CHICAGO — It's apparently National Cat Day, and while cat ladies like myself need no faux holiday to celebrate our feline friends, I figured it was a great chance to highlight some of our in-depth cat reporting from over the years.
We've actually done A LOT of cat stories. Like, a surprising amount. But here are some of my personal favorites.
1. Man's Headstone Dedicated To His Cats: In 2013, our Beverly reporter Howard Ludwig caught up with Dan "The Cat Man" Chaplick, who bought his own headstone 12 years ago and covered it with etchings of his 29 cats.
Here's Dan showing off the best headstone I have ever seen. [DNAinfo/Howard Ludwig]
Chaplick operates a licensed foster home for cats from his humble, two-story house at 109th Street and Kedzie Avenue. He owns 17 cats, but he's had as many as 35 felines living in his house at once.
"There's no limit on the number of cats in the city of Chicago," Chaplick said. "Plus, my cats are treated better than most people treat their kids."
2. Meet The Cat Squad: This is my kind of #squadgoal. Over the summer, reporter Linze Rice met a group of Edgewater residents who came together to find Tiger, a cat who went missing while his owner made a brief stop in the neighborhood. Tiger's 92-year-old owner had been traveling from Iowa to Michigan to get treatment for health issues, and was heartbroken to leave Tiger to roam Chicago's streets. Fortunately, neighbors stepped up, creating a network to discuss Tiger sightings and finding the cat 20 days after he vanished.
"These people and what they did is just so incredible to me, that people are so caring and have such big hearts, that's the thing that was so incredible," the woman's daughter said. "It's amazing, I mean, nobody thought he'd be found."
Tiger was reunited with his owner thanks to some kind Northsiders. [DNAinfo/Linze Rice]
3. The Cat Cafe That Will Change Your Life: Chicago's first-ever cat cafe is currently under construction, and will soon become a massive cat and cat-person haven on the city's North Side. Tree House Humane Society's $7 million, 15,000-square-foot facility at 7225 N. Western Ave. will house the catfe, a shelter wing, adoption rooms, a pet store and an education center.
Plan to sip coffee with kittens by next summer if construction goes as planned.
LOOK AT THE CAT ROOM YOU GUYS. See more renderings of the cat paradise here.
Tree House Humane Society
4. Meet 'Trapper John,' an Expert Kitty Catcher Who Some Say Has Gone Rogue: Two years back, we profiled a man known as "Trapper John," a former Animal Care & Control worker who still drives around and picks up stray cats and drops them at shelters. Many shelters refuse to work with him - and others claim he's damaging successful feral cat colonies:
After years of suspicions, Tree House put out a flier last month with a photo of Norton and his truck ... and a stark message.
"WARNING!" it reads, "This man was recently seen trapping registered colony cats (ear-tipped & microchipped). If you find this man trapping your registered feral colony cats call 911 immediately."
... Donna Alexander, head of the county's Department of Animal and Rabies Control, said the [spay and release] program has decreased the stray cat population by 30 percent since it started five years ago — the goal of people on all sides of the issue, she said.
"Capture and killing is what we have been doing for decades," Alexander said. "It was not working."
Norton said he has to live with being "vilified" by cat lovers.
"Reverence for life does not preclude killing," he said. "I don’t like to kill anything. To alleviate suffering, sometimes it's more merciful to give it a humane death."
5. Chicago Cats, Trumped: Sorry, but I'm using this fifth slot to show off my cats. Even if you're totally sick of hearing about Donald Trump, these cat hairstyles make it sort of worth the breathless Trump news cycle.
Bea (l.) and Theodore (r.) were Trumped by DNAinfo editor Jen Sabella's wife. [DNAinfo/Jen Sabella]
Can't get enough cat stories? Us either. Here's a couple more for the road:
'Video Catnip' Empire Now Run By Edgewater Man: A man made a video that he said made cats go crazy. We saw mixed results in our super scientific test.
Award-Winning Cat Movies Get 'Side Eye' at Sundance, but Help Local Strays: River North-based filmmakers Alana Grelyak and Michael Gabriele have raised nearly $3,500 since 2013 for local cat rescue shelters through their award-winning "CATastrophes" Web series. One of their episodes won at the Catdance festival. Yes, there is a Catdance festival.
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