Old Bet
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Old Bet was the second elephant brought to the United States. [1] [2]
[edit] Biography
In 1808, while residing in Somers, New York, Hachaliah Bailey purchased an African elephant for $1,000 and named it "Old Bet." Old Bet appears to be one of the first elephants brought to the United States; she had previously been on exhibit in Boston in 1804, but Bailey found her for sale four years later in a New York City cattle market.
(An alternate version of the story relates that Bailey purchased Old Bet from a sea captain, possibly his brother, who had acquired the elephant for $20 in London prior to the War of 1812.)
Bailey originally planned to use Old Bet as a draught animal on his farm, but she attracted so much attention that he decided to found a travelling menagerie instead. He started out to show Old Bet with a wagon of hay, a horse to draw it, and an assistant. The admission fee for an entire family was either a coin or a 2-gallon jug of rum. In 1808, Hachaliah Bailey rented two-thirds of Old Bet to Benjamin Lent and Andrew Brown, who also had a right to display her.
On July 24, 1816, Old Bet was killed while on tour near Alfred, Maine by a farmer who thought it sinful for poor people to waste money on a traveling circus, and Bailey memorialized her in 1825 with a statue and the Elephant Hotel in Somers, New York.
[edit] References
- ^ "Under the Big Top", New York Times, December 8, 2002. Retrieved on 2007-07-21. "Old Bet, called the second elephant in America by the Somers Historical Society, was also one of the most important elephants in America. The Elephant Hotel in Somers was built in 1825 to honor her, and her owner, Hachaliah Bailey of Somers, and is now in its third century of circus fame. Old Bet was part of the new tradition of menageries -- elephants, tigers, giraffes, rhinos and other exotic animals imported from abroad -- that traveled the countryside with circuses beginning about 1804. Now an exhibition and a theatrical production recall those early circus days."
- ^ Setting The Record Straight On Old Bet.. American Heritage. Retrieved on 2008-03-21. “It is not an established fact that Old Bet was the first elephant to arrive in America, and quite possibly she was second. An April, 1796, publication, Greenleaf’s New York, mentions an elephant journeying to our shores aboard the ship America. A few days later an elephant was exhibited around Beaver Street and Broadway, according to an advertisement in The Argus, April 23, 1796. This area was the location of the Bull’s Head Tavern, a place frequented by ships’ captains, drovers, and a variety of businessmen. Hachaliah Bailey of Somers, New York, regularly stayed at the Bull’s Head when he took his cattle to the abattoir, which was located nearby. The newspaper reports that the first elephant was sold to a 'Mister Owen.' Unfortunately, they gave no other information about the man, nor did they tell what he did with the elephant he bought, but Hachaliah Bailey’s business partner and brother-in-law was named Owen.”
