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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: These photos were an unusual purchase. Listed on eBay in two separate offerings of four photos each were these photos of this one little fellow with his cat toy. (The cat toy was advertised as Felix, but I beg to disagree. Nonetheless, we love all cat toy photos here at Pam’s Pictorama, generic or otherwise.) One set of photos, those which are less sepia-toned, are all marked At Aunt Ada’s in Lancaster, Jimmie 4 yrs. on the back. Two have a notation on the front, but those are hard to see in these scans. The others, clearly still of Jimmie and not too long before or after the Lancaster photos, are unmarked. By virtue of how I purchased them, we will assume they stayed together all this time, and it is worth noting that these photos were never glued into an album. If they were in one, which I somehow imagine they likely were, they were secured in another way.

The labeled set of photos seem pretty timeless, but the other set show these to be earlier than I might have guessed. The cloche hat probably puts it back as far as at least the 30’s, and looking at her coat, maybe the early part of that decade. Jimmie is a well dressed little guy and that is a pretty hot tricycle he has as well. I especially like the photo where he is letting kitty drive the trike.

It is, of course, Jimmie’s toy that interests me. At first I was quite convinced that it was one I bid on recently, and was very sorry to lose out on. I supply the eBay photo below. There is a more common, generic black cat toy which is very similar, made of the same oil cloth fabric and general design, that does not carry the Felix name as well. I include one of those, snatched off the internet, below.

Felix toy not in Pam’s Pictorama collection.

Toy cat, not in Pictorama collection

As I looked more closely at the toy he is holding I decided it is actually closer to this Puss ‘n Boots version I stumbled across while looking for the photo above. (The boots are a give-away!)

Puss ‘n Boots not in Pam’s Pictorama collection

I admire what these photos show to be Jimmie’s rather single-minded affection for this toy. I wouldn’t mind having that nice cat toy for my own either – maybe someday Santa or the eBay gods will deliver him to me one day.