Gay's Lion Farm was a public
selective breeding
Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant mal ...
facility and
tourist attraction
A tourist attraction is a place of interest that tourists visit, typically for its inherent or an exhibited natural or cultural value, historical significance, natural or built beauty, offering leisure and amusement.
Types
Places of natural b ...
just west of the south-east junction of Peck Road and Valley Boulevard in
El Monte, California
}
El Monte (Spanish for "The Mountain") is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. The city lies in the San Gabriel Valley, east of the city of Los Angeles.
El Monte's slogan is "Welcome to Friendly El Monte" and is historically ...
. It operated from 1925 through 1942, when it was closed temporarily due to wartime meat shortages. It never reopened.
Early years
Founders Charles and Muriel Gay were Anglo-French circus performers who arrived in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
in 1914. They established an attraction in
MacArthur Park
MacArthur Park (originally Westlake Park) is a park dating back to the late 19th century in the Westlake, Los Angeles, Westlake neighborhood of Los Angeles. In the early 1940s, it was renamed after General Douglas MacArthur, and later designated ...
(then known as Westlake Park) where the public could watch Charles Gay working with three adult lions. The lions were trained as animal actors in the burgeoning
motion picture
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
industry.
Needing more room for their animals, the Gays found a large plot of un-zoned property in
El Monte, east of Los Angeles, where in 1925 they opened Gay's Lion Farm, a public attraction dedicated to the breeding, training and exhibition of African lions. The Farm quickly became one of the most popular tourist attractions in the Southland, doing a brisk trade in souvenir photographic postcards. Among the famous animals raised on the Farm were
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by amazon (company), Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded o ...
Studio lions
Slats
Super Low Altitude Test Satellite (SLATS) or Tsubame was a JAXA satellite intended to demonstrate operations in very low Earth orbit (VLEO, below 200 km), using ion engines to counteract aerodynamic drag from the Earth's atmosphere which i ...
(1924–1927, died of appendicitis and was stuffed) and his lookalike successor
Jackie, and the celebrated comic lion Numa (1912–1930, died of cancer and was stuffed), named for the lion in the
Tarzan
Tarzan (John Clayton II, Viscount Greystoke) is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungle by the Mangani great apes; he later experiences civilization, only to reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adv ...
books. Slats, Numa, and Jackie (the friendliest of the three) appeared as one lion in
Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin Jr. (16 April 188925 December 1977) was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film. He became a worldwide icon through his screen persona, the Tramp, and is consider ...
's "The Circus" (1928).
The farm with its thatched roof, African-inspired architecture (a likely inspiration for
Walt Disney
Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...
's
Adventureland), was a U-shaped compound, with separate cages for each adult cat, a nursery, and a central caged arena where Charles Gay, with whip and gun, performed a classic lion tamer act for the crowds. Feedings were also a big draw, with a ton of meat being consumed daily.
In 1925,
El Monte High School
El Monte High School in El Monte, California, is a public high school of the El Monte Union High School District. It is one of the oldest high schools in the San Gabriel Valley. Founded in 1901, it began operation in a single, upstairs classroom i ...
adopted the Lions name for its teams, and the Gays provided a lion mascot for big games.
Visitors
Starting in 1927, the Farm hosted organized visits from men's clubs, such as the
Lions Club
The International Association of Lions Clubs, more commonly known as Lions Clubs International, is an international non-political service organization established originally in 1916 in Chicago, Illinois
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, ...
and the Adventurers Club. These events centered on outdoor banquets set in a clearing among the animal cages, at which guests were served small samples of barbecued lion meat in addition to steak and chicken. An honored guest at these meals, toasted and encouraged to walk the length of the table, was Numa the lion.
[Los Angeles Times]
When
Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo (born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson; 18 September 1905 – 15 April 1990) was a Swedish-American actress. Regarded as one of the greatest screen actresses, she was known for her melancholic, somber persona, her film portrayals of tragedy, ...
first came to Hollywood in 1926, she didn't speak much English. Publicist Don Gillum arranged a publicity stunt at the Farm where the actress was to be photographed cuddling lion cubs, and in a stunt cage so it looked like she was sitting with Numa. Although Gillum told her what she would be doing, Garbo didn't recognize the word lion, and so didn't realize what was in store for her until she was almost in the cage, at which point she shrieked "Oh! Dos terrible animals!" But she was a good sport and posed for the pictures.
Other well-known visitors included
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
,
Eleanor Roosevelt
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt () (October 11, 1884November 7, 1962) was an American political figure, diplomat, and activist. She was the first lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945, during her husband President Franklin D. Roosevelt's four ...
and
Marie Dressler
Marie Dressler (born Leila Marie Koerber, November 9, 1868 – July 28, 1934) was a Canadian stage and screen actress, comedian, and early silent film and Depression-era film star. In 1914, she was in the first full-length film comedy. She ...
.
Lions escape
In September 1928, while the Gays were traveling in Europe, a trainer failed to close a runway while lions Ike and Short-Tail were being moved between cages. The lion made a dash for freedom, and slashed the arm of farm manager
John Rounan at the moment Rounan fired a shot at the animal; the wound required 100 stitches, and Rounan later died. Trainer
Joe Hoffman took off after the lion and felled him with a bullet in the brain. Short-Tail walked into an open cage, and Hoffman was able to lock him in. But Ike got shot in the leg and ran around the farm in a rage, menacing a cow, a cage full of baby lions and arriving police officers. Ike finally died in a hail of bullets from many guns.
This incident provided inspiration for hard-boiled author
James M. Cain
James Mallahan Cain (July 1, 1892 – October 27, 1977) was an American novelist, journalist and screenwriter. He is widely regarded as a progenitor of the hardboiled school of American crime fiction.
His novels ''The Postman Always Rings Twice ...
's short story "The Baby in the Icebox," which in turn inspired his celebrated novel
The Postman Always Rings Twice.
The late years
At its high point, there were more than 200 adult lions living at the Farm. The farm closed in December 1942, when wartime rationing made it impossible to get the ton of horse meat required daily for the cats, and the lions were loaned to zoos around the country. But by the time the war ended, Charles Gay was too ill to reclaim his cats. He retired to Balboa Island, where he died in 1950. He is buried at San Gabriel Cemetery.
The site of the Farm is now an overpass of Interstate 10, the location distinguished by a life-sized bronze statue of a male lion behind a chain link fence beside the sidewalk. A larger lion statue, which was commissioned for the Farm, stands in front of nearby El Monte High School.
See also
*
List of defunct amusement parks
The following is a list of amusement parks and theme parks that have been closed, demolished, or abandoned:
Africa
Egypt
* Luna Park, Cairo (1911–1915)
Rwanda
*Kigali Park, Rwanda
South Africa
* Ratanga Junction, Cape Town (1998-2018)
...
*
Jungleland USA
Jungleland USA was a private zoo, animal training facility, and animal theme park in Thousand Oaks, California, United States, on the current site of the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza. At its peak the facility encompassed .
Louis Goebel created ...
References
External links
Image Archeology - Old Postcard and Brochure Collection
{{Coord missing, Los Angeles County, California
Zoos in California
History of Los Angeles
1925 establishments in California
1942 disestablishments in California
Former zoos
El Monte, California
Zoos established in 1925
Zoos disestablished in 1942