Vintage National Zoo

Professor RJR,  what year did James E. Cooper, owner of the Adam Forepaugh Circus, donate Dunk on the right, and Gold Dust on the left to the National Zoo?

Adam Forepaugh Circus Loaned Many Rare Animals to National Zoo in 1893

By Richard J. Reynolds, III. Bandwagon, Vol. 7, No. 1 (Jan-Feb), 1963, p. 3.

At the close of the 1893 season, the Adam Forepaugh Circus deposited a large number of animals in the National Zoological Park, Washington, D.C. In June, 1962, Sgt. Marvin L. Jones, of the United States Army, completed a project for the National Zoo which lists every species and sub species of mammal which have been exhibited at the zoo together with the date of arrival of the first example of each. It is significant that of the Forepaugh animals, deposited at the zoo on Nov. 7, 1893, no less than 23 species were the first of their kind to be exhibited in Washington, as follows:

Rhesus monkey Ceylonese toque monkey Sooty mangabey monkey Yellow baboon Guinea baboon Spotted hyena Puma Bengal tiger Cape mountain zebra Sumatran rhinoceros Wart hog Common or Nile hippopotamus

Bactrian or two-humped camel Arabian or one-humped camel Guanaco Alpaca Axis deer Eastern waterbuck Beisa oryx antelope Gemsbok antelope Tora hartebeest White tailed gnu Blackbuck antelope

The preponderance of large hoofed mammals, particularly antelopes, illustrates a difference between the circus menagerie of that day and the ones of more recent times.

It is interesting to note the great rarity of some of these animals. The curious, little, hair-covered Sumatran rhino is so scarce that experts estimate its current wild population at no more than 100 examples. It has not been exhibited in this country since World War I. 

'RICHARD, I'LL BET YOU "POPPED A NUT" IN 2001, WHEN CINCINNATI ZOO'S ANDALAS BECAME THE FIRST SUMATRAN RHINO BORN IN CAPTIVITY IN OVER 112 YEARS(1889)  :)  WHAT'S NOT TO LOVE ABOUT CAPTIVE ANIMAL HISTORY AND THE PEOPLE WHO ARE AND WERE A PART OF IT.'

The Cape mountain zebra was rather common in captivity at the turn of the century, but today it cannot be seen in any American or European zoo or circus. It has been reduced to a single small herd living in a preserve near the tip of South Africa. The same is true of another South African animal, the white tailed gnu.

The tora hartebeest from the Forepaugh collection is the only example of this particular kind of hartebeest ever shown in America. While not too rare in a wild state, the U. S. Department of Agriculture currently forbids the importation of wart hogs so that they are very rare in captivity.

The Adam Forepaugh show was always noted for its fine menagerie, and the 1893 edition was no exception.