"A guide dog is almost equal in many ways to giving a blind man sight itself."

Musgrave Frankland, one of the first British people trained with a guide dog.

Whilst The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association was founded in 1934, the guide dog story started in Germany in 1916 when dogs were trained to lead soldiers blinded in the First World War.

In 1927 Mrs Dorothy Eustis, an American police dog trainer, wrote an article about these German dog training schools and was contacted by blind American, Morris Frank. A year later Mrs Eustis trained a dog for him and started 'The Seeing Eye' in Switzerland and America.

In 1930 two British women, Miss Muriel Crooke and Mrs Rosumund Bond, heard about The Seeing Eye and asked Dorothy Eustis to send one of her trainers. In 1931, the first four British guide dogs completed their training and three years later The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association was born - training from a lock up garage in Wallasey, Cheshire.

From humble beginnings, the charity slowly grew. In 1940, the first training centre was established in Leamington Spa and since then centres have been built to serve every part of the UK.

In 1956 a 'puppy walking scheme' was started, placing puppies with volunteer 'walkers' who introduce the young dogs to the sights and sounds of a world in which they will play such an important part.