Hemingway’s 6-toed cats ride out hurricane

Entire islands have been reduced to rubble, streets have turned to rivers, cranes have buckled and more than 30 people have died. But the six-toed Hemingway cats are fine.

The 54 cats, many of them descendants of a white polydactyl cat owned by Ernest Hemingway, live at the writer’s house in Key West, Florida, which was hit hard by Hurricane Irma.

As the storm approached last week, officials ordered a full evacuation of the Florida Keys. But Jacque Sands, the general manager of the Ernest Hemingway Home and Museum, refused to leave. She had an obligation, she said, to see the property and the cats through the hurricane.

Animal lovers fretted. One of Hemingway’s granddaughters, the actress Mariel Hemingway, publicly urged Sands to move to safety. “I think you’re wonderful and an admirable person for trying to stay there and to try to save the cats and the house,” she said in a video posted by TMZ, but “this is frightening. This hurricane is a big deal.”

“Get in the car with the cats and take off,” Hemingway pleaded.

Sands did not. The cats, she said, would come inside when the barometric pressure dropped, and they and their human attendants would be safe within the 18-inch-thick limestone walls of the house.

It appears she was right: The house’s curator, Dave Gonzales, confirmed Monday that the cats, many of which have six or seven toes, were unharmed.

It was a welcome piece of good news amid the destruction stretching from Barbuda to Tampa.

Gonzales told NBC that 10 employees had stayed on site with the cats and had made it through the storm just fine. He said that the limestone had retained the air-conditioning that made the building so comfortable, and that the staff would probably accompany the cats in the house overnight once more.

After that, he said, “hopefully, things will get back to normal in Key West and we’ll enjoy our life in paradise.”

Although she is not involved in the operations of the house, and was not even sure how to get in touch with Sands as Irma approached, Hemingway said she had been “horribly nervous for everybody.”

But now that the storm has passed and all the denizens of the house are safe, she said in an interview on Monday, “I think it’s great that they cared enough to try to really protect all things Hemingway.

“I’m just glad it’s over.”