GREAT BRITAIN: FEPC (Feline Branch)

"The worst case of wage discrimination in the British public service," said the Manchester Guardian. "Certain post-office workers in London are receiving weekly wages 50% greater than workers doing exactly the same job in Manchester and the North. What is perhaps even worse is the fact that there has been no wage increase for either group since September 1873." The workers whose state so roused the Guardian were cats employed to keep mice from mutilating Her Majesty's mail.

The first post-office cats were hired in 1868 when London Postmaster Frederick-Roger Jackson, worried over "very serious...