Overview
Tardar Sauce (April 4, 2012 – May 14, 2019), nicknamed Grumpy Cat, was an American Internet celebrity cat. She was known for her permanently "grumpy" facial appearance, which was caused by an underbite and feline dwarfism. She came to prominence when a photograph of her was posted on September 22, 2012, on social news website Reddit by Bryan Bundesen, the brother of her owner Tabatha Bundesen. "Lolcats" and parodies created from the photograph by Reddit users became popular. She was the subject of a popular Internet meme in which humorously negative, cynical images were made from photographs of her.
As of June 3, 2023, Grumpy Cat had 8.3 million total likes on Facebook, 2.6 million followers on Instagram 1.5 million followers on Twitter and 276,000 subscribers on YouTube.
Background
Tardar Sauce was one of a litter of four kittens born to a calico mother and a blue-and-white tabby putative father at the home of her owner, Tabatha Bundesen of Morristown, Arizona. The Bundesens said that Tardar Sauce's face appeared grumpy because the feline had a form of dwarfism. Though the mother and father were described as "normal-sized domestic short-hair cats", Tardar Sauce was undersized and had hind legs that are "a bit different". Both she and her brother, Pokey, were born with "a flat face, bubble eyes, and a short tail". Although she had a "grumpy" appearance and was called "Grumpy Cat", according to the Bundesens, "Ninety-nine percent of the time she is just a regular cat."
"Meme manager" Ben Lashes represented Grumpy Cat, in addition to Keyboard Cat and Nyan Cat. In 2013, Tabatha Bundesen took a leave of absence from her job at Red Lobster to manage Grumpy Cat's schedule, while her brother Bryan Bundesen manages the Grumpy Cat website, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter accounts.
From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).