Episode Title:
Naughty Number Nine.
Episode Description:
A Minnesota Fats-like feline pool hustler plays a game of nine-ball, with a mouse as his usual target, in the process showing multiplication by nine. It also looks at the phenomenon that any multiple of nine will have its digits add up to nine (e.g. 3 x 9 = 27, and 2 + 7 = 9). This short came out two years after the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act had prohibited cigarette advertising; it did not, however, prohibit the depiction of smoking in fiction, even in children's programming, so long as it was not a sponsored tie-in. In the short, Number Nine puffs a cigar throughout. ABC Broadcast Standards and Practices, after initially rejecting the short for this reason, relented and allowed the short to air when it accepted that the cat was a villain and would not encourage children to smoke. It remained in rotation through the rest of the series run.
