One hundred years ago, on Jan. 30, 1923, Adrian firefighters were called to a fire at the Adrian Knitting Co.
Their effort to put out the fire was stymied, it was suggested, by a black cat.
The alarm for the fire on Michigan Avenue came in at about 3 p.m. that day. The firefighters boarded their trucks and headed across town to put out the company's blaze.
On the way, however, one of the department's two kittens, a coal black cat, had apparently curled up inside the hose reel. As the fire trucks passed the library, the kitten woke up and leaped from the truck to the pavement, right in front of the following unit.