HAPPY MEOW-NEVERSARY! To The First And Only Space Cat!

Forget monkeys. Forget hoomans. Forget janky Disney movies. 60 years ago this year, the French did a very French thing: they launched the first and only chatte into space ("chatte" is "cat" in French, you rube). Her name was Felicette. She was but a simple stray wandering the streets of Paris, smoking Gitanes and enjoying the occasional espresso dans les cafes. Everything changed when she was secretly recruited to serve her country by Cerma, the French space agency. Competing against 14 other cats for the honor, Madmoiselle Felicette charmed her space hoomans and was chosen to be shot into space. This was very courageous on her part, since in 1963, space travel was still quite treacherous. Several dogs and a monkey had already died during their rocket launches, so Felicitte knew there was no guarantee that she would return alive (much less in one piece). But Viva La France! Viva Le Chatte! She was up for the mission. 

Kaboom! Felicette, pictured above in her official Cerma headshot, was launched into space on October 18th in a Sputnik-type rocket ship for her lone suborbital mission, her breathing and vitals monitored by electrodes implanted in her fine feline form. There were no cameras on board the ship, so we don't necessarily know how she reacted, nor whom she might have met, but we can assume it went something like this: 

Cara and the French government kept Felicette's mission a secret from the public, but once returned safely to earth after her perilous mission, she met her adoring public, who were rightly impressed by her daring, her beauty, her unmistakable je n'est ve quoi. But Felicette's bravest act was yet to come. Several months later, scientists wanted to euthanize her and examine her brain in order to learn if it had been affected by space travel. She fearlessly consented, bringing great honor to all French chats un chattes, along with her lessers, the French people. 

Mademoiselle Felicitte has remained in every French person's heart - how could she not? - but only later did she receive proper acknowledgement. In 2020, a bronze statue of her was at last unveiled in Pioneers Hall at France's International Space University in Strasbourg - which features Felicitte posed fetchingly atop the globe - along with a plaque which acknowledges her storied place in history and her "profound contribution to space travel" as the first and only "Astrocat." Let this be a story you share with cats everywhere - especially wee kittens. If you're brave, and, yes, glamorous, you too can do more than clean your butthole or cruise the kitchen countertop. Space travel awaits, cherie!

Photo Credits: Matthew Guy, Walt Disney Productions, ISU/Photo Expression