Eureka

"Eureka isn't purple or pink; she is white, or at least was." Said Dorothy. "It's this queer light that gives her that color". "Where's my milk?" asked the kitten, looking up into Dorothy's face. "I'm 'most starved to death! "Why Eureka, cried out Dorothy, "You can talk!" "Of course I can talk, funny isn't it?" Eureka replied. "

―Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz (1908)

Eureka is a white kitten which Dorothy Gale acquired either in Australia or in San Francisco. Dorothy named her Eureka because she found the kitten, and her Uncle Henry told her that "Eureka" means "I have found it."

History

Dorothy kept the kitten in a bird cage covered in newspaper when she traveled by train from San Francisco to Hugson's Ranch.

Eureka, along with Dorothy, Zeb Hugson, and Jim the cab-horse fell through a crack in the earth created by an earthquake and landed in the Land of the Mangaboos. It was in this kingdom that the kitten first began to talk.

The Wizard with Dorothy, Eureka on the Yellow Brick Road!

She traveled with Dorothy through the Valley of Voe, the Land of Naught, and the Den of the Dragonettes before eventually being taken with her to the Emerald City of the Land of Oz.A few days after they had arrived, one of the Wizard's Nine Tiny Piglets went missing. Since Eureka had frequently asked permission to eat one of them, she became the prime suspect and was put on trial. The accusations were proven false however, when Eureka revealed the location of the lost piglet, safe and sound. (Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz)

She later somehow became Pink, and became known as the Pink Kitten. (The Patchwork Girl of Oz)

She went missing one day, in the dungeons below Ozma's palace, and Number Nine located her with the Wizard's equipment, among other lost things. (The Wonder City of Oz)

Appearances

• Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz (first appearance)
• The Patchwork Girl of Oz (mentioned)
• The Scarecrow of Oz
• The Magic of Oz
• The Wonder City of Oz (mentioned)
• In Eric Shanower's book 'the Magic Island of Oz, Eureka is a main character.

Background

Eureka, as noted above, is a "white kitten" on her first appearance. By the time of The Patchwork Girl of Oz, though, she has become a pink kitten (Chapter 11). She is mentioned again in The Scarecrow of Oz as "Eureka the Pink Kitten" (Chapter 24). Dorothy has a "Pink Kitten" again in The Magic of Oz (Chapter 20), and a "purple kitten" in Glinda of Oz (Chapter 5); but Dorothy is not known to have had any pet kitten other than Eureka. Several authors have offered explanations for the kitten's color change.

How Eureka got to Oz is also a mystery. At the end of Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, Eureka was put on trial for eating one of the Nine Tiny Piglets. Finding herself in disgrace after the trial, she asks Dorothy to bring her back to Kansas (Chapter 20). When the Shaggy Man mentions Eureka three books later (in The Patchwork Girl of Oz), there is no explanation for how she ended up back in the Land of Oz.

Glenn Ingersoll's short story "The Piglets' Revenge or How Eureka became Pink" was printed in Oziana in 1984.

Eureka is a supporting character in Dick Martin's The Ozmapolitan of Oz (1986).

March Laumer's The Careless Kangaroo of Oz (1988) has Eureka left behind when Dorothy and her aunt and uncle move to Oz; an adventure involving Polychrome, the Shaggy Man, the Wogglebug, and Sky Island leads to the kitten's color change to pink and her return to Oz. Laumer returned to Eureka in The China Dog of Oz (1990).

Chris Dulabone offers his explanation of the color changes in his book The Colorful Kitten of Oz (1990).

David Hulan wrote his own version of Eureka's origins in Eureka in Oz (2003).

Both Oz felines, Eureka and the Glass Cat, feature prominently in Scott Dickerson's Ruggedo in Oz; Bungle even claims to be Eureka.