Wednesday, November 07, 2007

St. Louis Zoo #4


Scan000010423, originally uploaded by bucklesw1.

Posted by Buckles at 11/07/2007 05:53:00 AM

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

In 1953 I was a Freshman at Wasington University in St Louis. The University was not far from Forest Park, the giant park which included Zoo, "Jewell Box" with its botanitical, Lakes and The large Amusement Park to its south edge.

The elephant, monkey and seal shows were free and went daily. They caused me to miss a lot of classes. All excellent as I recall and unique. These were extremely popular as you would imagine and were almost always full.

Same time the zoo had a giant gorilla in a fresh air cage who loved to sit in corner until all viewers were right next to his shallow pond on the front of the cage and then unexpectantly race to the pond and leap in on his back and splash one hundred or so visitors. I thought he sort of laughed at everyone then retired to his corner to await the next bunch of suckers.

I guess Marlin Perkins was director of zoo at time. It was a hell of a place giving away entertainment every day in great quanity which today any single of the acts whould be considered rare.

Sure made me and a lot of other people happy...Paul Ingrassia

07 November, 2007 10:48
Buckles said...

I showed the nearby Arena many times, mostly the Police Circus.
I always found time to stroll over to the zoo and it was there I saw my first sea elephant. He was awesome.

07 November, 2007 11:39
24-HOUR-MAN said...

We were in the Monkey house at Cyenne Mtn. Zoo and as I turned and walked away from a corner cage my back became soaked, my first thought was I got peed on. I stood and watched for awhile, the water in each cage was supplied by pipe barely sticking up from the floor with water barely bubbling out of it. every time some one would walk away , one monkey would go over, put the heel of his hand over the pipe and spray them.

07 November, 2007 23:07
Lion Den said...

The gorilla that Paul mentions was Phil the Gorilla, a very popular character in St. Louis in those days. When he died, the zoo mounted him and he can still be seen in a glass case. When I started as a keeper/trainer there, an old-timer showed me a photo of him (the keeper) walking Phil through the zoo grounds on a leash. I couldn't believe it because Phil was full grown at the time and he was a particularly ornery male gorilla anyway. It took me a bit before I realized that Phil had the same pose as he does today . . . you see, one day they'd taken his mounted body out for dusting and decided to pose for a few photos out on the sidewalk.

11 November, 2007 11:12
Anonymous said...

The Chimp Act shown is Greg and Carol Lille in 1977. Mike Kostial, the chimp trainer from the late 40's, died in late August of 1976. There was a debate about continuing the Chimp Show or not. Mike was a hard act to follow and govt. regulations and all would have been good reasons to end the show. The public loved the show and Doug Howadel (Zoo Friends Pres. and later co-owner of the CB-CB Circus) found Greg and Carol at the Japanese Deer Park in CA. They were at the Zoo until 1981. That was the end of the Chimp Show. In 1982 and 83 I had two chimps in the Sea Lion Show for a short routine. The Zoo would shortly open a new Ape House and I gladly got out of monkey business.

Paul, you saw the shows in their "golden era". Floyd Smith with his original elephant group, Jules Jacot's big cage act, and Mike Kostial with 15 chimps and 4 ponies. Buckles, I guess you saw Moby Dick II, the Northern elephant seal. He held the longevity record of 14 years on the Zoo's Seal Basin.

11 November, 2007 13:52

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