1880s USA: Cat on Transcontinental Train

March 28, 2024 8:05 AM

Seeking nonfiction narrative of rail travel with a cat across the United States, heading east or west, in the 1880s.

Transcontinental US and Canadian rail travel has a robust literature--there's fiction on cat-travelers, but I'm having a hard time getting a handle on how to search for reports by people who traveled on early trains from or to California with a cat. Search strategies, please--seems it might be a special collections find, maybe letter or series of letters?

posted by xaryts to Pets & Animals (3 answers total)

Best answer: Your question reminded me of TS Elliot's Skimbleshanks the Railway Cat - which was written about a British, fictional night train resident cat around 1940 (around about the time that cat litter was invented). The UK records many cats that inhabit particular stations - and this article from Illinois indicates this was also the case on American railroads. So the idea of there being resident cats on trains which could have been useful for vermin control - is certainly out there. The Smitshsonian Magazine has an article about the history of travel with cats: lots of mentions of ship cats but none of train journeys. Likewise no mention of cats in this article on what it was like to ride the Transcontinental Railroad - or this documentary (that I have seen so far) but no doubt, if you were in Pullman class, one would be accommodated.
posted by rongorongo at 12:24 PM on March 28 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Hmm, this is a pretty tough one. I found two interesting if slightly peripheral references;

#1. Amusing story of a stowaway cat on a train

#2. Discussion of transporting animals via railway. It specifically discusses horses and dogs. The specifically relevant point here, is that dogs are normally supposed to go into a kennel in the luggage car. But they are finding that people vastly prefer to hide their beloved small dogs/lap dogs covered in a basket and keep the pet with them rather than placing it in the luggage car. This is how I would imagine people transporting a beloved cat.

Also it mentions that more wealthy people might get their own private compartment and could keep their dog with them in that more private space. I would imagine this is another way people might travel with a cat, too.

The RailFans history of animals on railroads makes no mention whatsoever of cats, or pet transport in general, in the 1900s.

The PetTravel.com history of pet travel mentions something that is quite relevant:

Up until the late 1980's, only the wealthy traveled with their pets, and only a few upper end hotels catered to them. Travel was primarily by automobile, or, in some cases, by private rail cars.

So that brings up a fourth way pet cats may have traveled: With the ultra-wealthy in a private rail car.

(The first three ways, in case you missed them, were #1. Stowed away/hiding somewhere on the train, #2. Smuggled with the passenger closed and disguised in a basket, and #3. Traveling with the passenger in a private compartment.)

Personally I think this is by far the most likely way a cat would have traveled long distances by rail in the 1900s. The ultra wealthy and people like railroad barons had their own private rail cars and part of the appeal was that it was like a home away from home and they could travel with all the comforts. If some ultra wealthy person happened to have a beloved cat, then they you go.

I can't find any specific references to private rail cars carrying cats, but it would be a fruitful area to research in more detail.

Here are some generic references to private rail cars to get you started: Wikipedia, Curbed, Henry Ford, Quora, 20th Century, modern private rail car whose owner lives in the car with a dog and a cat.

I happened to read recently of one super-rich guy in the 1900s, John Insley Blair, who routinely lived in his private rail car. It's easy to imagine him - or more likely in this time period, his wife or daughter - traveling with a cat in that car.

FYI Chessie the Kitten was mascot/logo of the Chesapeake & Ohio RR - though I don't believe they were promoting or even particularly allowing transport of kittens per se.

And here is one pretty solid hit: Everybody's Cat Book by Dorothy Champion (1909) has a whole chapter on "Travelling", page 57. It covers everything from how to build and line a suitable cat transport container to exactly what to write on it in case of shipping ("Valuable Livestock - Rush!" and never "Live Cat!").

This should give you some pretty solid practical descriptions of how cats were transported, including by rail, from at least close to the time you're looking at. Also you might try searching for other books generally about the care and handling of cats from the time period and place of interest. As this example shows, traveling with the animal is likely to be one topic covered, and this might give you more specifics to think about.
posted by flug at 2:35 PM on March 28 [6 favorites]

There are no cats involved, but you might enjoy reading Mailing May. This is a children's book based on the true story of a family who mailed their daughter via parcel post to visit her grandmother during the summer. I believe it takes place in the 1890s in the Pacific Northwest. The postal service had just started a service that allowed the mailing of live animals. In the case of the story, the girl was sent as a load of chicks, and she spent the train ride with her uncle, who worked for the railroad. It's a delightful little window back to that time.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 10:23 AM on March 29 [2 favorites]