Part I: Buster and Topsy, the Rival Police Cat Mascots On the evening of December 6, 1911, the men of the old Eldridge Street police precinct in New York City’s Lower East Side moved into the brand-new station house occupied by the men of the old Delancey Street precinct. The large modern building at the corner of Clinton and […]
Posts Tagged ‘Cat Stories’
1911: Buster, Topsy, and Yaller, the Police Mascots of NYC’s Lower East Side, Part 1
Posted: 3rd March 2017 by The Hatching Cat in Cat MascotsTags: Cat Stories, Lower East Side, New York History, NYPD, police cats, police mascots
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1887: Punch and Chico, the Photogenic Dogs of Alice Austen That Lived Where History Was Made in Staten Island, Part I
Posted: 10th February 2017 by The Hatching Cat in Dog TailsTags: Alice Austen, Cat Stories, Clear Comfort, Dog stories, Gertrude Tate, Oswald Muller, Staten Island history
George Washington. Ben Franklin. General William Howe. Cornelius “Commodore” Vanderbilt. These are just a few of the prominent men in history who visited the 17th-century farmhouse on the banks of The Narrows in Rosebank, Staten Island, where photographer Alice Austen made history in the late 19th century. Today, this old farmhouse where Alice lived with her family […]
1886: The 10 Lives of Hero, the New York City Fire Cat of Chelsea, Part I
Posted: 26th December 2016 by The Hatching Cat in Cat Mascots, Cat StoriesTags: Cat Stories, fire cat, Forty-second Street and Grand Street Ferry, Grand Street Ferry, John Leake Norton, New York History, The Hermitage Farm
Part I of this Old New York cat tale begins in 1825 at the old Hermitage Farm on the west side of Manhattan, where a large horse car depot was built in 1864.
1888: Union Square Jim, the Mascot Cat of New York’s Union Square Theatre, II
Posted: 21st August 2016 by The Hatching Cat in Cat Mascots, Cat StoriesTags: B.F. Keith, Cat Stories, James M. Hill, Michael Sweeney, Morton House, New York History, Old New York, Union Square Theatre
Union Square Jim was a large, blue-eyed, orange tabby mascot of the old Union Square Theatre in New York City. Jim was born in the theater sometime around 1886, a year after James Hill took over as manager of the theater.
1888: Union Square Jim, the Mascot Cat of New York’s Union Square Theatre, I
Posted: 13th August 2016 by The Hatching Cat in Cat Mascots, Cat Men, Cat StoriesTags: Cat Stories, Morton House Hotel, New York History, Old New York, Sheridan Shook, Union Place Hotel, Union Square Theatre
Like most cats that became the popular mascots of New York City police stations, fire stations, hotels, and theaters in the 1800s and 1900s, Jim began his life as a vagrant cat without friends or influence. It didn’t take him long, however, to win the hearts of the managers, actors, and patrons of the old Union Square Theatre.
