by Nathanael Hodge, on behalf of Mills Archive Trust, UKMeet Biddy who worked for Bemis Bags for 79 years.
Introduced as a company trademark in the 1880s for Bemis Bags, images of similar cats in bags were used in company products and advertising up until the 1960s. This is the original cat: her name is Biddy and she was a common sight at the St Louis Bemis Bag company factory as the champion mouser.
The story goes that she was brought into the factory by her owner, Miss Annie Fyfe, who was the forelady of the cotton department in 1882. One day Biddy was exploring an empty bag on the shop floor, and when she emerged, she struck her famous pose. She just so happened to be observed by none other than the company’s owner, Stephen Bemis, who was hit by a flash of inspiration and thus the trademark was born.
Biddy first appeared in an advertisement for the company in the 30 May 1884 issue of the Northwestern Miller, and would continue to grace its pages for years to come. The design changed over the years with Biddy getting older and the bags changing with new designs. Bemis Bags was founded in 1858 and produced machine sewn cotton and burlap bags.
To begin with millers were rather suspicious of this new method of machine stitching, expecting it to be weaker than traditional hand sewing. In response, Judson Bemis guaranteed every bag against rips – an action which paid off as the company became very successful. Bemis Company Inc existed until 2019 when they were bought by Amcor.
Unfortunately, they no longer use cats in bags in their advertising, but the recognisable trademark which for 79 years stood as a symbol of quality workmanship will go down in history in the pages of the Northwestern Miller.
