Lynea Lattanzio is a self-proclaimed “ultimate cat lady.”

Lattanzio founded Cat House on The Kings in 1992, and ran it solo for years, even selling her wedding ring to keep it going. Now, the sanctuary has outside funding (it currently costs $1.6 million a year to run) and employs seven veterinary technicians as well as an army of cat-loving volunteers.

 

 

When she was first starting out, she lived in the big main house. But with 60 cats in her bedroom, not to mention dogs, she decided that was too much; “there wasn’t room for me anymore.”

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The sheer volume of cat forced Lattanzio into a mobile home on the property.

 

“I went from a 4,200-square-foot, five-bedroom home with a pool and a wet bar and a view of the river to a 1,600-, 1,800-square-foot mobile home with a view of a rusty metal shed,” she says. “I’ve come up in the world.”

Of course, even that home is full of cats (and a few dogs). They sleep on benches, eat on tables and wander around the carpeted floors. They even mill about on the long driveway leading to her property, sunning themselves on the asphalt.