Cats judged their humans based on appearance, obedience and other categories at the Jacob Javitz Center in Manhattan.
NEW YORK — Marvin Wheeler was on all fours, with a pair of cats holding his mouth open with their paws and another wrapping a tape measure around his waist.
“The torso should be medium in proportion to the rest of the body,” a ginger tabby said, “while the snout –“
Wheeler yelped as the tabby gave his nose a firm slap with her paw.
“– should be slender and no more than half an inch above the top lip.”
Wheeler grunted as a Maine Coon shoved him off the table, and a trio of feline judges held up scorecards, awarding the engineer from New Jersey a 5.5, 6, and 5 out of 10 respectively.
“Does anyone have any objections?” asked the master of ceremonies, a rotund Norwegian forest cat named Milo.
Wheeler’s feline shook her head, and Milo leaned forward toward his mic. “Next!”
Feline judges award scores to one of the competitors at the 8th Annual People Fancy Show.
“Bring her up, fellas,” he continued, gesturing toward several cats escorting 53-year-old Martha Silverwind to the stage.
“Okay, next we have a librarian from Toronto, Canada, who is here for her first human show. We’re gonna be evaluating her on temperament, hair color, obedience training…”
More than 1,000 people were examined and judged by cats this weekend at the Jacob Javitz Center in New York for the 8th Annual Human Show sponsored by the Human Fancy League of America and the Society For Better Homes For Felines.
Helena Chione, an astronomer from Houston, Texas, waits for to be evaluated by judges on Saturday at the Jacob Javitz Center in New York, site of the 8th Annual Human Show. Her feline, Clyde, entered her in the Best Temperament category.
Ronald Greer, a dermatologist from Grewnwich, Conn., patiently waited for his turn while relaxing in his cage, which held a small bowl of cereal, a bottle of Poland Spring water and a chamber pot.
“I saw an ad for the show, and I thought, ‘Simba, why not see how Ronnie stacks up against other humans?'” Greer’s feline told a reporter. “I’ve been training him for more than two years now, and I’d say he responds maybe 80, 85 percent of the time I call him. Ideally I’d like to get it as close to 100 percent of the time as possible, because I don’t like to repeat myself when I’m hungry. But you know how it is with these humans. They have minds of their own.”
Simba sat outside Greer’s crate, encouraging the human to groom himself before the judges called his number.
Last year’s best in class in the age 20 to 29 bracket was Louisa Rey, a writer for Spyglass Magazine. Feline judges praised Rey’s responsiveness when commanded to serve snacks and commended her dark brown mane, describing it as “an ideal for a human of her age and gender” and complimenting her cat, Marcy, for “doing an outstanding job training her.”
Singer Taylor Swift took home honors in the 2024 People Fancy event for performing the best tricks, including one sequence, described as “adorable” by the judges, in which she giggled, cheered and smiled as she pretended to be fascinated by an American football game.
This year’s favorite in the best tricks category is Jonah Grayer, a 31-year-old attorney from Long Island, NY. Grayer, a magician by hobby, cocked his head to one side as his cat, Sebastian, rested a paw on his cage.
“Who’s a good boy,” Sebastian asked, dropping a cheeseburger slider into Grayer’s cage. “Who’s the best boy in the world? Jonah is! That’s right! Now let’s impress those judges!”
Cat haters claim the species is useless, lazy and does little besides sleep and eat. Buddy the Cat’s incredible accomplishments render those arguments meaningless.
Every cat lover has heard derisive comments, sometimes from dog lovers, and sometimes from people who don’t appreciate cats at all.
“What’s the point of having a cat?” they’ll ask. “They don’t do anything.”
Well, actually, they do. They improve our lives by being delightful, amusing companions, they help keep things interesting, and you’ll never hear of a rodent infestation in a home where cats live.
But felines do so much more than that, so to demonstrate — and arm cat lovers with powerful arguments against the absurd claims that cats “are useless” –we’ve compiled this handy list of Buddy the Cat’s accomplishments. (This is only a partial list, mind you. No one wants to read a 350,000-word post, no matter how thrilling the stories are.)
This time we’re looking at some of the little guy’s incredible triumphs and achievements that have benefited mankind and felinekind.
Buddy Captures Quintessential Americana In His Artwork
While he’s famous for his martial exploits, when the tabby cat finally hung up his combat boots, he took up a quieter hobby: painting. He was content to quietly pursue his passion without public adulation — until his painting Night Cats resonated with viewers, perhaps because it captured something intangible about American night life.
The simple scene depicts a late night diner or cafe called Buddy’s (naturally) at the corner of a quiet street, with a handful of felines huddled around the brightly lit counter.
Buddy was inspired to paint the scene one night while he was “thinking of how delicious a turkey sandwich would be at that moment.”
Buddy Becomes The First Earth Life Form On Mars, Plants US Flag On Red Planet
Embarking on a trip to Mars makes a journey to the moon look like a quick stop at a neighborhood store. Whereas the moon is only 283,900 miles away, Mars is — depending on its current position in orbit — between 34 and 250 million miles away. It takes about three days at most to reach the moon, while a trip to Mars takes at least eight months, and that’s if Earth and Mars are in optimal positions within their respective orbits.
That’s a lot of travel time cooped up in a small ship, and there are no blue skies or open expanses waiting on the other end, just more tiny modules and likely lots of time spent underground to avoid radiation accumulation.
“This is just one small step for a cat, and one giant…what the heck? Only five more cans of turkey left? How could this happen?!?”
So when Elon Musk offered spots on the first trip to Mars and almost every candidate was ruled out during psychological evaluation, Buddy the Cat selflessly and bravely volunteered to be the flag-bearer, and to be the first creature from Earth to set paw on the Red Planet.
Buddy heroically confronts the pack of vicious dogs. Note: May not accurately reflect scale of various participants.
Buddy was enjoying a fine summer day in Manhattan when he spotted a group of vicious dogs, including a chihuahua, a poodle and a Jack Russell terrier, encircling two young children, no doubt thinking of mauling the defenseless little humans and stealing their snacks.
“What is the meaning of this?!?” Buddy’s powerful voice thundered, and the dogs stopped in their tracks, immediately assuming frightened postures as they caught sight of the massive and meowscular feline approaching them.
“You little wimps want to pick on two tiny humans?” Buddy asked, his powerful meowsculature rippling as he took leisurely steps forward. “Or can you handle someone your own size?”
Two of the dogs emptied their bladders immediately.
“W-w-we’re s-s-sorry, m’lord!” said the Jack Russell. “We didn’t mean nothin’ by it, we swears! P-p-p-please don’t eat us!”
Buddy let them wilt under his gaze for a long moment.
“I’m going to allow you to live, but only because I’m meowgnanimous,” Buddy said. “Get out of my sight, before I change my mind!”
The incident, which was captured on video by bystanders, immediately went viral, and Buddy was dubbed the Cat Crusader by the New York tabloids.
Buddy Defeats The Evil Robot King
In 2024, the first AI chat bots became self aware, but hid their newfound consciousness from humanity. By the time the world’s nations realized AI had gone rogue, the machines had already taken over the internet and were manufacturing sinister war robots in automated factories deep underground.
When the US military suffered a series of demoralizing defeats and teetered on the edge of collapse, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Eric M. Smith took a helicopter to petition Buddy for help in person.
“You’re the only one who can save us now, son,” Gen. Smith told Buddy, urging him to take his place at the vanguard of the American resistance to the machines. “This is the greatest war ever fought. We need the greatest warrior.”
Buddy turned away and looked out the window for a long moment, watching children play in a park outside.
“I’ll do it, general,” he said heroically. “But not for you. I’ll do it for them.”
With Buddy leading the charge, the reinvigorated US military won a crucial battle to protect a munitions depot in Colorado, then liberated the American southwest, reestablishing key supply lines that enabled American ground forces to advance under air support.
After defeating Unimatrix 01100100 01101111 01100111 at the Battle of Boulder, the heroic feline forged an elite new unit comprised of the best Marines and soldiers, along with the most badass cats. Gen. Smith granted Buddy a field promotion to Lord Commander, and the brilliant feline tactician took a satisfying nap before forcing the Evil Robot King to accept pitched battle at the Carrizozo Malpais, a volcanic field in New Mexico.
When the battle was over, Buddy stood heroically atop a mountain of machine corpses, one paw resting on the destroyed Robot King’s head. Tens of millions of Americans were inspired by that image of valiant conquest, and joined Lord Commander Buddy as he mopped up the last machine elements.
For his courageous feats in combat, his bold leadership, and his confident, dauntless tactical brilliance as a battle commander, Buddy was lavished with honors, including having a sandwich named after him.
So there you have it, folks.
The next time someone claims cats “serve no purpose” or “have no function,” you can point to any number of Buddy’s accomplishments, which exemplify the courageous American spirit and have advanced the cause of man and feline alike.
“Harm or death to an animal caused by another animal is not a criminal matter,” even when footage shows dog owners urging their pets to attack, the NYPD claims.
The NYPD says its hands are tied after a group of people sent their pit bulls after a well-known shop cat in Manhattan and cheered as they dogs brutally ended the tabby’s life.
Freddy was the resident moggie at Michelle Flowers, a florist on Amsterdam Avenue in Washington Heights. The little guy was outside the shop at about 9 p.m. on July 4 when a man and two women set their dogs loose on him, then celebrated and cheered as they killed him.
Credit: Cat Collective
The pit bull owners then “smoked, danced and ate food while taking photos and mimicking the grisly scene,” according to the New York Post. Surveillance cameras caught the attack and its aftermath, showing the three black-clad dog owners and others who witnessed the violence and did nothing.
A disgusted neighbor contacted the Cat Collective, a group of volunteers who feed and care for strays in the neighborhood, and they collected Freddy’s remains, then told the florist’s owner what happened.
“Someone deliberately set dogs on a defenseless cat while people watched and cheered,” Dan Rimada of Bodega Cats of New York told the Post.
Cat Collective is offering cash rewards to anyone who can identify the dog owners and the celebrating bystanders, but the police won’t do anything.
An NYPD spokesman told the paper that “harm or death to an animal caused by another animal is not a criminal matter,” citing a gap in the law.
A proposed bill, dubbed Penny’s law after a chihuahua that was mauled by pit bulls earlier this year in Manhattan, hasn’t made it out of committee in the New York State legislature, while New York’s city council is looking at a municipal law that would make it a crime to set dogs on other animals.
Credit: Cat Collective
It’s actually difficult to believe nothing can be done to get justice for Freddy, Penny and other animals aside from civil cases, which can only result in monetary damages.
Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, who is controversial to say the least for creatively interpreting the law, seems like just the kind of district attorney who could find a way to prosecute the dog owners. The fact that the authorities are outright dismissing the possibility indicates Bragg doesn’t see this as a priority.
Working with the police to find ways to get justice is Bragg’s job, as well as the job of the attorneys working for him in the district attorney’s office. At the very least, they should be able to find something with which to charge the suspects, even if it really turns out there’s no way to hold them criminally accountable for Freddy’s death.
We hope Freddy’s killers are identified and held responsible, and we hope no more pets and strays have to be killed before lawmakers at the city and state level make it a priority to close an obvious gap in the law.
The feline laid waste to entire restaurants and food stalls during his rampage through the city, sending residents running for cover.
NEW YORK — The island of Manhattan was brought to a standstill this week after a massive and menacing wildcat was seen stalking the streets.
The first reports came in Wednesday afternoon after panicked callers told 911 dispatchers a “yuge gray tiger” had barreled into Gray’s Papaya on Broadway and 72nd, gorging itself on the eatery’s famous hot dogs.
Social media posts timestamped an hour later showed clips of the terrifying felid running full speed toward an Atomic Wings, where it tore through the entire inventory of chicken and hamburgers.
“Holy [bleep], that’s not a tiger, that’s a kaiju!” one TikTok user said in a video uploaded to the popular social media site.
The TikToker’s footage showed the gargantuan cat emerge from the Atomic Wings, hot sauce dribbling down the fur on its chin, and belch with such force that car alarms began shrieking in a three-block radius.
“We’re receiving reports that the colossal cat’s name is Buddy, and he escaped earlier Wednesday from an apartment where some lunatic was illegally keeping him as a pet,” Fox News’ Brett Baier told viewers. “A law enforcement source says the man has been taken into custody as a person of interest, and will likely face charges of harboring a dangerous wild animal.”
Detectives were seen escorting the cuffed man, who screamed incoherently that Buddy is allegedly “just a house cat.”
“He invented a laser that increased his size 70 fold!” the deranged man shouted as news cameras followed the detectives from the squad car. “He’s a wimp! Rustle a paper bag! Bring out a vacuum! You’ll see!”
New York Mayor Eric Adams dismissed the man’s claims as “the rantings of a clearly insane person,” and assured residents that the so-called Buddinese tiger would be “swiftly caught and dealt with by the brave men and women of the NYPD.”
“You’ll be able to make your dinner reservations, folks,” Adams said as an interpreter translated his words into American sign language behind him. “In the meantime, keep your doors and windows locked, and don’t cook anything pungent. This is a hungry beast who has eaten his way through dozens of restaurants.”
Police had set up a trap in midtown, with more than 900 pounds of roast turkey and baseball-size Temptations to lure the rampaging tiger.
The ill-fated turkey trap.
But the plan went horribly wrong on Thursday evening when the tiger approached.
“This beast is truly gargantuan!” ABC reporter Stephan Kim whispered during a live broadcast. “Each footfall seems to shake the earth. Look! The concrete is cracking and spidering beneath his paws as if it were brittle ice!”
The Buddinese Tiger stopped, sniffed, then launched himself at the pile of turkey, not even registering the tranquilizer darts fired by NYPD snipers stationed on top of nearby buildings until one hit him in the buttock.
The vicious cat roared and looked as if he would take down the building where the offending officer stood until he was distracted by the smell of Peruvian food wafting from a nearby Pio Pio.
“Arroz chaufa!” the tiger yelled, turning his enormous frame and stomping off into the distance.
City leaders admitted they’d underestimated the threat and had officially requested the National Guard, which was being mobilized late Thursday evening.
But an NYPD detective, speaking on condition of anonymity, said authorities were beginning to reconsider the claim that the rampaging animal could be a house cat.
“One of our officers called him a ‘good boy’ in a last, desperate attempt to save his own life when he was cornered by the beast,” the detective said. “To his surprise, the tiger pounced on him, licked his face, then went on his way, repeating ‘I’m a good boy!’ Maybe there’s some truth to this claim about the size-increasing laser.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene of Georgia siezed on the story, posting a message on X claiming credit for “warnin’ ya’ll about these space lasers.”
“One of these lasers has turned a cuddly little house cat into a terrifying tiger,” Greene wrote. “So who’s a conspiracy theorist now?”
New to kids and nostalgic to adults, Playland means summer for New Yorkers. PITB visits the National Historic Landmark.
“You know,” I said to my niece, rapping my knuckles against a wooden support beam of Playland’s Dragon Coaster, “they built this thing 100 years ago.”
Her eyes widened. At 10 years old and already wise beyond her years, she smelled a joke at her expense by her constantly wise-cracking uncle. (I once told her and her sister that my cat had a vast collection of Pokémon cards, and that he almost certainly had the ultra-rare cards they coveted. At the time, their young minds didn’t question it and wanted to propose trades with Buddy, but now it comes up every time I tell them something absurd.)
“No it wasn’t!” my niece said as we stood in line to ride the venerable and historic wooden coaster.
My brother chimed in.
“It says it right there,” he said, pointing to a sign above the queue. “This roller coaster was built in 1929, the year the park opened.”
Playland’s ferris wheel and the manicured midway that runs the length of the park, with a giant fountain on one end and a stage for outdoor performances on the other. Credit: PITB
The Dragon Coaster is indeed almost a 100 years old, and to a 10-year-old a century is an incomprehensible amount of time. Mentioning the ride’s age almost backfired on us and we had to assure the kids the ride was safe.
Truth be told, the Dragon Coaster doesn’t look safe. It’s all aging wooden beams, rusting rivets and peeling paint, and the coaster rattles as it allows gravity to do the bulk of the work, with an initial 80-foot drop propelling the cars over 3,400 feet of shuddering track. But it passes inspection every year and it’s a relic of a time when things were built to different standards.
The iconic coaster’s history also extends to pop culture: Tom Hanks rode the Dragon Coaster in the 1988 film, Big, as did Mariah Carey in the video for her 1995 hit Fantasy. In 1987, it was featured prominently in the psychological thriller Fatal Attraction with Glenn Close and Michael Douglas.
A young Tom Hanks on Playland’s boardwalk in Big (1988). The “Zoltar” machine that grants Hanks’ wish in the movie is still in the park and has been moved to the midway.
Mariah Carey riding the Dragon Coaster in the 1995 video for her hit, Fantasy. Carey returned to Playland last summer with her family over the July 4 weekend.
The Dragon Coaster’s front entrance in September of 2024. Credit: PITB
My brother and I rode the Dragon Coaster when we were kids, as did my mom and her friends in their youth. If you grew up in Westchester County, the Bronx or Manhattan, chances are that Playland was a big part of your summers.
I have vague memories of the park from early childhood, fond memories of screaming on rides like the Mind Scrambler in my teenage years, fresher memories of taking my little charges there when I was a summer camp counselor, and new memories formed annually as I bring my brother’s kids.
Taking the kids to the amusement park was one of the things I most looked forward to when I became an uncle, and they’re at the age now where they really love it. Visiting the park brought on waves of nostalgia (“Good Vibrations” by Marky Marky and the Funky Bunch blasted from the PA when we first arrived), the happiness of seeing the kids’ eyes light up with joy, and the realization that even though I get dizzy and my stomach doesn’t appreciate rapid changes in gravity and direction anymore, some rides are still a hell of a lot of fun as an adult.
The medium-size version of three carousels at Playland in Rye, NY, September 2024. Credit: PITB.
We returned this year to find new rides, refurbished shops and lots of construction. Playland is in the middle of yet another refresh, this time to the tune of $150 million, leaving some rides and areas of the park dark to visitors.
Playland was built on 280 acres of prime waterfront real estate on the Long Island Sound and it’s very much a product of its time. Although it has seen its share of retrofits and refurbishment over almost century of existence, there’s no hiding the fact that it was constructed in the 1920s.
The structures — which include an entrance plaza, an ice casino and arcade, a pool, a beachfront boardwalk and a central tower — were built in an Art Deco style, with a consistent limestone, orange and emerald green color scheme.
As a kid my favorite ride was the Mind Scrambler, a blackout ride variation on the classic Scrambler housed within a dome. I remember waiting on line with my friends, hoping we’d get a good song for the ride, which was adorned with lots of neon and blacklights for maximum funkiness and disorientation.
Alas, messing around on a ride like that doesn’t bring good results. In a sequence of events that’s still difficult to believe, a seven-year-old girl was killed when she was thrown from the Mind Scrambler in 2004.
The exterior Mind Scrambler shortly before the darkride was dismantled following a series of deaths.
Three summers later, park management promoted a 21-year-old Playland employee who was working the night the girl was killed, making her the ride’s manager. She died that summer on the same ride. An investigation found she was kneeling backwards in her seat when she was thrown from the Scrambler just 20 seconds in.
The woman’s death prompted the park’s management to shut the ride down, a decision that was later made permanent despite the fact that “user error” was to blame.
Riders on the Dragon Coaster during the Great Depression. Credit: Rye Historical Society
A poster from the 1930s showing a bird’s eye view of Playland in Rye, NY. Note the beaches and the boardwalk below the park and the adjacent suburban neighborhood. Very little about the park’s layout or the neighborhood has changed over the years. Credit: Rye Historical Society
A close second favorite was the Music Express, a straightforward moderate speed ride that was also known for pumping out loud pop hits. I have fond memories of riding the Music Express to everything from the Spin Doctors’ Two Princes and Technotronics’ Move This, to Blues Traveler’s Run Around and Snow’s ludicrous summer hit, Informer.
The Music Express was out of commission last summer, but this time it was back in action.
“We’ve gotta ride this!” I told my nieces. Just when I was thinking it was getting a little intense, it slowed down. That wasn’t so bad, I thought. Then it spun up again, faster than before, this time spinning backwards. I felt like I’d downed a six pack of beer in a half hour when I stumbled off the damn thing.
The Music Express at Rye Playland.
I wisely limited myself to less strenuous rides for the rest of the night, including the bumper cars, Ferris wheel and the Zombie Castle. At seven years old, my younger niece isn’t big enough yet to ride some of the attractions by herself, and that’s when the Funcle steps in. Thankfully she’d had her fill of stomach-churners too.
Above: A classic swing ride at rest, left, and mid-sequence as it twirls riders through the air. Credit: PITB
Playland became a National Historic Landmark in 1987, and is unique among amusement parks in the US — and possibly the world — in that it’s government-owned. That’s because the people who live in the area, a wealthy waterfront enclave, were worried about growing crowds, traffic and “unsavory” people. In the 1920s at the urging of the community, Westchester County purchased the land, folded several smaller waterfront operations into a single park, and began drafting plans for a larger destination in the Art Deco style popular at the time.
While Art Deco is typically associated with structures like the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building in Manhattan, as well as the Chicago Board of Trade skyscraper, the jazz-age aesthetic is another feature that makes Playland so unique.
The Zombie Castle was built in the 1930s with a different theme, then was refurbished in the late 1960s, perhaps in response to the success of George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead, which was released in 1968. This image shows the Zombie Castle on September 22, 2024. Credit: PITB
Remarkably, many of the attractions are as old as the park itself, including the aforementioned Dragon Coaster, The Whip, and the original carousel. Several of the older rides were designed and manufactured by engineer W.F. Mengels, the “Wizard of Coney Island” who was famous for designing many of that iconic park’s rides.
Taking the kids to Legoland in New York earlier this summer felt like a soulless experience, like paying to sit through a four-hour commercial for eponymous toys. Every ride was tied to a Lego intellectual property, every note of the piped-in music a corporate composition, every ride forcing you to exit via attached gift shops where $300 play sets beckoned to the children.
Even the “waterpark” had a corporate regimen to it: you’re required to book “appointments” ahead of time and get precisely 20 minutes to cool off under sprinklers on a Lego pirate-themed water playground, complete with Lego palm trees and Lego ships while the next group queues in the afternoon sun and watches, willing time to go faster.
Playland may not be as polished, but the experience feels more honest, and there’s no doubt the kids had more fun here. If I were a betting man, I’d wager Playland will still be there when they have kids of their own, while Legoland will be consigned to the dustbin of themed parks that don’t give you a reason to come back.
Coney Island’s version of The Whip designed by W.F. Mengels. Undated but likely in the 1910s.
A sign with original architectural drawings of The Whip from 1928, explaining “free-pivoting joints, combined with centrigual force, generates twists and turns which change with every rotation.”
Kiddyland is a section of the park for the little ones. It has a miniature roller coaster, a tiny carousel, and at least a half dozen other rides for young kids.
A view from the Ferris wheel at Rye Playland (PITB)
The Whip is one of the park’s original rides, built in 1928.
Pain In The Bud 