MAY 1945

                              THAT AWARD ..

"BEST CAT IN SHOW"

A plea For more recognition of Short Hair Cats

By
L. H. FAIRCHILD M. D.
ASSOCIATE EDITOR

    In a recent issue of Cats Magazine I noticed a comment by William R. Braun which touched a tender chord in my heart. I have been striving for years to get a higher place in the sun for our short hair cats. Quoting Mr. Braun, he says, ''I'm rather touchy about the Siamese getting their just dues at shows. Every show does it the same way. They never bother to pick a 'Best Long Hair' and a 'Best Short Hair' and choose 'Best Cat' from the two. The whole proceeding goes along blithely assuming that 'Best Cat' simply has to be a Persian."
    I would go further, Mr. Braun, and say that other varieties of short hair cats also deserve their place as competitors for award of ''Best Cat.'' I know that there are judges who, though they have never raised a variety of short hair cats, greatly admire them. Yet, few have the courage to break the precedent of awarding ''Best Cat'' to one of the long haired felines.
    One of the most beautiful and perfect short hairs I ever saw was a pure black Manx named ''Black Phoebe II." She was exquisite in conformation, in the taillessness required of the breed and sound color of coat. Yet, Black Phoebe, as far as I know, never won more than best of color in her class although I believe she was good enough for any competition of ''Best Cat." It requires years of painstaking effort and careful selective breeding to produce such a cat and such effort should be rewarded.
    It has always been my argument that an All-Breed Show was one in which cats of all breeds, both long and short hair, were entered in competition to select the cat which most closely met the standard of perfection of its breed. A number of years ago when I attended one of my first shows I found that when the time came for selecting the best cat only a few were called to the stand. The judge had already awarded best of color to the various cats, Best Siamese, Best Manx, etc. But when she selected her cats for judging "Best in Show'' only certain long haired cats were on the stand.
    This was all perfectly new to me! I thumbed quickly through my book of show rules, for though I thought I knew the rules pretty well, this procedure just didn't seem fair. I approached one of the show committee members and said to her. "Will you please tell me why other cats such as the Bests in the short hair classes are not being called up for award of "Best Cat." She looked at me as though I had insulted her. The idea! Such things just were not done. She made the excuse that there was ''not enough competition among the classes of short hairs,"
    I found that I was very much alone at that time in carrying on my fight for the short hair classes. Since that time I have brought the matter before various cat clubs and have had little success in convincing them that such is a just request.
    Most fanciers agree that in the show when the long haired cats are brought up, some ONE cat which is outstanding in coat and beauty of type makes an impression on the judge and she picks that cat for ''Best in Show" regardless of the merit of others being shown. At this time the cat most likely to win is either a silver or one of the solid color long hairs.

    Regardless of their perfection I have never seen a "Best'' award go to a Brown Tabby, Red Tabby long hair or to a Manx, Siamese, Abyssinian or Domestic Short Hair. I remember reading of one or two shows in the Mid-west and East where a short hair won (in the past 12 years) but I also remember more vividly the furore which followed!
    There has been a gradual increase in the number of Siamese and other Short Hair classes in recent years. So the idea of lack of competition should not hold for shows in which these classes make up a high percentage of the cats shown. A California show in which we exhibited cats this year had 46 Siamese entered out of a total of approximately 185 felines. Siamese alone—not counting other short hair breeds! This percentage of short haired cats entered in shows may be as high in some other parts of the country. I should be interested in learning if this is true.
Why is there no serious effort on the part of our judges to select the ''BEST" from all of the cats entered?