Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

Let's recap: to date, I have brought you ghost cats, talking cats, goblin cats, hoodoo cats, and hypnotist cats. What's the one thing missing?

Why, of course. Martini-swilling cats. The "Oshkosh Northwestern," July 22, 1949:

Kiki, an old foreign toper, came to the land of plenty today--and promptly went on the wagon.

Kiki, to be real plain about it, couldn't stomach our martinis. Not sweet enough.

Kiki, who was raised on gin and vermouth, is a cat. A fugitive from the back alley of old Madrid; a gray and white rascal of doubtful parentage and the property of Mrs. Winifred Hunter, a 62-year-old widow who has just returned from an official tour of duty in Spain. Mrs. H. as of now is waiting for a reassignment, after 26 years of foreign service with our government.

When she walked into the Hunter-Kiki hotel room for a chat, the lovely Mrs. Hunter, who looks half her age, said "Be careful." This reporter disregarded the warning and has a couple of Kiki's toothmarks on his left arm to prove it.

Mrs. Hunter, after she bandaged the damage, explained that (1) Kiki doesn't like men; (2) he is no sissy.

There was no argument on either count.

Before she told me about the drinking habits of her pet, Mrs. Hunter admitted there had been trouble before over Kiki, who came to this country billed as a martini-drinking, boxing tabby."

"I taught him to box," she said. "He was raised around children and so I made him some boxing gloves so he wouldn't scratch the little ones."

Well, when Mrs. Hunter and Kiki landed in New York in the middle of July the cat demonstrated both of his talents. Ship reporters wanted pictures for the papers. Kiki was accommodating enough to lap up a martini--a sweet one like he was accustomed to in Spain. But he got a little unhappy with a reporter from the New York Herald Tribune who got a little too folksy.

"One of Kiki's gloves had blown overboard, but I had one on his left paw for safety," said Mrs. Hunter. "Kiki is right pawed and he could have been mean about it. But he is a gentleman. He let the man have a good one with his left, or gloved hand. The man did not appreciate it."

If Kiki says anything at all, except "meow," he says it in Spanish, since he understands very little, if any, English.

Kiki makes a catline for under the bed when Mrs. Hunter says "malo malo." That means "bad bad." Or to a cat "spanky, spanky."

"Quieta," spoken to the pussy means about what it says. Quiet! "Tamo" means "take it" or "eat your supper."

Kiki knows.

But back to the martinis and how Kiki developed the habit.

Mrs. Hunter pitched a cocktail party in Madrid soon after she got her alley cat as a gift from a Spanish princess. A gentleman guest came rushing into the room and said that Kiki was stealing his martinis.

"I had trouble with the cat ever after," she said.

On the way over here, Kiki made sort of a nuisance of himself running up and down the bar, lapping up the dregs.

He's cured now, though. These American martinis are too tough. Almost cured, that is.

While I was talking to Mrs. H., somebody stole my olive.

"New York Daily News," July 12, 1949

I think I must have been Kiki in a former life.