And their deaths brought attention to the quest of animal rights groups to keep elephants and other animals out of circus tents, contributing to a gradual phasing-out of the practice.Wanna find stuff to do in Fort Collins? Here's some ideas for a sample itinerary. Their deaths triggered investigations into Cuneo’s alleged animal abuse and studies of a tuberculosis epidemic in elephants that persists today.
They were the first elephants in America to die of tuberculosis since the 1800s. It's not clear exactly how they contracted the disease. Necropsies found their lungs were 80 percent clogged, according to an investigation of their deaths and Bradley’s book. Mycobacterium tuberculosis, a contagious disease that can spread among humans and other mammals, killed Hattie and Joyce. They took her to Colorado State University in Fort Collins, where her necropsy was conducted.Īt 26 years old, she'd outlived the average life expectancy of an Asian elephant in captivity by nine years.Īnother elephant on the tour, Joyce, died the day of Hattie's last show and was shipped to San Bernardino, Calif., for a necropsy. 6, she died. The caravan, en route to Illinois from Southern California, was in Colorado when Hattie’s handlers realized she had died.
Her burial site became a part of Hattie’s story by chance. The day after that performance, her hind legs gave out as she was being unloaded from a truck. 3, 1996 - that a visibly emaciated Hattie performed for the last time. Circus Vargas representatives didn’t respond to a request for information about what the elephant performances included at that time. It had gotten rid of its herd of elephants in favor of short-term elephant leases. Hattie’s last circus venture was with Circus Vargas in Southern California, a once-mighty act that by the 1990s had shrunk to one ring. Along with dolphins, great apes and magpies, they’re the only mammals that can recognize their own reflection, a sign of supreme intelligence and self-awareness in the animal kingdom. “They’re such majestic animals,” said Rose Watson, Environmental Education Center coordinator at Hattie's final resting place, the Larmier County Landfill. “I hate to think what happened to the animals that performed in those circuses.”Įlephants have the largest brain of any land mammal and are known for their extraordinary cognitive processing. Holter, a North Dakota native, collected exotic animals and put on shows with no music, the sound of his voice the only melody in the tents. And again.Īccording to the Elephant Encyclopedia, she touched American soil in 1971 as part of Gene Holter’s Movieland Animals. Before she was a year old, she arrived at Nehru Zoological Park in Hyderabad, a massive Indian city that hugs the banks of the Musi River. Hattie, an Asian elephant, was born in 1970 in a tropical forest in India.īut she didn’t enjoy life in the wild for long. Here's her story, stitched together from a trove of sources. and Barnum & Bailey circus featured elephants in its show for the final time on Sunday. In fact, Hattie’s unusual death marked a landmark in the charge to remove elephants from circus acts. It's the little-known tale of how an elephant from India zigzagged across America, going to various zoos and circuses, only to end up dead in Colorado and buried in Fort Collins nearly 20 years ago.Īnd Hattie's story is even more intriguing given the 145-year-old Ringling Bros. It's a popular anecdote for children touring the landfill in Fort Collins, Colo. - one often accompanied by handfuls of animal crackers.
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