Maggie, the elephant languishing in Anchorage

The cover story of the current Anchorage Press (February 17-23) is about Maggie, the elephant languishing in the Anchorage Zoo. It is a beautiful article, detailing her plight, giving us information on the pitiful history of elephants in captivity, and questioning the keeping of wild animals captive for human entertainment. The article, by Robert Meyerowitz, is headed "Elephant in the Room."

It opens:
"The Alaska Zoo, with its rough-hewn rails and obvious cages, feels like a throwback to a simpler time and place - say, a Boy Scout camp circa 1965 - more than it resembles modern zoos today, which often strive to seem not like zoos at all. Whether more natural habitats and invisible enclosures make captive animals happier, or simply make visitors feel better about captive animals, they're parts of one more Outside idea that's taking its time coming north.

We learn that Maggie has been in the Alaska Zoo for 21 years, and that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and many other groups feel "she ought to be able to spend her golden years in the sun, in the company of other elephants, preferably in a sanctuary."

Meyerowitz visits Maggie at the zoo. He writes:
"Rob Smith, Maggie's lead attendant, led me inside. In the winter, Maggie lives in what is essentially a huge cage inside an even bigger room, with a small, adjoining office for humans. The big room was warm, lit and steamy from hot water used for cleaning."

We learn that "Maggie is unrestrained within her cage except when she eats breakfast, for about half an hour, so zoo workers can clean in her enclosure; at those times, one of her front legs is chained to a cage bar."

We read about Maggie's personality, and then about elephants in general, such as the way they communicate at frequencies too low for humans to hear. Then we learn about their history in human captivity: in combat, zoos, early circuses and about astonishing human cruelty towards these animals.
Meyerowitz shares a description, from Martin Meredith, of a series of games in Pompey in 55 BC that "culminated with 20 elephants put in the ring against javelin-wielding African tribesman, the Gaetulians." Meredith writes, of one elephant who put up a valiant fight:

"Wounded in its feet, it crawled on its knees towards the Gaetulians, snatching their shields and tossing them into the air. Another elephant was killed by a single blow from a javelin, which struck it just below the eye. The remaining elephants then tried to escape by breaking through the iron barriers of the enclosure protecting spectators. When their attempt failed, they stood in the arena waving their trunks in desperation and trumpeting piteously."

From that shameful ancient history, we move to shameful recent history, and specifically to Maggie's:

"In the 1980s, African elephants were imperiled as never before. The trade in ivory was accelerating, and the elephants, which had been moved to game preserves, were overgrazing. The government of Zimbabwe, like some other African states, culled their herds. From 1981 to 1988, Zimbabwe slaughtered nearly 25,000 elephants, selling the ivory and other body parts. Biologists, conservationists and others protested what they said was senseless killing, but there were also conservationists who supported programs like Zimbabwe's as sound game management....

"In 1983, a Zimbabwe cull left five baby elephants watching on grassy plains as all the adults in their herds, all the elephants they'd ever known, were cut down around their ears. The five orphans were purchased by Americans and flown to the Catskill Game Farm, a private zoo in Upstate New York."

One of those orphans was then purchased by the Anchorage Zoo, as a companion for the zoos solo elephant, Annabelle. She was named Maggie.

Meyerowitz tackles the broader issue of zoos:

"Animals in a zoo fascinate me because I can see them. At the same time, I don't ever really suppose they want to be there, any more than my childhood collie really wanted us to dress him up. I just blind myself to that elephant in the room to satisfy my curiosity. I'd bet I'm not the only person at the zoo lying to myself this way, pretending that this is somehow a choice the zebra or the leopard would make. What worries me is this: Isn't saying we want zoos to remain really to say that our interest in other animals is more important than their happiness?"

He admits that meeting Maggie instilled in him some of the wonder that zoo proponents say makes zoos worthwhile. But he writes:

"I'm not sure the average zoo visitor, for whose benefit Maggie was brought here, has anything like my experience. One recent Saturday morning I went to the zoo during regular hours and went to the back, to the elephant house. It was a bitterly cold day, and the elephant house was warm. I watched as people trooped in until the gallery held about twenty folks, families with toddlers in strollers, mothers and fathers with just their eyes and the tops of their noses showing above their scarves, two Goth teen girls and several soldiers. They all stopped for a moment once they were inside and looked at Maggie, but Maggie wasn't doing anything much that morning, just standing in her enclosure, her broad rump at a 45-degree angle to the audience, her head in shadow. She was doing what I imagine she spends much of her time doing, just standing around....The visitors that cold morning noted that this was indeed an elephant, as promised, and a few read aloud from the sign above their h eads that talked about the size and shape and parts of African elephants, and the danger they face nowadays in the wild, but eventually everyone in the room ceased to pay the elephant much attention at all, which made sense, since Maggie didn't seem interested in them either. But it was cold outside. So the people lingered and soon were enveloped in their conversations, their heads turned away from the enclosure, and, except for a loud snort every now and then that punctuated their chatter about work and school and hockey practice, it was as though they had no idea they were in a room with an elephant."

You can read the whole article, and see heartbreaking photos of Maggie alone in her concrete cell at: http://www.anchoragepress.com/archives-2005/coverstoryvol14ed7.shtml OR http://tinyurl.com/6f67y

And you can write appreciative letters, making it clear that the public would like to see Maggie, after all she and her kind have suffered, released to sanctuary.

The Anchorage press takes letters at:
http://www.anchoragepress.com/feedback.shtml

You can send an appreciative note to Robert Meyerowitz at: robert [at] anchoragepress.com

A terrific resource on this issue is the website: http://www.savewildelephants.com . There is a special section about Maggie.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. If you forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts, please do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this tag line.)