Margaret "Peggy" M. Young, who owned and operated Carriage Hill Kennels in Finleyville for some 40 years, died of pneumonia March 9 at Washington County Health Center.

Ms. Young, 80, bred collies and took care of dozens of clients' dogs and cats at any given time on an idyllic 21-acre piece of wooded property she bought and developed in the early 1960s. She built a white house and gazebo and began boarding generations of pets in Washington County after operating a kennel previously in the Wexford area.

She and those working for her showed her collies at events across the region and nation, winning several American Kennel Club championships, until health problems slowed her. Ms. Young sold the kennel to an employee earlier this decade and moved off the property, living the past few years in Hopewell with her two Pomeranians.

The Carnegie Mellon University graduate, originally from Mt. Lebanon, was a member of the Western Pennsylvania Kennel Association, Collie Club of Western Pennsylvania and Collie Club of America.

Ms. Young married and divorced when young, and had no immediate family members who survived her. A private memorial service is planned by friends.

Contributions may be made to the Washington Area Humane Society, P.O. Box 66, Eighty Four, PA 15330.

-- Gary Rotstein