Cats are a way of uniting people who would not otherwise meet.
|
Top
Top
|
Dirigo Beth PO Box 1678 Windham, ME 04062 207-893-0499 dirigo3@earthlink.net |
Email: dirigo3@earthlink.net . . . or . . . dirigo3@earthlink.net Top
. . 
|
Top
Copyright © Beth E. Kus 1987 The State of Maine 200 years ago was particularly suited for development of the cat now known as the Maine Coon Cat. In those colonial times trade flourished with ships sailing to Europe and beyond. The return trip to England or Europe from Boston, Massachusetts was downwind to Maine, and "Downeast Maine" is an old seafaring term. When ships put into port for repair with Maine's magnificent timbers, cats jumped ship. Shipboard cats were common for rodent control and good luck. The strong sea trade in combination with family farms located near the small harbors created the perfect environment for development of the breed. The ship cats interbred with hardy harbor side cats. The family farms near the small harbors gave a good and welcoming environment. Though no one can be sure of the precise origin of the Maine Coon Cat, it is likely that those cats, the early gene pool of the Maine Coon Cat of today flourished and slowly developed the distinctive characteristics unique to the breed. Uncanny intelligence, sweet temperament, long warm coats, good size and slow maturity contributed to survival of the Maine Coon Cat. Two hundred years ago, and even now, the Maine harbor villages were isolated and the cat population was small. The gene pool of the early Maine coon Cat was not lost by interbreeding with large numbers of other domestic cats. These few early cats were nurtured and allowed to multiply until they naturally bred true to type in this magical location, with the beautiful sea, family farms and harbor side villages set in this cold northern climate. The breed could not have developed in Boston, for example, because there would have been too many other cats to dilute the gene pool. However, the Bostonian influence can be seen in the polydactyl Maine Coons that still naturally occur. The best-loved color of the Maine Coon Cat has always been the brown tabby. It is possible that the cat got its name because a farmer’s wife, watching her fluffy brown tabby, exclaimed, "Look at that cat. He looks like a big old coon!" Maine folks, long known for their sense of humor, soon began remarking to each other about their "coon cats". The name stuck. Exhibited in America's earliest cat shows as MaineCats (but known only as "coon cats" back home), the breed is now formally called the "Maine Coon Cat". Maine people invariably still call them "coon cats". Those from other states outside Maine are the only ones to call these cats "the Maines". In 1985, the Maine Coon Cat was designated the Maine State cat by act of legislature. Maine is still a source of lovely, pure, unregistered Maine Coon Cats. Some of the finest are living unobtrusively doing porch - duty or as much-loved family companions. They may never see a cat show or registration slip, but are valued and appreciated for their unique quality. Pure Maine blood in a pedigreed Maine Coon Cat is extremely rare and hard to find today. Few breeders exist who breed or have bred Maine-origin Maine cats exclusively. The breed itself is barely beyond its infancy because the registered genetic base is notably very small. The Maine Coon Cat is truly the every day cat of New England. Many still do barn-duty and many more are ordinary house pets. Through the efforts of a dedicated group of breeders in the '60's, the Maine Coon Cat has found its way back to the fancy show halls, since its heyday in the earliest cat show of America in 1895. In order to really understand the origin of the Maine Coon Cat, it is first needed to grasp the nature of the State of Maine as it has been over the past 3 centuries and continues today, an ongoing undercurrent of beauty, when separated from the signs of industrial toil and economic factors -- when visualized as it was 2 centuries ago, this vision and beauty lingers -- in the coastal villages in the salty air and in the now quiet golden fields. Family farms have virtually disappeared from existence, but the now quiet field fields are quiescent. Barns remain, such structures that reminisce days of old as much as the two hulls in the Sheepscot River. Imagine Maine's teeming clipper days. In order to really understand the origin of the Maine Coon Cat, one must visualize the unique characteristics of the State of Maine as it has been continues today. Its beauty lingers eastward to Mt. Desert Island and Cadillac Mountain in the deep and grand Penobscot of mighty tides and pointed firs. Maine lingers where winters are long and chill but the sea beacons ever fresh; the joys of hearth and home beckons ever more bright with a warmly purring, winter-hardy cats all the more treasured. Imagine old Maine teeming. boat builders hammering and sawing, clipper captains by the score called Maine ports home, and trusty schooners sailed the eastern coast, and world wide vessels of commerce. Maine's villages with salty air and inland, the short growing season, sent many of her young men to find their fortunes at sea. This is from where the Maine Coon Cat came.
Top
Blue Danube, bred by Mrs. E. R. Pierce.
Copyright © Beth E. Kus 1998
Two hundred years ago, Maine Coon cats were simply called "Maine
cats." Where and when the word "coon" was added to their name is no longer
known for sure, but it is likely a late eighteenth century addition. These
early cats were known as "Maine cats" with the name "Coon" added prior to
1865 (in publications by a celebrated Maine author of that period, whose
"coon-cat" named "Polly" grew up together with her.)
The earliest writer to describe Maine Cats was F. R. Pierce. Mrs.
Pierce, an American from the State of Maine, wrote the chapter titled "Maine
Cats" for "The Book of the Cat." This classic cat book published in England
in 1903, was primarily written by English author Frances Simpson. Mrs. Pierce
wrote the chapter on the Maine cats from her extensive personal knowledge and
experience. She included comments from her correspondence with other
nineteenth century Maine cat owners. This account and description of Maine
cats is a guide to breeders and cat lovers still, in its correct assessment of
the historical origin of the cats we now know as Maine Coon Cats.
According to Mrs. Pierce, Maine cats were plentiful well before "The Book
of the Cat" was published. In fact, they were present in Maine generations
before the Civil War, and according to her, had become plentiful in certain
areas of Maine by the 1880's.
Mrs. Pierce' first cat owned in 1861 by her brother and herself was a
Maine cat named "Captain Jenks of the Horse Marines." This cat she describes
as one of the "long-haired cats of that variety often called Maine
cats.......... their advent reaches far back beyond the memory of the oldest
inhabitant." It is clear from this comment that Mrs. Pierce had questioned
elderly relatives and friends about their Maine cats, and had listened to tales
of Maine cats in her girlhood years.
And "....I have been writing of the cats of long, long ago," authenticates
historically the presence of a recognizable type of cat, known as Maine cats,
as present in Maine well before the Civil War era in 1861; well before her own
cat "Captain Jenks of the Horse Marines."
Maine Cats in Shows - Brown Tabbies Plentiful
She writes of an acquaintance, Mr. Robinson, whose Maine cat "Richelieu"
won best in class in an 1884 cat show held in Bangor, Maine. This sets the
date that she refers to in the following paragraph describing the plentitude of
Maine cats in the time and era of the 1880's.
"At that time [of the 1884 cat show] Maine, near the coast, was rich in
fine specimens of the long-haired cats. That was before they began to sell. I
have in mind their brown tabbies."
"...They have had some extremely fine brown tabbies in Maine. .... It is one of
nature's own secrets how they keep bringing forth -- now and then, not always,
these fine types."
" ......tabbies also being well ... distributed along the coast, and for
quite a distance back, perhaps sixty miles or more; but I have not known of
their appearing to any extent in the northern portion of the State, which is
less thickly settled."
These observations provide absolute certainty that Maine cats were
established in the Maine coastal areas in the early part of the 1800's and that
they were a recognized type of cat even then. By the later decades of the
1800's, Maine cats had become plentiful, and they often won recognition in cat
shows. The brown tabby color probably dominated the breed at that time.
Maine Cats of Maritime Origin
That the early ancestors of the Maine Coon cat came to Maine via the sea
was clear to Mrs. Pierce. While still a young girl in 1869, she keenly
recalled seeing for the first time the pair of blue-eyed white little kittens
peeking out of a sailmaker's pocket. Mrs. Pierce later owned personally one of
their white offspring. "From that time on long-haired blue-eyed white kittens
sprang up in most unexpected places." Mrs. Pierce is careful to explain
"that Maine at that time was one of the largest ship-building States in the
Union, residents of the seaport towns and cities being often masters of their
own floating palaces, taking their families with them to foreign
countries,..."
She carefully explains that "pets of every variety were bought in foreign
ports to amuse the children on shipboard; otherwise, as in one case I call to
mind, the children would make pets of the live stock .... " " Therefore
.... cats ....found their way to nearly all the coast towns -- many more in the
past than at this time [prior to printing in 1903], when sailing vessels have
passed their usefulness as money-making institutions, ..."...." those [cats] we
find there now can safely be called natives."
This comment shows that the genetic base of the Maine Cat was established from
the maritime families'love of cats, and that it changed little after the demise
of the shipping industry.
Sea Captains Nurtured Cats
To Mrs. Pierce, that arrival of a pair of long-hair white kittens given to
the sailmaker by the ship's cook was remarkable, and memorable. Her girlhood
witness and observations capture and prove the careful nurturing that the early
Maine cats received. This is how this cat breed has survived the two
centuries of its heritage. She notes that these kittens "grew and were nursed
with tenderest care." When their owners obtained a perfect male to keep, the
original pair were sent to a relative. These two kittens would grow to become
part of the original gene pool of the early white Maine cats.
A second source of white Maine cats was identified as coming to Maine
also by way of the sea. The mother of a cat named Swampscott, a white Maine
cat, was described in a letter to Mrs. Pierce.
..."My cat's ... great-grandfather was brought to Rockport, Maine, from France,
he was a blue-eyed white."
Two other sea captains are mentioned by Mrs. Pierce, solidifying the
maritime influence on both the development and cherishment of the Maine cat.
In the era of 1885, Captain Condon had a fine cream whose kittens were known
for " all showing great strength, form, bone, and sinew." Captain Ryan was
personally mentioned by Mrs. Pierce as having had at one time four generations
of his line of blacks, and was particular about the homes for their kittens.
"They loved their cats like babies," she writes of Captain Ryan and his family,
"and for years looked for people suitable to give their kittens to."
The preferred location for retired or active sea captains to live was the
coastal towns and small cities along the coast of Maine. Because so many
mariners loved their ship's cats and treasured their kittens, there is a
distinct sea-salt flavor to the history and development of the Maine cat.
The educated expertise regarding the Maine cat is clear from the detail Mrs.
Pierce has passed down to us. Clearly Mrs. Pierce recognized that the Maine
cat was a product of seagoing Maine mariners' pets. She explains for us that
the Maine cat was developed primarily along the coastal areas of Maine, and
spread inland to farms only slowly as the kittens were given to relatives and
friends.
"For a long time the long-haired cats seemed to be confined mostly to the
coast towns and cities; but the giving of their best to 'their sisters and
their cousins and their aunts' have spread them inland," she writes.
Even noting colors was among her facts depicting the development of the
Maine cat. She clearly describes prevalence of color being the dominant
..."The strong colors predominate, whites, blacks, blues, orange, and creams,
tabbies also being well-divided and distributed..." Rare colors such as smoke
were located in only one out of two hundred kittens according to an agent's
reply to her letter. "Silvers and chinchillas are not common" she writes, and
these colors still are not common in the Maine Coon Cat to this present
day.
Who was Mrs. Pierce? She describes herself very briefly as keenly
interested in Maine cats from youth. "Having had this fancy from my infancy
and before it became a fashion, I took kindly to all new developments." She
describes her family as cat lovers: "Our own family circle was never complete
without one or more cats--not always long-haired, but that variety always held
the place of honour." She entered her Maine cats in shows and owned noted
winners. She visited and corresponded with fellow cat fanciers of her day.
Her accurate descriptions and assessments of various cats makes obvious her
native expertise of knowledge of the Maine cat. When describing one of "the
fine brown tabbies in Maine," she is careful with detail. 'Leo', brown
tabby, born 1884, died 1901; ... noting "colour of muzzle, length of nose, size
and shape of eyes, length of hair in the ears, and on the head."
Those carefully analyzing Ms. Pierce' insights, easily conclude that the
Maine cat was initially well developed in the earliest decades of the 1800's;
and that the early and definitive growth of the breed took place in the first
part of the 1800's. Later in that century, the additions to the breed brought
diverse color and larger size. The source of this distinct breed was clearly
the shipboard cats of the seafaring days and mariner families' pets. As the
pets were brought to the houses of the captain's families, they naturally bred
and multiplied in the coastal towns. The genetic base of the Maine cat was well
established and changed little after the demise of the shipping industry; to
repeat the comment: "those we find there now can safely be called natives, "
is most accurate for the next millenium.
The characteristics of the cat, a long-haired, good-natured variety,
fashioned by "the cool climate and long winters, with clean air full of ozone,
is what is needed to develop their best qualities, ... "Looking forward to the
future", she writes "with a few years of careful breeding for types, they would
be able to compete quite successfully in an international show."
The Maine cat has become popular. With popularity, its origins have
become blurred and sometimes forgotten. It is now called the Maine Coon Cat
and it has become recognized internationally as a show cat and pet of the
finest type. The Maine Coon Cat of today has distinct and recognizable
heritage, and its ancestry must always be tracable to cats from the State of
Maine.
Notes:
Quotations are from:
The Book of the Cat, Simpson, Chapter xxviii, by F. R. Pierce,
Published Cassell and Company Limited 1903
Top
Cat Registries:
|
Top
A special thanks goes to GeoCities for providing this community space to make this meeting possible
.
.
