This archival footage takes us back 75 years to when network TV reporters covered the opening of the Bronx Zoo’s African Plains exhibit. Inside that box is—yep—a CBS reporter who likely was not seeking the lions’ undivided attention, but got it anyway.
The African Plains exhibit was signficant in that it was the first time the Bronx Zoo presented animals outside of metal cages, in an enclosure similar to their own natural environs. It cost around $110,000 (that’s in 1941 dollars), with the tab quietly picked up by the owner of upscale department store Marshall Field’s. It was designed by the president of the New York Zoological Society, Fairfield Osborn. The exhibit was wildly popular, with up to 85,000 visitors in one day. (The New York Zoological Society is now the Wildlife Conservation Society.)
Since it was the first zoo exhibit based on geography and not taxonomy, African Plains had both predators and prey living together, separated only by strategically placed—and hidden—moats. The residents included elands, zebras, warthogs, a few bird species, and, for one day, a CBS reporter who might well have been questioning his career choice.
