Stubbs the cat, honorary mayor of Alaska town, dies

TALKEETNA, Alaska — Stubbs the cat, mayor of a small town in Alaska, has died at age 20, the cat’s owners announced Saturday.

The town has no human mayor. The Associated Press reported that Stubbs was elected to the position in 1998 in a write-in campaign in Talkeetna, Alaska.

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Lately, the elderly cat had been keeping close to home, but in his younger years, he was known as a cat-about-town -- usually meowing up a storm at Nagley's General Store.

KTVA reported that in 2013, Stubb survived a dog attack. In 2016, he was the subject of a false report of his death.

“Stubbs lived for 20 years and 3 months. He was a trooper until the very last day of his life; meowing at us throughout the day to pet him or to come sit on the bed with him and let him snuggle and purr for hours in our lap,” the family said in a statement Saturday. “Thank you, Stubbs, for coming into our lives for the past 31 months; you are a remarkable cat and we will dearly miss you. We loved the time we were allowed to spend with you.”

According to Stubb’s owners, another kitten in might be ready to take up the mayoral mantle.

“Amazingly, Denali has the exact personality as Stubbs,” the family wrote of the kitten. “He loves the attention. He’s like a little puppy when he’s around people. We couldn’t have asked for a better understudy than Denali — he really has followed in Stubbs’ paw prints in just about everything.”

Cox Media Group