Sherlock Bones – the Go-to-guy when Your Pet Goes Missing
“Losing a pet can be like losing a child for some people. Pets are companions; they are loving, and need care and attention. When someone loses a pet, they go into crisis mode because it seems like there’s very little they can do. Not only that, some people’s sympathy only extends to “oh well, you can always get another one”. I keep them grounded and try to remind them that this is not their fault, and that they shouldn’t beat themselves up about it. I’ve worked at veterinarian hospitals, grooming parlors and animal shelters, and no matter how careful you are, a pet can always get lost.”
Now living near Portland, Oregon after spending many years in California – “I lived all over. Until a year ago I lived in Walnut Creek, and it was San Jose before that” – John Keane spoke to Daily Ireland about his professional persona of “Sherlock Bones”. For over 30 years he has been the go-to-guy if your cat or dog has gone missing, although he has dealt with other lost animals too:
“There’s been a horse, a llama called Fernando that was stolen from a private zoo in Hollywood, a spider monkey, a tortoise – I was almost tempted to wonder how far away it could have actually got. The largest reward I have ever heard offered was $10,000 for a lost dog.”
Born in Flushing, New York and raised in Whitestone, Queens, Keane was restless in school, and after a stint in the US Marine Corps where he served in Vietnam as a jet mechanic and several years working in various jobs, he ended up living in his “dream home” in Telegraph Hill, San Francisco:
“One day I picked up a copy of the San Francisco Chronicle which was open at the Lost and Found page. There was a $1000 reward for a missing Chihuahua, and I thought “that’s about $500 a pound!” but then I thought about my own dog. What would happen if it went missing? Who would help me? Where would I go?”
Determined to go into business for himself, he did some soul searching and read a book that changed his life:
“The book said that you should “bring something new to the table”, and I thought that this could be it. I didn’t know how to do a business plan though, and it’s just as well really, because this is something that has no repeat business – if I had thought about that, I probably wouldn’t have gone ahead with it!”
Success came early for Keane when he wrote “Sherlock Bones, Tracer of Missing Pets” about his adventures finding lost animals. It was published worldwide, and since then he has been featured in Time, Cosmopolitan, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and appeared on the Today Show, Good Morning America and the Tonight Show.
There were also rumors that the hit movie Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was loosely based on Keane’s story, although these were never confirmed:
“Funnily enough, his wife hired me to find their own dog when it went missing!”
Over the years Keane reckons that he has helped find thousands of pets, but alongside his love of animals – including his own French Briard, Moke – is a passionate interest in his Irish heritage:
“You bet! I have a great deal of connection to my Irish roots. My father was originally from Kilkee in County Clare, and he came over in 1925 on the SS Celtic, with just $5 dollars in his pocket. He’s in the manifest at Ellis Island. My mother was from Gort in County Galway.”
Keane has done some genealogical research and gone as far back as his father’s great-great grandfather, but he has only visited Ireland once before:
“Some years ago, a distant cousin of mine called Jack Doherty left everyone in the family $5000 and we all – my sister, brothers, myself and our wives and husbands – all took a trip to Ireland to see where our parents had lived.”
It was a moving experience, and Keane wasn’t ashamed to say that he cried when he saw the famous “patchwork quilt” of land as their plane came into land, or when he finally found what he had been searching for:
“Sadly their cottage was long gone, but the people who now lived on the land showed me where it had been, and we actually managed to pull up some earth and find the hearth. I must admit that I knelt down and kissed it. It made me feel very happy and comfortable, though they were more than a little surprised!”
Keane also wanted to find his mother’s house, but finding the remains of a country cottage in Ireland is never easy until, as a last attempt, he tried knocking on a random farmhouse door:
“I explained about my mother’s family, and they said: “You’d better come in – I think we’re related”. They took me to the ruins of my mother’s childhood home, and parts of it were still standing. I took two nails from the door – they’re on my desk right now.”
The visit to the resort area of Kilkee also bought a very clear connection to Keane’s mind about his family’s favorite vacation spot in New York:
“We all loved Rockaway Beach, Long Island, especially my father. Even though I was young, I remember loving it too – the smell of beer and wood chips coming out of the Irish bars. When I saw the beach at Kilkee, I released how similar they were. We still have family down there”
It has been a long time since he started Sherlock Bones at his house in Oakland, California, and Keane now runs Sherlock Bones as consultancy service, answering around half a dozen calls a day:
“There’s no running around like Ace Ventura; most people could not afford it, and besides, there is nothing I could physically do that my clients could not do just as well. They like to be involved in finding their pet, and successful pet finding is all about technique – not just what you do, but how you do it. I offer them advice and ideas, as well as some trade secrets. Most pets are found within a two-mile radius, but the key thing is to make the phone ring, and use the network – it’s all about advertising”
The huge majority of lost pets are found, and often they have been “adopted” by people or families who have taken them home after finding them:
“It’s easily done. People find a lost, shivering dog without a collar, are wary of animal shelters, and take it home – then become smitten. It’s actually illegal in some states, and many people justify their actions much later by saying, “oh, it was the owner’s fault for losing it in the first place.”
Keane hopes to visit Ireland again soon – “my family research will be much easier if I am actually there “- but he finds it hard to drag himself away when people need his help:
“I really believe that this is my calling, as humble as it might be. I have tried to get into other businesses in the past, but I always came back to this. My website has given me more exposure in the last few years – if you type “Lost Pets” into Google you get over 400,000 hits, and there are many people offering similar services to me – but making a fortune at this was never my goal. I’ve helped reunite thousands of pets with their owners, and caused a million smiles and tail wags. If that’s my legacy for this life, I figure it’s a life well spent.”
Sherlock Bones can be found at www.sherlock.com
