The Great Catnip Caper

In 1904, a policeman in New York City arrested Joseph Weiss for disorderly conduct after he made intoxicating agents available to a crowd of cats. In other words, he put catnip powder on the sidewalk, and the cats appeared. A lot of cats.  

Several people in the crowd yelled to Policeman Levy to arrest Joseph Weiss for disorderly conduct. Levy did charge Weiss with disorderly conduct, “although he admitted that the man was not nearly as disorderly as the cats, which the prisoner had intoxicated with catnip powder.”

As Levy lead Weiss toward the Union Market police station at East Houston and Sheriff Streets, the cats followed right along, not about to lose sight of the man who had served up their drug of choice. They even followed the men into the station, where a doorman spent the rest of his shift searching for them in the cells and “chasing them off the roof with a mop, lest a shower of acrobatic cats disturb passersby.” (Sadly, the doorman eventually resorted to squirting the cats with a hose to get them to leave the station.)

Read more details of the story, including Weiss' explanation of his intent, at The Hatching Cat. -via Strange Company


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