old cat photo

Happy

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Pam’s Pictorama photo post:  On the back of this photo postcard, very faded and in barely visible script it says, This is “Happy” the pet of the family taking a piece of bread. Some of you may remember another photo postcard post with a cat named Happy Hooligan – Happy clearly a good name for a cat at the turn-of-the-century.  I am a real sucker for tuxedo cats and Happy is no exception – he is a dead ringer for at least two of mine from days gone by.  (RIP Roscoe and Zippy!) As handsome as Happy is, nothing takes center stage entirely away from that woman’s hat.  Wowzers! The hat, her sheer girth, her enjoyment of Happy, and Happy reaching up to grab the food (bread??) out of her hands – proving once again that cats haven’t changed a bit in the last 100 years – made me leap to buy this photo. (Ancient Egyptian cats were probably head butting their humans when happy and using their paws to grab a bit of food from people’s hands.) It is a satisfying scene – sunny day, the horizontal siding on the house, broken by the window – but I am vaguely mystified by the covered table outside. Was this scene and composition carefully thought out and arranged in advance? Or were we just lucky to catch them that day?

Passin’ Through

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  This card would be pretty interesting even if it was just the musicians, but I really love that it was snapped as the cat was tip toeing through.  Everyone is looking sort of like they just stepped out of a band box – oops, pun I guess. But truly, the neat straw hats, her dress – this is their good bib and tucker.  No idea where this was taken and frankly, the background does look a bit down and out.  A photo postcard with no writing on the back. I would like to hear them play. I imagine it was jolly despite the frayed surroundings.

The cat is the same black and white cow print as my very first cat and best friend when I was a tiny tot, the aptly named Snoopy. A very nice cat, a bit heavier in the tum than this fine looking fellow. When I was a little older we acquired several more cats, all fairly territorial, as cats will be about their yard. Our neighbors, meanwhile, had a marmalade tabby tom of medium size – I think his name was Phil. Somehow this rather shy and peace-loving cat had negotiated a treaty with our cats whereby he could enter the yard as long as he kept moving – was allowed to cross it – without being chased. He would pass with a determined, steady and continuous stride at all hours of the day and night. He was renamed and forever known to the Butler clan as Passin’ Through. This cat has that same let me get out of here yet un-hurried look just like Passin’ Through used to have. While I am not sure, maybe there is a cat as diplomat lesson to be learned there.  If not, we still have the great photo.

White Cat and the Art of Motorcycle Riding

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Bought this photo of the cat on the motorcycle recently, and then scooped up the mate, the one with the boy, subsequently so they would stay together.  However, it is the photo of the cat alone on the bike that really appeals and gets the imagination going.  Much to my surprise, these are tiny snap shots, although with lots of information on those negs considering how nicely they blow up.  (I seem to be bad about comprehending the size of photos when I buy them online – I assume the information is there, but for some reason it seldom seems to penetrate my brain – all focused on the image.)  Don’t know much about it, but I really love this old motorcycle – barely more than a bike with an engine.  Perfect for a cat to drive…

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It brought to mind this Felix-y photo which I have already shared here (September 13,  Mysteries of Felix) which, although not a motorcycle seems to be a car of roughly the same period and, of course, another white cat.  Like the motorcycle photos those are also tiny photos – less information though and they start to disintegrate when blown up too much.

Being a non-driver myself, I cannot speak to the affinity of cats and transportation, but I suggest you watch them around your keys.

Strange Hijinxs

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Cag tree...tranquil scene

Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: The cat photo is a recent purchase and it made me dig out the other, which I have had for years and was sitting on a shelf.  I guess it is the peering between the trees thing that scratched at my brain.  I love the photo of the cat showing his (or her) tummy in the tree, although it does make you wonder what the heck they were thinking.  I mean, if the cat liked to hang out in the tree like that, that why do you need to hold him up for the photo?  Cat looks concerned – often do in photos I have noticed.  This isn’t a large photo, about 3″x5″ and you can see where it used to fit into an album. Hmmm, wonder what else was on that page.

The other one is a photo postcard and a terrific photo.  Clearly the folks are having some fun, although I suspect the specifics might be somewhat lost to us. I like the way the dog is looking one way and the man in the tree the other. Perfect reflection in the water which adds to it too. I do wonder how I even found this photo (no cat in it to turn up on a search) which brings to mind one of the things I do not like about living in the age of eBay.  Ebay is beyond wonderful for finding things you are looking for, but is somewhat limited to what you are looking for – it is not impossible, but a bit harder to stumble on things you didn’t know about, the way you might at a flea market digging through a dusty box.  I have managed, and this photo is evidence – and I am the first to say that the good outweighs the bad!

Cat in a Box

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  Introducing a nice little fellow, immortalized in his (or her) favorite spot.  Anyone who has a cat knows that they can rarely resist a box.  There is, of course, the most famous box loving cat of our day, Maru:

which proves that cats the world over are the same.

And this photo helps reminds us that it has also been ever thus. People are the same too and we have loved recording our adorable darlings in their irresistible poses first in daguerreotype, then wet plate, and endlessly on film. One imagines that the “cloud” is weighed down with digital cat images and, let’s face it, where would Youtube be without them? I worry though about the future of those digital images.  Where are tomorrow’s cat pictures of today?

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Cookie examines a recently arrived package in our apartment

Tom the Fire Boat Cat

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  I don’t have all that much to say except that I fell in LOVE with this postcard when I saw it a few weeks ago.  I will confess that I paid dearly for it (which just shows that other people saw his charm as well), but the pain of purchase is already fading in my memory  – my pleasure with the card rapidly eclipsing the cost.

September 1910, more than a hundred years ago this month, Tom, The pride of the Fire Boat, Portland, Oregon, posed for this photo. (Yep, another wonderful photo find from the great city of Portland, OR.)  What a nice fellow!  He has a great sense of readiness about him and it is easy to imagine him helping with all the necessary boat tasks.  A very solid little citizen, nicely well-fed, muscular, but not quite fat.  And he just about qualifies as a tuxedo – I have a soft spot for those, as many of you know.  I salute Tom and I hope you enjoy him too.

The Mysteries of Felix

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felix carCat ....umbrella

Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  Today’s post is of one of my favorite series of photos.  All three were purchased on Ebay, tiny photos – sort of 3 inches, smaller than reproduced here. The first two I purchased together, the third considerably later and from a different seller. They all came from Portland (which, as some of you know already, is emerging in my mind as the el dorado for whacky old photo finds) and are so similar – I have to wonder what the story might be.

They are on photo paper, but poorly printed. How can they be so similar and unrelated?  If they were some sort of multiple prints what on earth was the reason or the origin? That the first two show the Felix person holding a white cat – and that old car! – well, what more could I ask for? (Love those white Felix cat tummies too!) If memory serves I lost out on a second image of Felix on the car. These didn’t come cheap and I think I was just out of money. I have posted them on FB in the past and the image on the car either circled back to me on the internet, or there are other copies out there. I haven’t ever seen the other two any place else. These photos were the first in my acquisition of strange photos of people wearing Felix masks, and still among the ones I like very best!

We Love Our Cat Photos

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  I’ve acquired these photos over the past few months and in my mind they somehow are all of a kind.  The top two photos (which are postcards) are from the United States, the smaller one on the bottom is a small photo and although I purchased it from someone in the US it has im Garten (in garden?) written on the back.  So I guess this could be from Germany.

I love to look at photos of people with their cats in the newspaper or magazines – Sunday morning, reading the Times, me showing Kim a photo in the Real Estate section of a family, “Hey, nice looking cat, huh? Calico.”  Kim, “Uh huh.” (He nicely puts up with me.) Clearly, one immediate response to someone taking your photo is to pick up the family cat or dog. (I know I do.) These photos are nice examples of that. Hard for me to say when I think these are from, but I am leaning toward the teens and twenties. Of course the whole point is that we’ve always loved to photograph our beloved cats and to be photographed with them, and to photograph them as part of our family.  From blurry tintypes to the several hundred photos I have on my iPhone of Cookie and Blackie today, we love ’em – they are our family and we have always liked to take their picture.

For more early cat photo, you might want to check out my Happy Hooligan post. Enjoy!

Peeved Puss Postcard

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  I purchased this photo postcard in Seattle, where I remember feeling like I paid too much for it – although frankly I have no idea what that was now.  It has held a place of pride in my office for the many years since, and now I’m quite sure that it is worth whatever it was that I paid.

Clearly this trained kitty is none too thrilled performing for the camera, the big bow seems especially annoying to him or her. I love the presence of the photographer here – makes the photo.  I was just outbid on a somewhat similar one, French (this one from US) on eBay – that cat was sitting up for a cat treat though, and seemed happier about it for obvious reasons. It prompted me to share this one of a cat who is also working hard.  Hope you enjoy it!

Felix Tintype – Little Gem

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Came across this while I was doing my post earlier today and thought I would add it. While at some point I want to do something comprehensive on the Felix tintype, they are fun one at a time too.  While the quality on these is generally pretty hideous – they hang on a dark, interior wall in the apartment where they get a minimum of light so they don’t darken further – I find them utterly irresistible, and have paid dearly for most of the ones I have – about a half-dozen.  This is among the least faded images.

Among those that got away was one with a stuffed Mickey Mouse – Australian I think.  Can’t win ’em all – but always surprised I haven’t seen others of Mickey.  (I also lost out on a photo of people posing with Spark Plug the horse – Hake’s auction I think – which went for a fortune.  Again, the only one I’ve ever seen.  Where do these things go?  Were there that many more taken with Felix?)

Anyway, here we have everyone in 1925 all tricked out for their day at the British Empire Exhibition with Felix – the parasol is a nice touch!