By Kevin Leininger

The News-Sentinel (Fort Wayne, Ind.)

FORT WAYNE, Ind. - Larry Williams was just 15 when he used some leftover school formaldehyde to embalm a grieving neighbor's cat. Some of the people in Centerville, Ind., he admits, thought it was just a bit strange.

If not for that early inspiration, however, Williams might never have started the business that has brought so much comfort to Cheri Somerville - and could do the same for people who think pets should receive in death the love they gave in life.

"I recently lost my 22-year-old cat, and it wasn't 'just a cat.' It was like a child had just died. The Bible says the Lord takes care of animals, and I do believe they have souls," said Williams, a 59-year-old Baptist minister who opened the My Best Friend Pet Mortuary on Newago Road in Fort Wayne, Ind., last month to give pet owners the kind of post-mortem closure that, until now, has been reserved for two-legged animals.

As the owner of four cats - with three more buried next to the house - I might quibble with Williams' theology. But there's no doubt he's right about some people's need to memorialize, in almost human terms, the passing of their pets. Somerville is proof.

Laying to rest

When her 16-year-old long-hair tiger cat D.D. Dickens had to be put to sleep last month following a long illness, the Fort Wayne woman considered digging a grave in the backyard. But when the frozen ground squelched that idea, she looked around for Plan B - and found it in a TV story about Williams' new enterprise.

It wasn't long before she became the pet mortuary's first client, deciding to cremate her beloved companion, whose ashes eventually may be taken out of a specially engraved pine box and sprinkled beneath a tree in her backyard.

"When I would come home, we would comfort each other. When there's just the two of you, it hurts," Somerville said of her black-and-gold feline friend. "He had a beautiful face and a quirky personality. I miss him so much, but this did bring closure."

As a funeral director for 40 years, Somerville's response comes as no surprise to Williams and co-owner John Thompson. "I've tried to tell funeral homes for years that they were missing the boat, but they didn't understand and nobody would listen to me.

Everything here is the same as it would be for a human." Part of the building is for humans, in fact, since the pet mortuary shares space - at least for now - with Williams' Midwest Cremation Society and Memorial Chapel. But there is a separate chapel set aside for animals, with posters proclaiming "Cats Rule" and "Dogs Rule" on the walls and a small viewing pad on which the "deceased" can be placed, a framed painting and ornate curtains providing just the right amount of decorum.

The basic "serenity package," which includes cremation and a framed photo, costs $175. But a full-blown funeral, which includes use of the pet chapel, costs about $500 - not including the casket. No cemetery in town buries animals yet, Williams said - but he expects that to change.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the Pet Angel Memorial Center in the Indianapolis suburb of Carmel, Ind., will begin franchising its pet funeral home business nationwide; it predicts up to 300 locations nationwide within seven years.