGO and POWDER OF MARKOVO; the following year saw two more litters from the same bitches.
(Uelen's Beowulf of SA x Powder of Markovo)
(Uelen's Beowulf of SA x Powder of Markovo)
