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Zoo: Loved, but overlooked

The National Zoo is at a crossroads once again, for many of the same reasons it was half a century ago

By MICHAEL ZITZ

Date published: 9/26/2004

By MICHAEL ZITZ Curator seeking support to turn problems around

WASHINGTON--History has a way of repeating itself at the Smithsonian National Zoological Park.

In the late 1950s, the zoo was in serious trouble.

A child had been mauled and killed by a lion--and that tragic event was just the exclamation point on a long list of problems.

The poorly funded and badly managed zoo of that era was in disarray. Most of the staff members weren't properly trained to work with animals, and facilities were woefully inadequate.

Things have changed in the 48 years since Bill Xanten was hired as a gardener at the 163-acre National Zoo located in the Adams Morgan area of Northwest D.C.

For one thing, the zoo smells better now.

When a 19-year-old Xanten came to work at the zoo in 1956, the monkey house, which had been built in the '20s, was made entirely of wood. No matter how conscientiously it was scrubbed, urine and feces soaked into the structure.

"It was ripe," said Xanten, now the zoo's general curator.

"The first time I took my oldest daughter in there, she immediately threw up," he said.

The National Zoo has gone through many changes since then, evolving into an entity with a mission to research wildlife, to educate the public, and to help endangered species--not merely to entertain families on lazy Sunday afternoons.

The more things change, however, the more they stay the same.

Today the National Zoo is again at a crossroads because of the same kind of neglect that caused the problems of the 1950s.

Sen. Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican and zoo supporter, has said the venerable park requires "a staggering backlog" of $250 million in repairs and renovation.

In an op-ed piece in the The Washington Post, Frist wrote: "There were many reasons for the decline--stingy congressional appropriators, tight-fisted White House budgeteers and other Smithsonian priorities that conflicted with the zoo's needs."

Over the last 20 years, Xanten said, uneven funding has resulted in attrition-driven staffing cuts, which would appear to have contributed to a series of tragedies including the infamous rat-poisoning of two red pandas, Luke and Quentin. Grevy's zebras Buumba and Har died of hypothermia and malnutrition.

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Date published: 9/26/2004