Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-11-14
THE MAKER OF ZOOS
Greatest Wild Animal Man
in the Country.
WILLIAM T, HoRNADAY
STUDY OF BEASTS IN THEIR Ma
TIVE JUNGLEs.
Some Thrilling Experiences While
Hunting Big Game in Many
Parts Of the World.

There goes the man who knows more
| about wild animals than anybody else in
| America, and probably more than anybody
else in the world.
The speaker pointed to a powerfully-set,
clear-eyed, bearded man who was super
intending the removal of some wolves from
one den to another at the New York Zoo
logical Park.
YES" continued the speaker; that is
William T. Hornaday, the greatest wild
animal man in this country. He knows
the mind and the temper of tigers and
wolves better than you or I know the mind
and temper of our children. He has spent
his life studying wild beasts in their native
jungles, shooting them to get their skele-
tons for museums, collecting them alive
training them and writing about them. He
has built up more zoos and geological mu-
seums, I suppose, than any other living
American"
William T. Hornaday is an example OF
the success which comes from life long
devotion to a steady purpose. In boyhood
he determined to know more about wild
animals than other people; now he STANDS
at the top of his profession. He Is the d.
rector of the New York geological park
and he is known to biologists all over the
world
He was born forty nine years ago in what
were then the backwoods of Indiana Il
belong to that rare and disappearing spe-
cieS known as the native American, ne
says; land I was farm bred and farm
reared. My father and brothers were keen
sportsmen good shots and ardent lovers
of nature, and l inherited the same tastes.
can't remember the time when didn't
love to be among wild animals fortunately,
my boyhood was spent in places where an.
imal life was abundant-in the forests or
central Indiana and the prairies of Iowa.
Those forests and nrairipS have since been
eaten up by the march of civilization. and
one has to go farther afield to find wild
life nowadays.
Student of Natural History.
Mr.. Hornaday was educated in Iowa col
leges, and there read Audubon and learned
that it was possible to make a livelihood
out of those practical natural history
studies which he loved. On leaving college
he went to an establishment which supplies
museums and geological gardens with their
specimens, and will even turn out entire
| museum or geological garden to order as
calmly as grocer sells pound of butter
At this establishment Mr.. Hornaday re-
ceived thorough practical training as
collecting naturalist and taXidermist pre-
paratory to being sent ION the road for
the great animal dealers send out travellers
all over the world to find all kinds of ZOO
logical specimens, from elephants to bats,
just as manufacturing firms send out their
''drummers'' to hunt up trade
Mr.. Hornaday was sent to Florida to col
| lect geological specimens. He won his
| spurs there, while still a beardless youth
| by discovering and sending up north the
| first specimen of the Florida crocodile
which ever came out of the country. That
crocodile is now one Of the treasured pos
| sessions Of the National Muselitn at Wash
| ington
! Mr.. Hornaday, with a companion tracked
| the crocodile to creek running out of the
| IN, fl,.n
| near the beasts home, and, after waiting
| for hours, managed to get a shot at it. Mr.
| Hornaday sent bullet through it's eye,
| which, contrary to the general belief of
| hunters, did not kill it, but Simply made it
| crazy. 1t had its strength left, but could
| not see and did not know what to do Wal
| lowing in the blood tinged water of the
creek, champing its jaws and threshing it's
| tail IN frantic lmpOtency, the crocodile was
| CHASTITY sight; but it chung to life so
| tenaciously that seven bullets had to he
| fired into its thick hide before it finally
| gave up the ghost.
Hunting Big Game.
Having begun to make his reputation by
| this Florida trip. Mr.. Hornaday was sent
off to Cuba. where he hobnobbed with both
| the Spaniards and the Cubans during the in
surrection of 1875. and then to South Ameri-
| ca. In 1876 he was sent to the East Indies
on his greatest trip, to spend two wears
| roaming at will through the jungles of In
dia, Ceylon, the Malay peninsula and Bor
neo.
1t was this trip that Mr. Hornaday
| made for himself a reputation among big
game hunters. Few men have shot SO MANY
| ferocious beasts as he did during those two
years. Elephants Indian bison. tigers,
| leopafdS, crocOdles. orang-outangs CHM
panZees, gibbons and bears fell to his gun
| by the score, to say nothing of hundreds of
antelopes, oxis deer, gazelles, monkeys and
| such like small fry. His bag of orang-ou-
| tang alone numbered forty-three
During these two years he had adyen-
| lures enough to provide material for half a
| dozen boys books had he cared to write
| them. Many time he narrowly ESCAPED
! dea tn from the wild beasts which he hunted
| He lived on terms of intimacy with the
| head hunters of BorneO, and formed such a
high opinion of their manners and morals
| that he now holds them up as the superiors
| of civilized man.
When he is asked which of his many ex-
citing adventures during those two years he
| regards as being his CLOSEST shave Mr.
| Hornaday usually tells how he was charged
! by huge old female elephant in an Indian
| forest belonging to the Rajah of Kulunyud.
A Thrilling Elephant Hunt.
While tramping through the jungle, he
came upon a herd of elephants which in
Guided this female and her smooth shiny
| calf. about three feet high. 81 never saw
| more demure and cute looking animal than
| that absurd little elephant" said Hornaday,
| land l fairly ached to steal up and grab
hold of its trunk and have a tussle with
| him.
But he had TO keep quiet because the
raiah, who owned the forest. had only
! permitted him to shoot male elephants
| Lying hidden in the dense underground, he
watched the herd for over half an hour
! Presently the baby elephant wandered off
| and Mr.. Hornaday tried to creep noiseless-
| ly through the Jungle after it. But he was
| heard and before she could realize his
parted suddenly and the huge old female