Saturday, December 30, 2006

From Gary Hill #1



"Abu", "Bubbles" and me.

"I had a struggle with the Blog this morning. Wayne Jackson sent me a picture from a newspaper article showing a young male elephant "Sobik" collared to "Anna May" at Circus World. Accompanied with a picture of him today as seen in the Portland Zoo and known as "Tusko". We only had him for a few days and while there we broke him to lie down and sit on a tub, after which he could easily be led around and handled when he returned to his home at the Central Florida Zoo. Gary Hill was also later involved with this elephant.
This was to be the centerpiece of todays article but the Blog refused to accept the newspaper photo and I had to do a lot of tap dancing and back tracking." BucklesPosted by Picasa

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thats my cowboy!! Wonderful GARY. You forgot to style. Maybe you had not yet met Barbara!!

Anonymous said...

Hey Patricia, I learned how to clean my key board!!!! Leaves a funny taste in your mouth thou. More GARY, You could have been a star!

Bob Cline said...

OK Gary, Tell us about ABU and BUBBLES. What year is this? Did their names get changed? Where did they come from. Inquiring minds want to know!
Bob

24-HOUR-MAN said...

Can you have the Shaz put the Tap Dancing on the Magic Lantern????

GaryHill said...

Dutchess, I knew Barbara but I liked staying in the background working and learning from Buckles, Charlie, and Jewell.

Anonymous said...

The African "Abu" might be the same one that went back to Africa with Randel Moore, he took several back, including 2 from Charlie Gray's place "Samson" a forest elephant and "Kathy" another African.

Anonymous said...

Both these elephants were owned by The Hunt's in Grand Praire, TX. Bubbles I beleive was half owned by Dick Drake at one time. Both these elephants were at the Texas facility when I worked for the Hunt's. I had Bubbles for a summer ride season at KC Zoo and she was a pleasure to be around. I was told Wally Ross had something to do with some of her training.

GaryHill said...

Darryl, Thanks, you took the words right out of my mouth. Abu worked harness even tho there wasn't anything special to pull, but he helped me with some young Africans they had there.

Anonymous said...

Gary Johnson bought Bubbles some years back and changed her name to Miss Kitty. A good friend of mine, Jason Barr did rides with her at the Hunt's place before she was sold. Gary confirmed it when I asked him about it.

Anonymous said...

One more comment. Dan Subaitus told me that Abu was killed by a wild tusker while he was chained to a tree. He was showing me some pictures of he and Randel Moore when Dan worked in Kenya and he told me the story.