The animals were sold to The
Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. According to Chris Siriano,
the colony was presented with a county ordinance saying they
had to either have a zoo or restaurant and beer garden. The restaurant, beer gardens and stage entertainment were very
profitable at the time so the decision was made to say good
bye to the zoo . The zoo was managed by Chic Bell and in this
photo can be seen with Marlin Perkins . Marlin Perkins
visited the zoo & later
became the host of the Wild Kingdom animal adventure series
on TV You can see where the Lion Cage was in relationship to
the rest of the Zoo & Aviary with this sequential
set of pictures.
This is a
picture of the Lion and Tiger House. These cages were
built to modernize the zoo and stand to this day, but were
converted to agriculture pursuits. In the 50's they
filled in the inside floor and made a small fruit packing
shed and later a cider mill with the conversion of the
basement. We have since sold our cider mill and pulled
out our orchards. It is currently used for
storage. The building sits on the East side of the
railroad tracks near the East railroad bridge.
