Dale Haney is the keeper of the White House grounds. In 37 years of keeping the grass green and the flowers blooming, he’s also managed to cultivate something just as important: relationships with the presidents’ pooches.
Haney is often spotted walking Bo, the Obama family’s Portuguese water dog. In fact, he’s tended to every White House pup since King Timahoe, Richard Nixon’s Irish setter.
Haney, 57, has been a White House fixture since 1972. After getting a degree in horticulture from Sandhills Community College in Pinehurst, N.C., he continued his training in Washington and basically was discovered for his green thumb, as he tells the story.
He began at the White House as a gardener, then was supervisor of grounds maintenance and lead horticulturist before becoming superintendent of all the grounds last fall.
“They heard about me and they called me to come over here for an interview, and I came – and here I still am,” he said during a tour of the gardens one recent rainy morning when Bo’s primary walker, first lady Michelle Obama, was out of town.
That meant Haney would be Bo’s handler until she returned from a day trip to Florida.
“I have him a little bit more” when she’s traveling, said Haney, who said he’s amazed by the public’s fascination with White House pets.
“Sometimes I think they’re more interested in the pets than the president,” he said. “It’s real amazing.”
Before Bo came along to romp on the South Lawn and roam the White House hallways, Haney spent a lot of time walking and playing with President George W. Bush’s Scottish terriers, Barney and Miss Beazley.
Haney was most fond of Spot, an English springer spaniel whose mother, Millie, belonged to Bush’s father, President George H.W. Bush. Haney said several years ago during an online White House chat that Barney and Spot kept the groundskeepers company all the time.
“They hang out with us during the day while the president and first lady are busy,” he said. “Barney plays with the volleyball and Spot plays with a tennis ball. … They are very helpful in the gardening.
“I do have a soft spot for Spot,” he said during the online chat in 2003. “I was there when she was born, and now she’s back.”
Millie gave birth to Spot at the White House in 1989; the younger Bush and his wife, Laura, put Spot to sleep in 2004 after she’d had several strokes.
Besides taking care of the now year-old Bo, Haney has 18 1/2 acres of lawns, trees and gardens to care for, including the Rose Garden, the slightly smaller Jacqueline Kennedy Garden (also known as the first lady’s garden) and Michelle Obama’s bountiful South Lawn produce garden.
The Obamas are “very into the grounds,” said Haney, who is now serving his eighth president. “They know what’s going on because they’re always out here walking the dog.”
