London Zoo memories are made of this

‘An amateur photographer at the zoo’ from the Graphic in 1885

The Zoological Society of London has launched the ‘History Hive’ to collect people’s memories and objects about London Zoo and Whipsnade as a way of building up to the conservation charity’s bicentenary in 2026.

The ZSL is asking the public to submit anything and everything associated with the zoos, from toys and historic tickets to letters and maps, to add to the charity’s understanding of its own history.

The objects will form part of an exhibition about the ZSL’s impact ‘not only on animal care and conservation, but on the very fabric of London and British culture’. That sounds grandiose – though the ZSL claims to have coined the words ‘zoo’ and ‘aquarium’ – but a moment’s reflection demonstrates this is no exaggeration.

As a lad growing up in Liverpool, one of my Christmas morning favourites was the Giles Annual that came from my grandparents. And one of the things I remember chuckling at were the drawings by the Daily Express cartoonist about the antics of the Chinese pandas An-An and Chi-Chi at London Zoo in the 1960s. (I recalled that recently on a recent trip to East Anglia where I saw the monument to Carl Giles in Ipswich.) Twenty years later, when driving into central London, I always tried to go round the Outer Circle of Regent’s Park and cruise slowly past the giraffe enclosure, especially if there were kids with me.

Back in 2010, one of the magazines I was keen to track down for A History of British Magazine Design was the first issue that printed a photograph as a half-tone. (This turned out to be fool’s errand – there were just so many magazines published, and how do you know you have access to all the magazines anyway, even with access to the backroom stacks at the V&A Museum and visits to the British Library?) However, I eventually identified a copy of the Graphic dated 5 September 1885. It carried a four-page supplement, ‘An amateur photographer at the zoo’ by Phil Robinson. There were 15 shots of animals in their pens by C.J. Hinxman. They were printed using blocks made by George Meisenbach, a German who had patented a half-tone process in England in 1882. One of the photographs is of eight children riding on one of the Prince of Wales’s Indian elephants, named Kafr Kali (no mention of the famous Jumbo). The future Edward VII had been given two young elephants during his tour of India in 1876 and these were presented to London Zoo. The sight of the elephants being disembarked at Portsmouth and then ridden to London must have been quite a surprise for other travellers.

Even Winnie-the-Pooh has his origins at London Zoo, based upon A.A. Milne and his son Christopher Robin visiting a black bear named Winnie.

Cartoons, giraffes in the park, and early halftones. They’re my memories; no doubt you will have your own for the archivist Natasha Wakely and the History Hive.

>>ZSL’s History Hive
>>Prince of Wales’s elephants
>>Giles characters in Ipswich
>>British Magazine Design

Tags: 1885, graphic-magazine, halftone, history, hive, london-zoo, news, photography, Zoo