Blast from the past: Barbara Woodhouse, dog trainer extraordinaire

​The Irish-born British dog trainer was stern and bossy, and made most dog owners (and television viewers) tremble with fear. She was, in essence, the Margaret Thatcher of dog discipline.

School playgrounds resounded with parodies of Woodhouse's shrill "Si-t-t-t-t!" or her jolly “Walkies”.

Her schoolmarmish approach has become somewhat out of fashion since then, but her innovative efforts spawned an industry. There is now at least one professional dog trainer in every town.

Woodhouse used to work wonders by transforming intractable dogs into models of obedience.

It looked so easy on the television. Her motto was: “No bad dogs”, it was the owners who lacked experience at asserting the pecking order.

Watching the bespectacled dispenser of common sense training, was weirdly compelling viewing.

Experts now believe that ‘ dominance’ dog training methods championed by Mrs Woodhouse do more harm than good. But when it came to barking orders, no one quite did it like the formidable Mrs Woodhouse, a Rottweiler in a plaid skirt.