by Janet Farricelli CPDT-KA

Created on: January 23, 2009

While a feline wearing a hot pink suit may be hard to imagine, we must admit that The Pink Panther character moving along with its jazzy theme composed by Henry Mancini, matches the role of a pretty cool cat, very well indeed. Aired on Sunday mornings in the late 1960's on NBC, the silent panther was a looked forwarded to event for both children and adults.

The pink character made its first appearance in 1963 as a secondary role following the original movie "The Pink Panther". So much success followed thereafter, that the character was given the role of a star, featuring a series on its own and ultimately becoming much more popular then the movie itself. In 1964, the Pink Panther cartoon won the "Animated Short Film" award for "The Pink Phink" launching the character to a successful career.

Still today, the Pink Panther has remained a classic and will remain so for many generations to come. The latest movies released featuring the pink-inked feline are the 2006 Pink Panther with Steve Martin assigned as Inspector Jacques Clouseau and following, the Pink Panther 2 to be aired soon in February 2009.

Felines have surely fascinated audiences for quite some time. The very first feline to have attracted audiences dates back in time, to the old 1919. Felix the cat had successfully hit the screen with its abundant mischievous acts in Feline Follies. Considered the most popular cartoon character, before the appearance of Mickey mouse, this animated character created by Otto Mesmer was also featured in the 1958 TV series Felix's Magic Bag of Tricks.

The legendary Hanna Barbera productions "Tom and Jerry" then made their first appearances in 1939 featuring the adventures of a pampered tom cat stalking and chasing a clever brown house mouse with all the subsequent havoc that ensues. The cartoon gained popularity quickly, and even though the series are speechless, one must admit that musical director Scott Bradley did indeed a great job on accompanying the cartoon with music and special sound effects like no other.

All it takes is to say "I taw I saw a puddy tat" and anybody will know it refers to Sylvester the cat. Sylvester the cat was produced in 1945 by Friz Freleng for the cartoon "Life with feathers". Following in 1947, the cat was finally paired with a yellow canary named Tweety and together they made a winning combination.

"I hate those meeces to pieces!" The Hanna Barbera production "Pixie, Dixie and Mr. Jinks" hit the screen from 1958 to 1962 as short segments introduced

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