My wife has relatives in some wonderful, exotic places: Oxford, Buenos Aires, Kansas City...what? Kansas City? Exotic?. In 1994, we visited her family in Kansas City, and then did a tour of the area. Now being both flat and rectangular, the state of Kansas comes in for a great deal of abuse. But we had a wonderful time there, no really, we did, no kidding.

    There are many interesting destinations in Kansas, although you wouldn't think it. For example, in KC, there is a museum built to house a complete Mississippi riverboat found buried in a cornfield. How did it get there? The boat had sunk in the 1840's, and the river covered it with a dense layer of mud. In time, the river's course changed, leaving the boat on dry ground, but buried under an avalanche of mud. It was discovered recently, excavated and preserved. The mud provided an anaerobic environment, so nothing rotted or decayed...it's a complete time capsule of life in the 1840's. You see? Really interesting.

    Kansas has many sites like this: the world's deepest well, the world's largest steam shovel, the world's biggest kaleidoscope (made out of an old barn silo), the Dalton Bros. hideout, Dodge City, at least 4 million people related to Jesse James, etc, etc, etc. The problem is, these sites are separated by hundreds of miles, it's a huge state. So while there is a lot to see, you have to drive forever to get there. And so we drove.

    In those days, we always used to bring Tuna the Cat along with us. He's a big black cat, from a long line of big black cats. He likes traveling, and is generally an easy companion. But this trip was to be a little different. He was about to get lost.

    We were in Liberal, Kansas that day. Now, Liberal is on the opposite corner of the state from KC, so we had been traveling for several days by that time. We'd driven through Dodge City, narrowly missed being swept away by a tornado, seen many sights, and here we were, just two days left in KS. We had come to see the Mid America Air Museum. This is one of the largest air museums in the country, and it dates back to when Liberal was a WWII bomber training school. But this story isn't about the museum.

    The museum tour was self guided...my wife and I went in different directions, I finished the tour before she did. I had left Tuna in his carrier at the souvenir counter, the lady was very nice about it. (Cat lovers are the same all over the world.) I took the cat outside, and since we'd been driving awhile, I took him to an out of the way place, and let him out of his cage to stretch his legs.. He's very attached to me, and had never run away before. This time was different. He became interested in an warehouse building nearby, and was gone like a shot. Disappeared without a trace.

    My wife came out, puzzled to see me poking around in the middle of an open meadow. Needless to say, we were both very upset. He had disappeared into a pile of old air conditioning equipment, and simply could not be found.

    Liberal is not a good place for a house cat to get lost. It's in the middle of no place, a vast, flat prairie with little shelter. It's on the borderline of Oklahoma, and they say that if you stand on the borderline and look south over the OK panhandle, you can see a sign that says Welcome to Texas (that's a joke, folks). There were a few old warehouse buildings in the general vicinity, a company that supplied piping for oil wells, and the old Air Force base. No water.

    For the next 24 hours, we combed every square inch of that prairie. It must have been quite humorous to the locals watching the two New Yorkers running around those fields hunting for a cat, making the "ispus" noise: cat people know what I mean. The warehouse was inhabited by a lady and her pet pig, neither of them had seen the cat. We stopped at every nearby home and business, and were universally greeted with the same dumb joke: "Stray cat? Let me get my shotgun...". At last, with our airline tickets ready to expire, we had to go home catless, and leave the problem in the hands of the local animal control officer, Linda Lucas. She was a very dedicated officer, and I think she took a fair amount of abuse, animal control not being a prize job among Kansas cops.

    That trip home was very grim, we were so sad that our good friend was gone. It was unimaginable that this had happened, and that it had been my fault for not minding him more closely. As soon as we landed, I checked for phone messages. Sure enough, the cat had turned up. Officer Lucas had set a trap for him, and the big fella couldn't resist a bit of kibble. He was safe and sound at the local animal shelter.

    How to get him home. There were no real airplanes in regular service to Liberal...the only plane available was a tiny commuter plane that only came once or twice a week. Since it had no luggage compartment, Tuna could only fly if the pilot could be persuaded to carry him in the cabin. This didn't work out. Alternatively, a friendly truck driver could have brought him to the airport in Wichita. Time dragged as we pondered the possibilities. Finally, I decided to go back for him.

    My wife convinced the airline clerk that this was a "bereavement" flight: cat lovers are the same all over the world. I was allowed one discounted ticket to Wichita, with a stopover in KC. The rescue was in full swing. We phoned to tell them we were coming, and the shelter thought it was interesting enough to invite the press.

    I arrived in Wichita late in the afternoon, and rented a minivan for the four hour trip to Liberal. By the time I was on the road, it was pitch dark, a cloudy, moonless night on the empty prairie. I barreled on through the night towards my objective. Suddenly, there was a flashing red light behind me.

    "License and registration." I handed the officer my papers, he went back to the patrol car to do whatever it is they do when they get your papers. A few minutes later, he returned.

    "What brings you to Kansas in the middle of the night, Mr. Frank?"

    "I'm here to rescue my cat"

    "How's that?"

    I explained about the air museum, how the cat had run away for a pee, the lady and her pig,  the bad joke about shotguns, the pipe yard,  the animal control officer, and how Tuna ended up in the shelter at Liberal.

    "The newspapers will be there", I concluded.

    "There's plenty of cats around here I could let you have. Don't they have other cats in New York?"

    "I couldn't leave him with the pig." I said without thinking, he shrugged it off.

    "You were going 66 in a 55 zone, I'll let you off with a warning this time, just keep it under control."

    I pulled away into the night, cruise control nailed at 55. He turned off his headlights and went back to doing whatever cops do when they're waiting for a crime. Munching on donuts, perhaps.

    It was 1AM when I reached Liberal. I checked into a motel. I was to pick up the cat at 9AM the next morning. Before heading out the the shelter, I picked up a pan and some cat litter, and set it up in the back of the minivan. It was a long way back to Wichita, and I figured the cat should be comfortable.

    I arrived on time, and was met by Officer Lucas and Joel Warner, the director of the Southwest Kansas Humane Society. There was Tuna, big and happy in his own cage.

    "That cat's bigger than most dogs, I had to put him in that big cage." said Joel Warner.

    I laughed. "How did you manage to catch him?"

    "I figured I'd get him if I put out some food. So I baited a trap one afternoon and left it where he was last seen. ", said Officer Lucas, "Sure enough, the food was gone the next day and the trap sprung. I didn't realize how big he was. One morning, there he was, he just came right over to me. He's a good old cat. "

    The newspaper came by with a photographer, they took the whole story. I loaded Tuna into his sherpa bag and put him in the van. As soon as I got in the truck, I opened the bag so he could walk around, and use the litter box. The first bump coming out of the animal shelter upended the tray, dumping cat litter all over the cargo compartment. Tuna could not have been happier.  We made it home without further incident.

To this day, I send donations to the Southwest Kansas Humane Society. If you'd like to help, their address is:

Copyright © 2000,2005 Michael Frank. All rights reserved.