The birth of two male jaguar cubs put smiles on the Zoo staff faces in 1944. All went well for the first six weeks, but then for reasons unknown, the mom stopped caring for her cubs. Hungry and dirty, the brothers were taken to the Zoo’s hospital for care. After a thorough scrubbing, their first meal of ground meat, egg, and milk was gobbled with abandon. But with a full tummy at last, their natural instincts kicked in, and they became quite a handful! Veterinary hospital keeper Emily Burlingame took great pains to eventually gain their trust, so they could safely be handled. All the effort put forth to save and raise the young cats was more than worth it, however. They thrived, becoming sleek, graceful adults. Emily described them “…as tough as two boots, probably as fine a pair of cats as there is in the world!”