This week we have heard of so many new strays being found in our local area, that I though I would post some information on the problems facing these poor little creatures as fall and winter moves in.

As the days grow shorter and night with its colder temperatures moves in these drop off or left behind animals seek shelter and food. The true unkindness of people is the shortsightedness of the former owner, many of whom think a domestic kitten or cat can seek food like a feral cat whose mother teaches them to hunt.

If we could get some cooperation at spreading the word about the importance of neuter and spaying your animals, we could help with this problem.

Kittens are great for playing with but ownership is a great responsibility. Have your cat fixed and remember that if you move it is still your responsibility… and apartment dwellers should realize many landlords do not want tenants with cats.

We also need more funding for ANIMAL SHELTERS, AS WELL AS VOLUNTEERS AND SUPPORTERS, FOR THOSE THAT WE DO HAVE. An more free or low cost clinics to help with fixing.

Go to our clinic and heath pages for importation on clinics in our area.

We also have a lost and found page….send backstreetmary@yahoo.com a picture with information and we will share it!!

A good site to visit in the CNY Area is SANS of Syracuse (https://www.spayandneutersyracuse.com

Backstreet Mary’s – View from the Backstreet

I read a note from a friend who just had her dogs DNA done. I was amused…then I thought back to an old blog I wrote many years ago on the first stray I had here in Eaton. When I took him to a local vet he exclaimed..”A real cat”...what! He explained that he was a cat who had double fur and descended from a Linx that we had in the area in early time!

So here his story…I called him Lincus the boy next door called him Linc!

As the 235th year of Eaton history begins I took the time to reflect on what life was like in Eaton in 1790s.  At first it was hard to visualize a few log buildings situated in the midst of a virtual wilderness of forest and streams.  These log buildings had been hailed by one visitor as “Log City,” a city of the future.  As I pondered this scene it occurred to me that I indeed had a glimpse of what the founding Morse families’ Holiday Season was like, and it was in the Wood House Museum’s front room.

Lincus, as he was called, had been through the worst and the best this town has to offer. Old Link had been in the house when there was no heat, electric or food, and had eaten anything presented to him including endless days of pea soup (made with nothing but peas and water) and bread, oatmeal, sunfish meat (deboned) or whatever.  Nothing seemed to bother him.  Each morning he set out on his route about Eaton regardless of the weather (be it 99 degrees) and each night he took a before-bed tour to make sure nothing had changed, even if it was 30 below.

Lincus’ genes seemed to come from the finest stock of old Eaton itself.  His family had most likely been here for more generations than I can count, perhaps even back to the times of the Native Americans first inhabitancy.  His family stayed while settlers picked up and moved west because of the poor conditions and outrageous weather swings.  Why just this week I recorded on our digital thermometer at the Wood House a low of  21 and a high of 71 degrees – almost a fifty degree change in 24 hours.  But alas, none of this ever seemed to bother Linc.

Lincus was on hand for all of our history events and sat near the wood stove listening to all the plans for Bicentennials and History Days with a quiet resolve.  Nothing seemed to change his outlook on life; he just watched history go by.  His motto was doing what you must to survive and forget the trouble and look only to what God has given you and the future.

Lincus came to the Wood House in January, years ago during a blizzard.  He was a full-grown cat that looked like a lynx out of the wild with thick fur, perfect lynx markings, and tufts in his ears.  He died on New Year’s Day 2004 at about what we guessed 24 years old. He took his usual morning spin around town…came home, laid next to the stove and died.  

My Hero Cat Rascal…

I have had so many people ask why Rascal my cat is so spoiled,,,he gets angus steak bits as a treat and has a plush heated sage green bed and Beach crunch anytime he wants…and now a Facebook page…so I decided to write Rasc’s story.

On the Fourth of July many years ago now-Mike Curtis came to my house and said he and his daughter stopped at the top of Hamilton Hill on his motorcycle to view the scene and out of nowhere came a mother cat and a bunch of little kittens someone had dumped.

He couldn’t pick them up because of being on his bike and having his daughter with him…so Mike and I jumped into my car and went up on the hill. By the time we got there we saw no cats…as the wind whipped we called and walked the field, but could not find them. Suddenly Mike’s “kitty, kitty” was answered by a faint meow…and Mike searched a hole near the road and found this itty, bitty little grey fur ball. We took it back to my house and gave it to my friend, Chris, (who was dying of Cancer) and she held it and tried to feed it while we went back to find any more that might be there.

The next day I learned that a couple stopped up on the hill and picked up the strays and had them…and we had Rascal.

Rascal became Chris’ companion night and day…even the nurses that came to visit said Rascal would come in the house and jump right up on the sofa where Chris was and watch them intently…and slap at them if Chris seemed in discomfort. After Chris’ death Rascal’s attitude toward me changed and the vet said she might not understand where Chris went when she died, and blamed me for taking her…so a progression of me spoiling her started.

Then Rascal became attached and extremely bossy to me…an alpha female that I refer to as “Mr. Cat” sometimes.

In December many years ago I became ill with the flu, caught it no doubt at the college where I had been using the computer. I was staying between Syracuse and my families house that I was cleaning and fixing (since my parents had both died) and Eaton. I laid down that night and had only the wood stove for heat…was very sick…did not wake up to stoke the wood stove and the temperature bottomed out somewhere in the below 20’s…all I remember is PAIN…Rascal had been scratching my face and chest…digging trying to wake me up (I was bleeding. ) I remember not being able to function, and to this day I have no idea how as I was shoeless, I got Rascal and myself to my car and turned on the heat…I was confused…shaking and my feet were quite frozen, but somehow I made it to Syracuse and the heated house there…My feet are still quite bad today…but the fact is Rascal SAVED MY LIFE and hers.

Today she sleeps next to me for the most part…and should the house dip to 59-60 degrees she wakes me up…relentless in her efforts.

So I spoil her and put up with her bad attitude…but somehow everyone likes her spunk and single mindedness…and the truth be known they spoil her with little treats and gifts too..

Jock a very famous cat!

Winston Churchill was supposed to come to speak at a family reunion in Syracuse once, but had to turn back because of the presence of U Boats…he did send a telegram to the family group assembled…a piece of history I learned from the Wood-Eaton sisters who visited me years back in Eaton. They were relatives and were to be at the reunion and remembered the trip. They had come to Eaton to visit their great grandfather Allen Nelson Wood’s house, the house I live in. Isn’t it strange how life is full of so much serendipity?

Mr. Wood was named Allen Nelson Wood…Nelson for Lord Nelson a hero his family honored with the name for many generations…and then suddenly my gray cat Rascal jumped in my lap…hint…one of Winston Churchill’s most famous cat’s (grey) was named Nelson to honor Lord Nelson his orange cat Jock!

Churchill was a cat lover, actually an animal lover. Winston and his wife, Clementine, signed their love letters to each other with little drawn pictures…he a dog (Pug) she his cat…and their daughter the PK or puppy-kitten.

His cat stories are famous and many can still picture him speaking with a drink in one hand and the grey cat next to him. One story I love is…after one of his famous speeches (he had a lisp as well as drank) a woman MP in Parliament said, “Sir, you are drunk?” His replay was “Madame that may be true, but in the morning I shall be sober whereas you will still be ugly!”

His favorite cat in later life was a ginger-marmalade colored cat he called “Jock”, named after Sir John Coville his secretary who gave it to him. Churchill loved the color and the cat so much that after giving his home Chartwell to the National Trust…he stated in his will that it should always have a ginger colored cat in residence…and to this day it does…and always named appropriately “Jock”.

Tom a Hero Cat, and the Crimean War, all on another cold Sunday!

Well it is Sunday again, it is freezing cold again, and they are predicting snow…AGAIN! May is coming in like a lion…but could it go out like a lamb?

So I am sitting here thinking about getting my Sunday blog up and wondering what in the world to blog about that might be a bit uplifting, unusual, different. Nothing came to me. Sure I had tons of stuff to bitch about as usual…but uplifting….hmmm.

Just then the little Tommy cat came bounding in the door…I had just named him after a very famous cat Sevastopol Tom or Crimean Tom a British Hero! So I decided that for my blog I would tell the story of Tom…the only hero cat I know who is in a Military Museum…STUFFED!

During the Crimean War in 1854 after a siege at Sevastopol, a port in Crimea, the British after successfully forcing the surrender or desertion by the Russian Army landed in a place they found totally devastated. The inhabitants and the Brits were left starving, as well as freezing in the frigid Crimean winter. They all knew it would be a long while before supplies could come, so men and stray animals were left to scrounge for food.

At one point, men noticed a sleek and well-fed cat that became very friendly with them…they wondered about him? One day they followed him to the wharf area where he disappeared under some rubble. Curious, they began to dig and there under the rubble was a Russian stash of food that had been placed there and hidden for their soldiers. Most of the food was good there was also clean water and…Tom got to eat the mice! (Why he was so well fed and sleek.)

Captain William Gair of the 6th Dragoon Guards (the Carabiniers) and his men eventually followed him to other hidden supply locations finding food that saved their lives. Gair and his men officially adopted him as their mascot…naming him Crimean Tom.

When it came time to return to England, unwilling to leave him behind, they somehow secreted Tom to England with them. The cat was honored many times and died a well taken care of cat a year later.

Since he was of “heroic” stature, Tom was stuffed and mounted and today gazes at visitors from a display at the Royal United Service Institution Museum…where he is remembered for his service to the armed forces of England!

So there, a tidbit of history…and a cat you can adopt a cat and name it for a hero cat called “Crimean Tom!!

A Hero Cat Named Faith

Faith

So it’s Sunday Blog time again…on a cold and snowy morning in Eaton I have been working on a Facebook page in my efforts for some strays that have been dropped at my door.

So this morning when I settled into my usual position on the sofa trying to think of something “blog-able” to write about…one of the cats that I have not named showed up. So I took that as an inspirational sign and decided to search for the perfect name for her.

I humorously thought if “Old Possum’s Book of Cats” and the theory that cats have the name we give them…and they have their own “cat” name, and I wondered what hers would be.

The cat I was naming was a stoic as well as a great mother cat. She was also interested in what was going on all of the time. She would often come forward and listen intently to wha I told her. She was attentive and even watched another mother’s kittens. So…I goggled…cat names. One search brought up a story on a cat named Faith! She was called “the famous cat of London”…hmmm…So I was once again off on another “history quest”.

Seems Faith was a stray that was found and taken in by the rector of St. Augustine & St. Faith’s Episcopal Church in London about 1936. The cat loved the Rector, Father Henry Ross, and would attend every service sitting at his feet when he preached or sit next to him when he sat in a pew. It was said that she attended every service at the church. Named Faith, she became like the mascot of the church throughout the horrible times in London…times of fire and bombing brought on by the War with Germany.

In September of 1940, she gave birth to just one kitten that was named “Panda” because of its black and white colorings. All the church members celebrated Panda’s arrival…in his honor the churches choir sang “All Things Bright and Beautiful” at the Sunday service.

The “Battle of London” was on and for some reason Faith insisted on taking herself and her kitten Panda to the basement of the church. Father Ross tried to dissuade her…but she continually removed the kitten from her basket and would take it to the basement area. So after a number of attempts back and forth, he finally gave up and moved her basket to the cold dark basement area she chose.

A few days later on the night of September 9th, the German bombing of London struck St. Augustine’s rendering it a mass of rubble. The following morning the air raid and civil workers asked the Rector if any people were in the church at the time…no…but he remembered Faith and went into the burning rubble, down to the basement where Faith was found meowing for help, laying over the top of her baby…Panda. It is said that just a short time later, just after her rescue, the entire building collapsed into the basement where the cat had hidden.

Faith’s story spread everywhere, even to the United States…to become part of the inspirational testament to the steadfastness of the Londoners and all who heroically survived the fire and bombing. Faith became a star and symbol of Londoners heroics!

For her act of sheltering her kitten and her savvy she was awarded the Dickens Medal in Silver in London, and a medal from the Greenwich Village Humane Society of New York…and so in her honor I named one of my stray cats “Faith”.

Last Weeks Blog Cats, Cats, Cats

This has been another year of trying to find homes for strays that have shown up in the winter with their young in our area. I know the only way to stop this is to educate the public on getting their animals neutered or spayed, but How!

Most of these cats are just drop offs that people can’t take care of…many times because they moved and other times because they haven’t the money to take care of them after getting them.

Getting a cat “fixed” costs a fortune and more than most poor families can pay. Another hard point to make is these cats are not feral and struggle to survive with their young. These cats who just have kittens and stay close to where they can find food. Feral cats or barn cats also need to be fixed or one years population would multiply expeditiously…programs or vets that will fix or take strays or feral cats is hard to find.

There is a difference between a community cat that stays in one area and is friendly with the area cats roam from place to place for food and/or shelter. What is really needed is a way to educate the public and the “powers that be” on the importance of programs to address these issues.

Families who take in a kitten for their kids need to understand the cost of veterinary care. Evan a local farm vet has to charge for services and medicines…an Animal Hospital of any area charges in excess of $300 plus for such a service.

Our little community group has formed a not for profit to try and raise not only awareness of the problems in rural and poor areas but also raise funds to continue our quest to educate the public and connect them with programs and to raise funds.