Rhubarb

Rhubarb: baseball term for a violent and noisy altercation. Also the name of a large, yellow cat, with maximum attitude, who has inherited the New York Loons, a professional baseball team, along with Thaddeus Whitcomb Banner’s entire fortune.

Banner was an eccentric millionaire who adopted Rhubarb because he liked the cat’s pugnacious attitude.

Eric Yaeger, Banner’s press secretary, is appointed Rhubarb’s guardian. Turns out Yaeger is one of very few people Rhubarb can stand and he finds he really has his hands full.

Convincing the New York Loons that the cat is a good luck charm and will help in winning games, is just one item on Yaeger’s list of to-dos. There is the matter of promoting the cat and the team to the public and show more the matter of dealing with Myra, Banner’s disinherited daughter. She files a lawsuit to invalidate the will and get the millions left. There is also a plot to have the cat killed for the money.

Written in 1946 by H. Allen Smith, it is a series of non-stop mad-cap actions, with a cast of zany characters. Definitely a fun read!! show less

Looks like a kid's book, but it ain't. The book is described as being about a cat who inherits a baseball team, but it's more about a PR guy having to deal with the people and business surrounding the cat. The humor holds up well for a book from the 40s, loaded with suggestive humor and screw-ball situations.