In the mid 1930s, Engine Company 203 in Brooklyn had a veteran cat-saving fire dog that rescued several felines during his long career. For his heroics, “Nipper” received four commendations.
Nipper was not the only cat-saving fire dog who received rewards. A few years before this popular dog made his saves, Pansy of Engine Company 225 on Liberty Avenue in Brooklyn was rewarded for making her first rescue in May 1931—she raced into a burning building and chased out a cat.
Although Pansy officially belonged to Police Emergency Squad 14 attached to the Liberty Avenue police station (the men had found her almost dead the previous summer and used an oxygen tank to revive her), the dog was a fire buff who answered all alarms with the nearby firehouse.
Following the cat rescue, Special Agent George J. Salzer of the S.P.C.A. presented Engine 255 Captain John H. Doherty with a free license for Pansy. The men told the press, “When there are more and better rescues to be made, Pansy will make them.”
Another cat-saving fire dog was Happy, who was attached to Engine 36 on Park Avenue two decades earlier.
On February 26, 1910, the East Harlem company responded to a fire in an apartment on the top floor of a tenement building at 2162 Fifth Avenue. During the fire, which was caused by an overturned oil lamp, Happy ran into the building with the firemen. He seized a Maltese cat by the nape of its neck and carried it outside.
About five hundred people, kept back by the reserves of the West 126th Street police station, cheered when the dog placed the cat on the sidewalk. According to the men, the cat had protested vigorously at first, and even scratched Happy on the nose, but the dog overlooked this indignity as he carried out his duties.
Back at headquarters, Happy reportedly refused to confirm or deny this part of the story. The cat did not confirm or deny overturning the lamp that started the fire.
