Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched The World

I knew families were suffering, that for many of these children times were hard. The parents never discussed their problems with me or anyone on staff. They probably didn’t discuss them with their closest friends. That’s not the way we are around here; we don’t talk about our personal circumstances, be they good, bad, or indifferent. But you could tell. One boy wore his old coat from the previous winter. His mother stopped wearing her makeup and, eventually, her jewelry. The boy loved Dewey; he clung to Dewey like a true friend; and his mother never stopped smiling when she saw them together. Then, around October, the boy and his mother stopped coming to the library. The family, I found out, had moved away.

That wasn’t the only boy who wore an old coat that fall, and he certainly wasn’t the only child who loved Dewey. They all wanted, even craved, his attention, so much so that they learned enough control to spend Story Hour with him. Every Tuesday morning, the murmur of excited children in the Round Room, where Story Hour was held, would be suddenly punctuated by a cry of “Dewey’s here!” A mad rush would ensue as every child in the room tried to pet Dewey at the same time.

“If you don’t settle down,” our children’s librarian, Mary Walk, would tell them, “Dewey has to go.”

A barely contained hush would fall over the room as the children took their seats, trying their best to contain their excitement. When they were relatively calm, Dewey would begin sliding between them, rubbing against each child and making them all giggle. Soon kids were grabbing at him and whispering, “Sit with me, Dewey. Sit with me.”

“Children, don’t make me warn you again.”

“Yes, Mary.” The children always called Mary Walk by her first name. She never got into the habit of Miss Mary.

Dewey, knowing he had pushed the limit, would stop wandering and curl up in the lap of one lucky child. He didn’t let a child grab him and hold him in her lap; he chose to spend time with her. And every week it was a different child.

Once he had chosen a lap, Dewey usually sat quietly for the whole hour. Unless a movie was being shown. Then he would jump on a table, curl his legs under his body, and watch the screen intently. When the credits rolled he feigned boredom and jumped down. Before the children could ask, “Where’s Dewey?” he was gone.

There was only one child Dewey couldn’t win over. She was four years old when Dewey arrived, and she came to the library every week with her mother and older brother. Her brother loved Dewey. The girl hung back as far as possible, looking tense and nervous. Her mother eventually confided in me that the girl was afraid of four-legged animals, especially cats and dogs.

What an opportunity! I knew Dewey could do for this girl what he had done for the children with cat allergies, who finally had a cat to spend time with. I suggested exposing her gently to Dewey, first by looking through the window at him and then with supervised meetings.

“This is an ideal job for our gentle, loving Dewey,” I told her mother. I was so enthusiastic, I even researched the best books to help the girl overcome her fear.

Her mother didn’t want to go that route, so instead of trying to change the girl’s feelings about cats, I accommodated her. When the girl came to the door and waved at the clerk on the front desk, we found Dewey and locked him in my office. Dewey hated being locked in my office, especially when patrons were in the library. You don’t have to do this, I could hear him howling. I know who she is! I won’t go near her!

I hated to lock him away, and I hated to miss the opportunity for Dewey to make this little girl’s life better, but what could I do? “Don’t force it, Vicki,” I told myself. “It will come.”

With that in mind I planned a low-key celebration for Dewey’s first birthday: just a cake made out of cat food for Dewey, and a normal one for the patrons. We didn’t know exactly when he was born, but Dr. Esterly had estimated he was eight weeks old when we found him, so we counted back to late November and chose the eighteenth. We found Dewey on January 18, so we figured that was his lucky day.

A week before the celebration, we put out a card for signatures. Within days there were more than a hundred. At the next Story Hour, the children colored pictures of birthday cakes. Four days before the party, we strung the pictures on a clothesline behind the circulation desk. Then the newspaper ran a story, and we started receiving birthday cards in the mail. I couldn’t believe it, people were sending birthday cards to a cat!