Beloved two-faced cat ‘Frankenlouie’ that was only meant to live a few days dies of cancer aged 15 after setting world record (Video)

I love pets with all my heart and soul. When I lose one, it is like losing a child and I grieve long and deeply for them. I can’t help that… it is who I am. When I first saw this cat, I was shocked. Human instinct is to put down such a deformed creature. But this nurse didn’t do that. When the little kitten was brought into Tuft’s at one day old, she took it home, thinking it would die. But she wanted to give it love and caring as long as it lived. The little Janus cat lived 15 years, beating all the odds, finally succumbing to cancer. He was loved and loved right back just like any other adorable feline pet would.


Beloved: The Janus cat was set to be euthanized by a breeder in 1999, but Stevens, a vet nurse, decided to bring him home with her.

From the Daily Mail:

This cat had two faces – but only nine lives.

A feline named Frank and Louie after he was born with two faces, two mouths, two noses and three blue eyes has died at the age of 15.

The Telegram of Worcester reports that ‘Frankenlouie’ died Thursday at the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University in North Grafton.

The cat’s owner, Marty Stevens, said veterinarians believe the cause of death was cancer.

Frank and Louie made it into the 2012 edition of Guinness World Records as the longest-surviving member of a group known as Janus cats, named for a Roman god with two faces.

Janus cats almost never survive, and most have congenital defects.

They usually only live a few days.

A breeder brought the rare feline to Stevens, a vet nurse, to be euthanized in September of 1999.

However Stevens, not believing the cat would survive, decided to take him home with her and care for him.

She fed Frankenlouie using tubes in both mouths, soon realizing that only the ‘Frank’ side was connected to his esophagus.

He did, however, eat enough for two.

Stevens said her cat quickly developed a strong personality and loved to walk around her neighborhood in North Grafton.

‘He’s just so affectionate and sweet he usually wins people over,’ she told The Telegram-Gazette in 2011.

He functioned as a regular cat.

While blind in his center eye, both his outer eyes worked fine, and while he had two noses and mouths, he had only one brain.

Stevens is now understandably devastated to lose her pet of 15 years.

She said her fell quite ill around Thanksgiving and she she took him to the Tuffs University clinic.

The vet told her it was best to euthanize him, because he was in quite a lot of pain.

Stevens says once her sadness passes she wouldn’t mind looking for another Janus to bring home with her, just like she did with Frankenlouie in 1999.

‘I would love to do it again,’ she said.

I write about bad people, criminals and radicals all the time. That is easy to do – writing about a cat with two faces… that’s hard. Frankenlouie played, purred and loved his owner as any other cat would. He got the chance to have a good cat life with lots of affection and adventures. I’m glad this nurse had such a big and giving heart that she saw past the deformity into a little, innocent and loving soul that deserved to live. May Frankenlouie enjoy kitty heaven – he will be missed. Marty Stevens is an angel of mercy. I hope she finds another kitty to save and soon.

Terresa Monroe-Hamilton

Terresa Monroe-Hamilton is an editor and writer for Right Wing News. She owns and blogs at NoisyRoom.net. She is a Constitutional Conservative and NoisyRoom focuses on political and national issues of interest to the American public. Terresa is the editor at Trevor Loudon's site, New Zeal - trevorloudon.com. She also does research at KeyWiki.org. You can email Terresa here. NoisyRoom can be found on Facebook and on Twitter.

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