A flood of photographs was submitted to the Evening Mail office in 1995 for its great cat competition.

The newspaper was inundated with snaps of readers' friendly felines and the newspaper printed some examples for people to peruse.

Pictures featuring a whole range of cat types and ages had been submitted. There were plenty of poses, including funny ones such as cat investigating a toilet.

"The trouble will be picking winners from this lot because there are so many top-class entries from which to choose," stated the newspaper. "There will certainly be a lot of paws for thought and plenty of head scratching before we come to our final decision."

Owners of the winning puss would win £25 worth of cat food, while five runners-up would receive a fiver's worth of food - guaranteeing a real feline feast for the lucky winners.

A week or so later The Mail reported that Monster, a cat owned by Jeff Airey from Walney, had won the competition.

Monster had had an accident involving a car. He had broken his leg and had a nasty infection but was well on the road to recovery.

Among the runners-up were: Panther from Baycliff; Penny from Marsh Street, Barrow; Skittles from Broughton; and Ben from Grey Friars Close, Barrow.

In 1994, the Mail reported that it had not been a hot tin roof that made Tabatha see sense, but the cold wet slates of Barrow Island.

After three days on the roof, a bowl of her favourite food finally enticed the four-year-old tabby cat down and back into her owner's flat.

Tabatha had got stuck after leaping out of an open window.

The fire brigade and the RSPCA were called to rescue Tabatha, but every time they got close to her, she ran away. Even a friendly scaffolder tried to rescue her.

Although human help failed, the call of nature triumphed.

And no-one was more pleased to see Tabatha than her owner Helen Anderson and Helen's boyfriend Paul Chambers.

"She was a bit shaken," said Paul of Brig Street. "But she's back."