In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Chapter Six domesticating nature on the television set domesticating nature on the television set In 1945 Marlin Perkins loaded some of the more popular small animals from Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo in his automobile and drove downtown to the studio of WBKB, the city’s experimental television station. Recognizing that the “lifeblood of the zoo is publicity and promotion,” Perkins looked upon the new medium of television as a way to revitalize the Lincoln Park Zoo, which he took over as director in 1944. Perkins’s _air for showmanship went back to his earliest days at the St. Louis Zoo, where he got his start sweeping sidewalks for $3.75 a day. Convinced that a real understanding of animals could not be taught in the classroom, but had instead to be experienced ~rsthand, Perkins left the University of Missouri at Columbia as a sophomore majoring in zoology in 1926 and placed himself at the services of George Vierheller, director of the St. Louis Zoo and one of the premier zoo showmen in the United States. Within a matter of weeks, Vierheller promoted Perkins to curator of reptiles and the understudy quickly learned from the “maestro” the art of public relations in attracting 132 crowds. Perkins orchestrated public performances every other week in which two reticulated pythons, the Maharanee of Wangpoo and Blondie, were each force-fed fourteen pounds of rabbit meat using eight men and a two-and-a-half-inch rubber pumping hose inserted into the python’s throat. Advertised in advance in local newspapers, the feedings attracted thousands of visitors and were featured in the pages of Life magazine. Neither Perkins’s theatrical verve nor the animals, however, adapted readily to the demands of television in its early years. Agitated from the car ride and by the intense heat of the studio lights, the animals were unpredictable as Perkins handled them and attempted to deliver off-the-cuff remarks on their adaptations and habits. With only three hundred televisions in the entire city of Chicago, Perkins called it quits after ~fteen shows.1 Five years later, television’s prospects had improved signi~cantly. In 1949, completion of the ~rst coaxial cable between Chicago and New York City linked Midwest cities with the Eastern Network. By 1950, 9 percent of American households, roughly four million homes, owned a television set. Reinald Werrenrath, a producer at the NBC af~liate in Chicago, approached Perkins in 1949 to inquire whether he would be interested in a one-half-hour daytime program broadcast live from the Lincoln Park Zoo. Perkins seized the opportunity. Just a few years earlier he had tried unsuccessfully to get WBKB to shift its broadcast from the studio to the zoo. With a mobile unit, Perkins felt he could capture the diversity of life at the zoo, and that the animals in their familiar surroundings would be more at ease performing before television cameras and microphones. The NBC station sent a mobile television camera crew and a former Marine combat correspondent , Jim Hurlbut, as an announcer to open and close the show. Zoo Parade premiered on the NBC network on May 28, 1950 and quickly rose to one of the top three programs in daytime telecast ratings. One year later, the show was broadcast to over forty-one cities coast to coast. By 1952, when television reached into one-third of American households, an estimated 11 million people tuned into the show on late Sunday afternoons. Surveys revealed an audience composition of equal proportions of men, women, and children. Offering wholesome entertainment for the entire family, Marlin Perkins and his animal friends became television celebrities, recognized by people all over the country. Attendance at the Lincoln Park Zoo soared to over 4 million in 1952, as crowds _ocked to see their favorite animal celebrities such as Judy the elephant, Fuad the fennec, Sinbad the gorilla, Nero the lion, Sweet William the skunk, and the chimpanzee Heinie domesticating nature on the television set 133 II. Many of the animal residents at the Lincoln Park Zoo had become adored pets with whom families regularly fraternized on Sunday afternoons in the comforts of their living rooms.2 The popularity of Zoo Parade traded upon the domestication of television in American homes. In the early 1950s, magazines such as House Beautiful and American Home helped tame this new technology by welcoming television as the newest family member, oftentimes described as “the family pet.” In fact, young couples added babies and televisions...

Share