The owner had just the right touch, trying to soothe her French bulldog’s trembling paws.

“There, there,” Patty Hearst said.

Far, far removed from the days when her image as a machine gun-toting revolutionary captivated a nation, Patricia Shaw Hearst was in more genteel surroundings yesterday. She was tending to Diva at Madison Square Garden, petting her soft head.

Surrounded by Cardigan Welsh corgis, Chinese shar-peis, and Parson Russell terriers, she blended right in at the Westminster Kennel Club show.

“When people find out it’s me, it’s like it doesn’t make sense,” the 53-year-old Ms. Shaw said. “The Frenchie people know me because I’ve been around. But others, they seemed surprised.”

That basically summed up Mitzie McGavic’s reaction. In town from Florida to root for her friend’s Australian shepherd, she was startled to learn who was standing a few feet away.

“You’re kidding. Is she the Patty Hearst?” Ms. McGavic asked. “Showing dogs at Westminster, who knew?”

Ms. Shaw has been working with dogs for three years, and her first trip to Westminster was well worth it. Her prize, with a champion’s name of Shann’s Legally Blonde, earned a red ribbon as Best of Opposite Sex — a male dog won the breed, and hers was judged the top female.

“It’s overwhelming,” she said.

Ms. Shaw said the ribbon would probably decorate one of the swords that her husband collects. The gold medallion, that one is hers to keep.

“It’s like winning a gold medal at the Olympics. Or would this be a silver?” she said. “Someone asked me before I came down what were the chances of winning something. I said it was one-in-35, because that’s how many dogs were entered. But I never expected this.”

The granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst gained notoriety in 1974 when, at 19, she was kidnapped by the radical group, the Symbionese Liberation Army.