The touching and strange tale of Lucy the chimp
I heard this story recently on NPR. Since it was first aired back in 2010, it must have been a repeat. But what a fascinating tale! It begins with psychotherapist and professor Maurice Temerlin and his wife Jane, who decided—in an act that seems to have been sweeping in its lack of consideration of the logical and almost inevitable consequences of what they were doing—to raise a chimpanzee virtually from birth, as a member of their household.
They named her Lucy. For a while the experiment (because that’s what it was) went very well, and the couple clearly loved the chimp. Lucy was a very bright animal and quickly learned many things, including a huge amount of sign language. However, it soon became clear that she thought of herself as a human.
I mean that quite literally: as far as we can tell, she related only to humans and not to chimps at all. When she reached adulthood, when chimps become bigger and much stronger than people, and virtually unmanageable in the type of home setting the couple had accustomed her to, they set out to reintroduce Lucy (or actually, to introduce her for the first time) to the wild, with the help of a psychology graduate student named Janis Carter.
They thought it would take a few weeks for this to be accomplished. But it actually took Carter many long and astoundingly patient years. Lucy was remarkably set in her ways and rejected the chimpanzee role with no small amount of creativity and persistence. In the end—well, listen to it or read the transcript for yourself.
Here’s the entire thing in audio:
During the three years (1977-80) we lived in Zaire (now Congo), we were “house parents” to a young pygmy chimp we called Pili-pili.
She had been bought from the local bush meat market by a Marine Security Guard who was somehow (can’t imagine it happening these days) allowed to keep her at the Marine House. The story as we came to learn it is that the chimp’s mother had been killed for bush meat, and the hunters found the youngster clinging to her body.
The Marine had her about 6 months before being transferred, and of course couldn’t take her with him. He advertised in the embassy newsletter for a new owner and we took her on.
Note an important difference between our situation and the one in this radio segment: Pili was a pygmy chimp; a different, more docile and not as strong animal. We knew an American family who had a regular chimp in a cage that should have been strong enough for Godzilla, but he managed to bend the steel bars and escape, scaring a whole lot of people before being dispatched. Pili was never going to reach that level of strength or aggressiveness.
Pili was about 3 years younger than our youngest daughter, and the two of them spent hours together. Our daughter was clearly smarter, but Pili was much stronger and more agile. Still, they were very cute together and a photo I took of the two of them having tea at a small table was on the front cover of the State Department’s monthly magazine (I should look for that!)
We dreaded the prospect of separation when we left, but knew the CITES convention (a UN convention to prevent trade in endangered species) made it impossible for us to take her back to the US with us. We tried to have her adopted by a primate center in South Africa and by the Yerkes Institute, but both were stymied by CITES.
Pili slept outside in the garage, pulling a burlap sack over her head when the sun went down. But for the rest of the day she and our daughter played madly in the back yard. We occasionally let her into the house, which she loved, particularly if she could join us for dinner. And if that was spaghetti dinner, she was in heaven! She’d sit in a chair while the spaghetti was served, then pick up one noodle at a time and slurp it into her mouth. Occasionally when she emptied her plate she’d try to sneak up onto the table and help herself to more spaghetti, but she knew that was an offense that resulted in her exile to the garage.
We grew very attached to her and were saddened by the prospect of leaving her, but found a Greek farmer who lived not far from Kinshasa who took her on. When we returned to Africa 3 years later we tried to track her down and learned that she had recently died, still living with the Greek farmer.
A great family friend.
F: Thanks for the charming (and sad) story.
If you save a life, don’t do it by half measures and abandon it later when convenient.
Humans are noble and horribly weak, due to the inconsistency of their ideals and their actual behavior.
I’d have to agree with Ymarsakar’s sentiment. Tell the UN to relax its Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species.
I wasn’t referring to the UN, but that’s not important.
The loyalty that subordinates and lower order life forms provide to a human must be returned with an equal duty in the form of protection and stability. This bond may be transferred to others if absolutely necessary, but should it be abandoned, what results is decadence and decay. A kind of sin or guilt.
For most humans, of course, they are not independent lords of their own domain. They Obey the Orders of their Authorities, no matter the cost. Which includes the cost to their own subordinates and loyalists.
Only free men and women can choose one way or another. And of course, some animals may choose to go away of their own reasons, but if they wish to remain in the safety of their current relationship, their master and lord should try to accommodate that, as it is better for all involved.
And if it is not possible, then dealing death to one’s loyal subordinate by one’s own hand, is also an option, when the alternative is allowing the fate of one’s subordinates to be decided by foreign powers.
No, I’m not a product of Western decadence nor modern 21st century Western civilization, if you haven’t noticed it already.
The strange tale of Oliver The Chimp .
The Humanzee That Wasn’t.
Not nice:
In 1986 Oliver was sold to a lab. Amazingly, Oliver was spared from typically torturous and fatal laboratory experimentation due to his unique characteristics. He was simply not considered a viable specimen because there were too many variables in his genetics when compared to other chimps in the lab. Any experimentation performed on him would have been tainted in the eyes of researchers. Instead, Oliver spent seven years in a tiny five by seven cage.
Don’t let them catch you, they will dissect you! And they will kill you! In that order!
“We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves,” by Karen Jay Fowler, is a novel about a family that — well, I can’t explain what the family does without giving up a spoiler, so I won’t go any farther with the specifics except to say that the plot fits this thread — which is probably enough to spoil a good chunk of it right there! Not the best book I’ve ever read, with some animal-rights politics I could have done without, but nevertheless a fascinating exploration of what makes us human and what makes us ourselves.
I tried to use Neo’s Amazon link to make this link. I hope it worked. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=as_sl_pc_tf_sb_27?tag=neo0b-20&link_code=wsw&_encoding=UTF-8&search-alias=aps&field-keywords=We+are+All+Completely+beside+ourselves&Submit.x=0&Submit.y=0&Submit=Go
It would have been kind to send her into a dreamy death.
Certainly kinder than
Surprise! You’re never getting cuddled any more. No more bedtime stories, no more TV. And, oh! Did we mention that you’re a hairy beast that is never again going to have anything to do with anyone who looks like you think you do? Instead of cocktail hour you’re going to have to make do with roots and berries. And instead of looking at magazines you can pick fleas off other chimps and eat them.
When it’s time for sex, instead of somebody who looks like Dad, you’re going to get mauled by one of those hairy beasts that scared you.
Nolanimrod; I agree, it would have been kinder to send her into a dreamy death.
While I shudder at animal experiments, I do see the necessity of them for medical research – far better to test drugs on animals than use those drugs for the first time on a human.
This “experiment” by these folks on Lucy I just don’t understand. Granted I didn’t listen to the whole recording; I got as far as the “perfect experimental moment” when the Dr. bought a Playgirl magazine for the chimp.
That made me wonder if the “Dr.” isn’t off his rocker!?
That made me wonder if the “Dr.” isn’t off his rocker!?
Wonder?
Animals that have been — for any reason — accustomed to the presence of man — ESPECIALLY the friendly presence of man — are virtually certain to be poached should they be returned to the wild — especially wild Africa.
Generally, it’s a false compassion.
Elsa, (Born Free — ironic, no?) — being a lioness, was a pariah when re-introduced to Africa.
A single fertile lioness is a freak show.
No male lion can function without a harem. In the event that Elsa became ‘full’ — where would the next meal come from?
One has to accept that messing around with such wildlife is only a prelude to its death.
All of the dynamics of Elsa, the lioness, would’ve been amplified for Lucy. Chimps, like lions and elephants, are centered around female cliques — a sisterhood. The males can come and go. Never the females.
Hence, the only sex that has the slightest chance of re-introduction is the male.
Which see: Christian the lion. It COULD drop in from outer space and make it as top lion.