The Boxing Cats (Prof. Welton's)

The Boxing Cats (Prof. Welton's)
The entire film
Directed by	William K.L. Dickson William Heise
Starring	Henry Welton and two of his cats
Production company	Edison Manufacturing Company
Release date	1894 (1894)
Running time	20 seconds at 27 fps[1]
Country	United States
Language	Silent film

The Boxing Cats (Prof. Welton's), or simply Boxing Cats,^[2] is an 1894 American short silent film directed by William K.L. Dickson and William Heise, and starring Henry Welton. It depicts a boxing match between two cats, each wearing a pair of boxing gloves.^[1] The two cats were members of Welton's touring "cat circus",^[3][4] which reportedly also featured cats riding bicycles.^[5]

The Boxing Cats was filmed in Thomas Edison's Black Maria studio in West Orange, New Jersey, on 35 mm.^[1] The film has been described as a precursor to cat videos popular on the Internet.^[2][5]

See also

• Men Boxing, an 1891 film also directed by Dickson and Heise

References

1. "The boxing cats (Prof. Welton's)". LoC.gov. Library of Congress. Retrieved September 16, 2021.
2. Waters, Michael (June 19, 2017). "This Feline Boxing Match From 1894 Is a Precursor to the Cat Video". Atlas Obscura. Retrieved September 16, 2021.
3. Florin, Bo; de Klerk, Nico; Vonderau, Patrick, eds. (2017). Films that Sell: Moving Pictures and Advertising. British Film Institute. ISBN 978-1844578924.
4. Gray, Frank (2019). The Brighton School and the Birth of British Film. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-3030175047.
5. Gutoskey, Ellen (August 17, 2019). "This Caturday, Watch Two Kitties Duke It Out in the World's Oldest Cat 'Video'". Mental Floss. Retrieved September 16, 2021.

Further reading

• Dessem, Matthew (July 7, 2018). "Anatomy of a Scene: The Part of "The Boxing Cats (Prof. Welton's)" Where the Cats Are Boxing". Slate. Retrieved September 16, 2021.

External links

• The Boxing Cats (Prof. Welton's) at IMDb
• The Boxing Cats (Prof. Welton's) at the Library of Congress