Chicago loves a good animal story. Whether it’s the discovery of a massive snapping turtle nicknamed Chonkasaurus, or pondering the lifespan of an Australian lungfish named Granddad, who arrived at the Shedd Aquarium for the 1933 World’s Fair and was estimated to be 109 years old when it died in February 2017.
For older generations, animals were mostly viewed in cages at local zoos. But as animal care practices have evolved, we’ve been able to watch polar bears, gorillas, lions and even beluga whales roam — or sleep — in their habitats from just beyond a panel of glass.
Then there are those wild, recent creatures who have imprinted on our hearts — and even a city sidewalk — for making their homes near ours.
Here’s a look back at some of Chicago’s well-loved animals.
Oliver B. Green, a contractor for the Illinois and Michigan Canal, had an idea to make Lincoln Park more attractive than its natural beauty alone could provide, and he had the connection to make it happen — his brother was the comptroller for New York City’s Central Park. In an August 1868 letter, Green asked “for a donation of some swans for Lincoln Park of this city.”
His request was almost immediately accepted and two pairs of mute swans, related to others that had earlier been given to Central Park by the cities of Hamburg, Germany, and London were bound for Chicago with instructions on their care: “Feed them with corn and put fresh grass into their enclosure until they get into the lake. …”
Aug. 15, 1930: Bushman
Chicago immediately fell in love with the 2-year-old, 40-pound gorilla from Cameroon. The Tribune reported he had been captured by J.L. Buck, an animal hunter from Camden, Mass., who killed the young gorilla’s mother in order to get to him. Lincoln Park Zoo purchased the primate for $3,500 (or almost $68,000 in today’s dollars) — a practice that was common in those days. At the time, there was not much known about this species, their diet and their rearing. The Tribune reported the youngster feasted heartily on “hot dogs, bananas, watermelon and chicken” when he first appeared at his new home. He was given the name Bushman by zookeeper Eddie Robinson.
No other animal in a Chicago-area zoo has ever drawn the crowds as Bushman did in his stark steel cage. Estimated to have been visited by millions of people during his lifetime, Bushman had a special way of treating photographers who tried to snap his photo — he “frequently pelted them with vegetables and other odds and ends he could find.”
During his lifetime, Bushman was seen by an estimated 100 million people. More than 100,000 of them came to the zoo on a June day in 1950, as rumors spread that he was dying. He was not, and later that year tasted a bit of freedom when he escaped from his cage — the door was left open — and wandered around the kitchen and some hallways for a few hours. A tiny garter snake frightened him back to his cage, but that only further endeared him.
His death was announced Jan. 1, 1951. Thousands rushed to the zoo, hoping it was, again, just a rumor. What they discovered was the ape’s cage, empty but for a life-size black-draped portrait of Bushman. A brass band played taps. Many fans placed flowers by the cage.
Visitors to The Field Museum can still see Bushman, whose remains were preserved by taxidermists.
When Brookfield Zoo opened to the public on July 1, 1934, Cookie was there to greet the almost 60,000 visitors. And though the pink cockatoo was never “top banana” at the zoo, he outlived every other animal who was on the grounds that day.
Cookie was one of several pink cockatoos gifted to the zoo by Australia, where they are natively found, the Tribune reported in 1994. The monogamous birds paired off, however, leaving Cookie solo. His roost changed through the years until Cookie essentially entered retirement in 2009, by moving into the keepers’ offices in the Bird and Reptile House. The cantankerous bird perked up — just like his plumage — when taken off public display.
“He did a complete turnaround and became very active,” Tim Snyder, curator of birds, said. “He sat in on our meetings. … If he didn’t like you, he had a really loud, screechy voice, and if you were talking, he would interrupt you.”
Zoo officials estimate Cookie was at least 83 years old when he died in August 2016.
April 20, 1937: Su-Lin
It was utter panda-monium when the first live giant panda to live in captivity in the United States greeted visitors at Brookfield Zoo.
Su-Lin, which loosely translates to mean “a little bit of something very cute,” and her guardian, Ruth Harkness, became instant celebrities when they arrived by boat in San Francisco from China in November 1936. Prior to that moment, the only pandas seen by most Westerners were taxidermied.
Brookfield Zoo agreed to house Su-Lin and gave Harness $10,000 (or more than $223,000 in today’s dollars) to return to China to find a mate for the young panda.
Unfortunately, Su-Lin died of pneumonia just weeks after Harkness returned with Mei-Mei, which means “younger sister.” Su-Lin’s remains are part of the Field Museum’s taxidermy collection.
1962: Olga
Described in appearance by the Tribune as “a 900-pound eraser that has been crossed with a jar of lard and then hit with a steam roller,” Olga the walrus was captured in the wild off Norway in late 1961, then arrived at Brookfield Zoo in 1962.
Olga was taught to perform tricks, as was common at zoos at the time. Her trainer, Jacque Mittendorf, first realized the walrus was capable of responding to commands when she retrieved a cigarette lighter he accidentally dropped into the pool inside Seven Seas Panorama. Olga was soon retrieving basketballs tossed into the water and performing for visitors.
Olga’s antics were an epiphany, according to a Tribune editorial. Animals could be friendly and kind to humans.
Olga died in 1988 at 27 years old, making her the oldest walrus in captivity.
Sept. 23, 1970: Ziggy’s freedom
Ziggy, a 6-ton Asian elephant, was named for theatrical producer Florenz Ziegfeld, who bought him, as a 1-year-old, as a gift for his 6-year-old daughter. Ziggy was sold from one circus to another before he was moved to Brookfield Zoo in 1936.
A scary incident on April 26, 1941, however, led the zoo to chain him to a wall inside the Pachyderm House for 29 years. That’s when the elephant threw down his keeper George “Slim” Lewis and tried to gore him. Lewis stunned Ziggy with a punch to the eye, jumped into the enclosure’s moat and escaped. The zoo’s management wanted to put Ziggy down, but Lewis begged that the sentence be commuted to life imprisonment, indoors.
An appeal by then-Tribune reporter Michael Sneed in 1969, started a movement — and a collection — to free the 52-year-old pachyderm. More than $15,000 in donations (or more than $132,000 in today’s dollars) was raised to build an outdoor enclosure for Ziggy to roam. On Sept. 23, 1970, Ziggy got his long-deserved taste of freedom.
Shortly after lunchtime, a docile coyote nonchalantly wandered through the propped-open door of a Quiznos submarine sandwich shop at 37 E. Adams St. in downtown Chicago and plopped down in front of the soda cooler.
Officials picked up the year-old male about an hour after it entered the restaurant. The animal ate nothing and no one was harmed.
The coyote was released later in Barrington Hills on 9 acres of private property, where rabbits and mice — not submarine sandwiches and chips — would be his daily fare.
Another coyote ventured onto ice on Lake Michigan in 2015, before it ran off into a nearby park. And in January, a coyote was discovered in a refrigerated section inside an Aldi grocery store at 800 N. Kedzie Ave. It was safely removed by Chicago police and Animal Care and Control.
June 2019: Monty and Rose
Monty and Rose achieved local celebrity status in 2019, when they became the first pair of piping plovers —an endangered species that migrates south for the winter — to raise a family in Chicago in more than 60 years. Their names were derived from their nesting location — Montrose Beach. The site was scheduled to host the music festival Mamby on the Beach, but the hatching of the pair’s three chicks forced the event’s cancellation.
There were Monty and Rose posters, T-shirts and beer. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker even declared Nov. 18, 2019, as Piping Plover Day in their honor.
The lovebirds returned to the area each summer to nest, garnering scores of enthusiastic followers and researchers. Monty died of a respiratory infection in 2022, just a month after Rose went missing. Scores of volunteers, who had stepped forward to help keep the birds safe, have continued their work for the pair’s heirs.
July 2019: Chance the Snapper
Chicago officials confirmed an alligator was living in Humboldt Park Lagoon, after several people reported seeing the animal there on July 9, 2019, and others shared photos of it. Dubbed “Chance the Snapper,” officials presumed he had been released into the lagoon by someone who had been keeping him as a pet in their house.
After a volunteer trapper failed to capture the alligator, the city reached out to Frank Robb “due to the possible threat to public safety at the Chicago Park District,” said Kelley Gandurski, director of Chicago Animal Care and Control in an email to another city official.
After Robb reeled in the gator with his fishing rod on July 16, 2019, he took a victory lap around the city, throwing out the first pitch at a Cubs game and turning on Buckingham Fountain.
The male gator was relocated to the St. Augustine Alligator Farm Zoological Park.
The bulk of the $33,649 cost for the weeklong effort to trap the gator came from city workers having to put up and and remove barricades to keep people away from the lagoon, with $2,500 going to Robb, according to information released by Chicago officials to the Tribune.
May 2023: Fox family
Below the towering skyscrapers lining Chicago’s Millennium Park, an unlikely group was holed up in Lurie Garden: A family of foxes. Several kits frolicked as their mother looked on. They played on the walkway, groomed one another atop a concrete slab and walked under metal gates lining the park.
The animals likely had plenty to eat. Red foxes are omnivores that prey on small animals such as birds, rabbits and squirrels, Lehrer said. In Chicago, dubbed America’s “rat capital” by pest-control brand Orkin for the eighth consecutive year in 2022, small mammal predation goes a long way.
“They’re doing the hard work for us,” Liza Lehrer, assistant director of the Urban Wildlife Institute, told the Tribune. She suspected the Lurie Garden was home to plenty of prey for the foxes.
January 2024: Chicago rat hole
Chicago’s love for animals extended to its absence of one in this case. The rat-shaped dent in the sidewalk, with a skinny tail and only three paws, went viral after a social media post drew more than 5 million views on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Neighbors along the busy residential street in Roscoe Village said the spot had been there for nearly 20 years and that the mark was actually left by a squirrel, not a rat. But the rodent-inspired name has endured.
After a series of complaints from neighbors, the infamous rodent-shaped sidewalk dent was removed and preserved in late April 2024, officials said.
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