Tyke, the Elephant -- a Tragedy in the Center Ring

Tyke, a 21-year-old female elephant, was one of a dozen such animals owned by the notorious Hawthorn Corporation and kept at a farm in Richmond, IL. These pachyderms were cruelly mistreated and neglected and suffered from infections, malnutrition, lesions, and in some cases the human strain of tuberculosis. They were also chained most of the time, which contributed greatly to their stress. Hawthorn Corporation rented these animals to circuses and shows.

Tyke especially was less than thrilled about the situation as evidenced by her history of behavioral problems. On April 21st, 1993, she had ripped through the front doors of the Jaffa Mosque during a performance and roamed out of control for an hour in Altoona, PA, forcing more than 4,500 children to evacuate the building and racking up more than $14,000 in damage. (She had also attacked a tiger trainer during the Altoona engagement.) Later that year, on July 23rd, she had escaped and run amok at the North Dakota State Fair in Minot, ND, causing injuries and threatening bystanders in the 25 minutes it took for her to be recaptured.

Despite these issues, on August 20th, 1994, Tyke had been rented to the Circus International for a Hawaiian engagement when she went berserk during a show, trampling her handler to death and mauling her groom. She then bolted from the arena and took off for Honolulu, roaming through downtown Kakaako for more than a half hour before local police were able to kill her with 86 shots, but only after she had created enough damage to result in 93 lawsuits.

Elephants are now a protected species but apparently not protected enough. For all their immense size (average weight:10,000 pounds), elephants would be hard put to hurt human beings as much as we have hurt them. Human intrusion has caused the African elephant population to plummet from 3 million in 1970 to between 400,000 and 660,000 in 2003. These magnificent creatures are popular attractions at zoos and circuses but require scrupulously compassionate and humane care both for the sake of the animals themselves and the public safety as well. A growing number of people would rather not see exotic animals displayed at circuses under any circumstances and we feel that the shows would be just as good without what we consider to be animal abuse.

Aside from what we may think, the elephants themselves are intelligent enough to resent bad treatment and sometimes become angry, aggressive, and hurt enough to hurt back ... thereby becoming almost as dangerous to us as we have been to them. Good for them!

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyke_the_elephant

"A Cruel Jungle Tale in Richmond," Chicago Tribune, Jan. 13, 2005