Make Time to See Winterthur's 'Pets in America'

If you enjoy pets -- and who among us does not? -- you owe it you and your family to see Winterthur's "Pets in America: The Story of Our Lives with Animals at Home," opening Saturday.


This wonderful exhibit was curated by Katherine Grier, who also wrote "Pets in America: A History," and is a professor in the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Early American Culture. She's down to earth, has plenty of her own pets (including a horse named Sipper) and has assembled an exhibit that reflects her personality.

Consider her take on kitty litter. In 1946, Edward Lowe, who sold granulated clay to absorb grease spills, realized that same clay could also be used by cats.

"When kitty litter came along, it rally changed things for cat owners," she says. "The indoor cat -- the one who never goes outside -- might not have been possible without this."

That's driving history home. "Pets in America" even has one of the original five-pound bags from the company's historical vaults on display. That's got to be a first for Winterthur.

One of Grier's favorite items -- and mine, too -- is a small amateur oil painting on black velvet (has to be another Winterthur first) of a cat named Tippy. Grier bought the painting in the '70s for $5 at a junk store in San Antonio, Texas, while she was a student. She was touched by the personal nature of the art.

"I guess because it was homemade," she says of what drew her to it. "It was not some big fancy pet portrait. Even then, I was a curator at heart." She was determined to get it into the show, and it's there.

"Pets in America" continues through Jan. 20. If Grier has one wish for the exhibit, which she's taken to other museums, it's this: "Visitors talk their way through the entire show. I'm really hoping we're going to see that phenomenon here as well." So leave that museum quiet voice behind. Talk. Have fun. Enjoy. Bring the kids.

P.S.: If you are inclined to share, take along a photo of your pet -- the exhibit has a place for pet lovers to post photos and to leave notes. "We're giving visitors an opportunity to join the exhibit," Grier says.

And don't miss the little gift shop -- filled with hundreds of pet-related items -- at the end of the exhibit. I have to get the paw print ornament balls -- black paw prints on a white ornament, or white paw prints on a red one -- for $12. So festive.