Book Review: Sunset at the Zoo - The Zoo You Don't Know

The world of zoos and aquariums is always in flux, but the 1970s and 1980s may have been the era of the most rapid, turbulent changes.  These are the decades when the introduction of new legislation, such as CITES and the US Endangered Species Act, came into play, adding a tremendous new layer of regulatory complexity to working with animals.  This the time when the modern environmental movement began to form itself.  And this is the time when our societal understanding and appreciation of animal welfare and animal rights began to formulate - including a new questioning of the ethics of zoos and aquariums.

Among this rapidly changing landscape, Steve Graham was one of the most pivotal figures on the zoo scene.  Graham shares his experiences from a career working with wildlife in his memoir Sunset at Zoo, published not long before his recent passing.

Starting off as a keeper at Maryland's Catoctin Mountain Zoo, he later served as the director of the Salisbury Zoo, then The Baltimore Zoo, before finally ending his career as the director of the Detroit Zoo.  During those years (at least at the three zoos where he was in charge), Graham implemented many changes to improve animal welfare.  One of his first actions as director at Detroit, for example, was to put a stop to the long-running chimpanzee tea parties which promoted unnatural behaviors among the animals.  At Baltimore, he ended the practice of allowing many animals to roam free and be fed (or harassed) by visitors.  At Salisbury, he worked to develop a strong conservation ethos and reshaped the collection to feature animals that a small zoo could better accommodate, showing the world that even a small zoo can do big things for animals.  And, at the same time, he demonstrated a willingness to stand up to other zoos, even advocating for shutting down Catoctin - his former employer - over their poor welfare.

All of this would make Graham an extremely compelling figure... if he didn't come across as so smug and unlikeable.

Seriously, when I put the book down, my first thought was, "Wow, he sure thinks a lot of himself, doesn't he?"

Most of the early book is taken up with Graham's recounting of his wild youth of drugs, alcoholism, and a trail of affairs, as well as all of the various other trouble he got into.  In many ways it seems that getting involved with animals saved his life and helped pull him from a rapid downward spiral.  In this, he wouldn't be alone - the zoo world is full of people who found their niche working with animals and couldn't imagine being anywhere else.  Unfortunately, the zoo world is also full of people who, having found their calling, decide that they have divine direction to do whatever they want in the interest of animals, and anyway who questions them is at best an idiot, at worst the devil.

Much of Graham's writing comes across as meanspirited and self-aggrandizing.  He refers to the incompetence of many of his colleagues, such as dismissing his predecessor at Baltimore as a useless alcoholic (a charge which is ironic from Graham).  Then, he casually brushes aside suggestions that his treatment of Baltimore's vet contributed to the man's suicide.  When officials from Detroit come to ask him about taking the helm at their zoo, his first response is to rudely laugh at them... until they plead (in his telling, anyway) that only he can save them.

I'm not saying that Graham didn't have some good ideas and have the willingness to implement them.  I'm just pointing out that he also had a streak of toxicity that really seems to have been counter-productive in making positive changes for the animals... and sometimes he seemed more interested in being shocking and controversial than he was in being practical.  A key feature of his tenure at Detroit was his willingness to use euthanasia to destroy animals that he felt otherwise wouldn't go to zoos that he deemed suitable - which was most of them.  No one is saying send the tiger to a squalid hellhole, but maybe there are other steps - birth control, working to improve habitats, etc - that you can try instead of resorting to being the zoo equivalent of a shock jock.  Seriously, I hope he didn't cut himself on all that edge...

I'm glad I found Sunset at the Zoo, being as there aren't many books about the histories of Baltimore and Detroit (even fewer about Salisbury and Catoctin), and it did provide a unique insight into the mind of one of the key architects of the 1970's zoo revolution.  I just wish there was a protagonist for this story who didn't leave such a smarmy impression.

Sunset at the Zoo: The Zoo You Don't Know at Amazon.com