Cat Show Plans Memorial Service for Dog
By JIM FITZGERALD
Associated Press
November 10, 2005
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. - This will probably be the
first time a dog's memorial service is attended by 300 cats. A
schnauzer-Siberian husky mix named Ginny will be eulogized Nov.
19 at the Westchester Cat Show, where she was named Cat of the
Year in 1998 for her uncanny skill and bravery in finding and
rescuing endangered tabbies.
"It'll be right during the show, with the
judging going on and all the cats out there on the floor," said
Leslie Masson, a spokeswoman for the Westchester Feline Club,
which sponsors the show. "We'll call for quiet, and then a few
people will get up on stage and talk about Ginny. Her owner will
be there and talk, if he's able to, and some people from her fan
club."
Ginny died in August at age 17, after a long
career as a one-dog rescue party for cats on Long Island's South
Shore. The club says she saved hundreds of cats who were
abandoned, injured or in harm's way.
Her owner, Philip Gonzalez of Long Beach, has
written two books about Ginny and the cats she found, several of
whom moved in with him. Among the best-known rescues is the time
Ginny threw herself against a vertical pipe at a construction
site to topple it and reveal the kittens trapped inside. She
once ignored the cuts on her paws as she dug through a box full
of broken glass to find an injured cat inside.
Gonzalez, 55, said Thursday that over the
years he has tried to train other dogs to do what Ginny did, but
"They just didn't have it."
"I didn't train her," he said. "Ginny was just
magical in a way. I adopted her from a shelter, and they said
she's never been with cats before. But she just had this knack
of knowing when a cat was in trouble."
As he used to do with Ginny, Gonzalez still
goes out every night to feed stray cats in the area, with the
help of the Ginny Fund, which pays for food, medical care and
spaying or neutering.
The cats seem to miss Ginny too, he said.
"They want nothing to do with my other dogs,"
he said. "They used to come up to Ginny and rub against her,
even if I was putting food out."
The memorial service will be followed by this
year's Cat of the Year award, which is going to an actual cat —
Zoe, an 8-year-old ragdoll from Larchmont who saved her owner
from carbon monoxide poisoning.
Other cats of the year have included a cat
with a cleft palate who taught herself to hold her feeding tube
and a cat who campaigns against rules that prohibit pets in
senior housing.
Besides the memorial service, the Cat of the
Year award and the best-of-breed judging, the show features a
household pet competition, an agility contest for cats and a
book signing by Allia Zobel, author of "101 Reasons Why a Cat is
Better Than a Man."
In addition, about 80 cats from shelters will
be up for adoption.
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