Canine Caterer

The ''Puppy Special," a baby Austin, called every day last week. The large blue trucks with cream paneling called three times. Along Philadelphia's swank, suburban Main Line, in & around socialite Hewlett, L. I. and in Reading, Pa. they stopped at the homes of William Wallace Atterbury, William Wistar Comfort, Mrs. Isaac Clothier Jr., Cornelius Vanderbilt ("Sonny") Whitney and hundreds of others in which were 4,000 dogs, 30 cats and one raccoon. On each truck in large green letters were the words CANINE CATERING CO. above a small green Scottie. At each stop a gauntleted, high-booted young man hopped out with a package. As he walked back to the kitchen there rose a great barking & scratching. In the package was a luscious dog dinner -- fresh beef of lamb, cleaned of fat & gristle, cubed for bolting, soaked in a broth of vegetable vitamin juices, garnished with shredded lettuce or cabbage wrapped in waxed paper and served up on a papier mache platter. Son of a socialite Washington insurance broker, Leroy Goff Jr. is 30, small, light-haired, blue-eyed, fresh-cheeked, amiable, handsome. At Princeton (Class of 1926) he had the peculiar distinction of being both a Triangle Club chorus girl and a varsity letterman in lacrosse. After college he went into insurance brokerage in Philadelphia, settled in Ithan on the Main Line. He joined Merion Cricket and Union League clubs, raised dogs as a hobby. By March 1933 Mr. Goff had acquired 24 assorted dogs and lost considerable money in a flyer in the refractory business. ''How do you keep your Great Danes' coats so glossy?" a friend asked him. Mr. Goff replied, "Let me feed your dogs for a few weeks and I'll guarantee their coats will improve." With his wife's kitchen knives, his baby's weighing scales, his gardener and $15 worth of meat, he retired to his garage. The gardener helped chop the meat and Mr. Goff took it around to neighbors' kennels. Their tongues and their dogs' coats were all the advertising he needed. By last week Mr. Goff was occupying a two-story brick building in leafy Ardmore, paying 13 men & women some $250 per week to prepare and serve dog meals. He was remodeling a onetime Japanese beetle quarantine station at Oakmont for use as a wholesale plant, to be opened next week. For seven weeks he had been incorporated, with a socialite partner, as Canine Catering Co. of America, with branches established in Hewlett and Reading and others budding in Boston, Manhattan, White Plains, N. Y., Orange, N. J., Baltimore. The meat platter is only the piece de resistance of Caterer Goff's menu. The company modestly recommends its table d'hote meals: "Veterinary" consisting of beef, vitamins, vegetable, and zwiebach in a separate paper cup; "Kennel" of beef, cabbage and a Shredded Wheat--each with a helping of fish on Friday. But Caterer Goff soon discovered that no such simple fare would do for Main Line dogs. He now prints a menu from which the client may order according to his dog's tastes or his veterinarian's advice. Entrees include beef hearts (16-c- per lb.), beef liver (20-c- ), beef kidneys (19-c- ), beef head meat (12-c- ), lamb (16-c- ), lamb hearts (16-c- ), tripe (11-c- ) and tongue (21-c- ). Beverages are cod liver oil, haliveroil, lime water, goats' milk, beef broth, sour milk and special "limed milk." There are eggs, fish, vegetables & fillers. For dessert Main Line dogs may have a Large Bone (5-c- ). Other prices vary with the market. The standard platter weighs 1 lb., ordinarily sells for 12-c- or 13-c- raw and 15-c- cooked. One of them usually lasts a Sealyham or spaniel two days but a Great Dane or setter wolfs several per day. Puppies and invalids, which need more food oftener, are served daily by the "Puppy Special." The new plant at Oakmont has been made ultra-sanitary, equipped with cutting, cooking, packing, snipping and reception rooms, an office for a government meat inspector. It will send complete menus (except skimmed milk) to all branches. Caterer Goff, whose New York and Boston representatives are both in the Social Register, values his business at $100,000.

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