Animals – LIFE

When Maine Got Its Caribou Back

Allison Sirica — Mon, 14 Oct 2019 15:16:07 +0000

They say you can’t beat mother nature, but every now and then people give it a shot. Every now and then it works—rivers are rerouted, new crops are introduced. So in 1963, Maine figured it would try to get its caribou back.

Caribou were once plentiful in pine tree state, during the early years of the United States, but then because of hunting and disease destroyed the population around the turn of the century.

But in 1963, Maine attempted to restore its population, by working out a trade with Newfoundland. They swung a wildlife swap. Maine sent Canada 320 grouse, and Newfoundland agreed to hand over 24 caribou. These weren’t just any 24 caribou, either. Six were males, but eighteen of group were pregnant females. With all those young ones on the way, the LIFE story about this plan sounded a hopeful note: “Maine hopes its herd will be multiplied come spring.”

The process took some effort.

Caribou being prepared for their journey.

Photo by Fritz Goro.

Caribou being flown to Maine.

Photo by Fritz Goro.

The Caribou were brought to Mount Katahdin in Maine’s Baxter State Park.

Photo by Fritz Goro.

In Maine but before being released into the wild, the caribou attracted the curious.

Photo by Fritz Goro.

The caribou were penned before released so they could be tagged and given penicillin shots.

Photo by Fritz Goro.

Did all these effort succeed? Not really. A recent report on Maine’s state website looked back on the 1963 effort, and Matthew LaRoche, Superintendent of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway, wrote of the caribou of the class of ’63: “They dispersed after three or four years and were never seen again.” Maine again tried to bring in caribou from Newfoundland in 1993, but failed once more. The second time around the caribou—a dozen of them were this time—were fitted with radio collars, which means that the defeat was a little more detailed: “They all died or migrated out of the area.”

Caribou didn’t last in Maine, experts believe, because their habitat changed. Old growth forests had been cut down and replaced with new growth forests, and the younger trees didn’t produce the kind of lichen that are a staple of the caribou diet. Also, the whitetail deer population had increased, and those deer which carry a brainworm that doesn’t affect deer but is deadly to moose or caribou. While it is speculated that a caribou replenishment might have succeeded with a bigger initial herd—maybe closer to 100—that’s a big and expensive project. So if caribou are to come back to Maine anytime soon, no one will be buying them a ticket.

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Celebrities’ Best Friends

Allison Sirica — Mon, 07 Oct 2019 17:38:08 +0000

Famous people really are just like us! And they always have been. Whether vintage actors or athletes or poets: They love their dogs.

Natalie Wood and her silver poodle Morningstar, at home in Beverly Hills in 1960.

Photo by Allan Grant/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation.

Gertrude Stein, right, and Alice B. Toklas walked their poodle, Baskets, in the French village of Culoz after the end of German occupation, 1945.

Photo by Carl Mydans/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation.

Baseball star Willie Mays walked with his poodle at the San Francisco airport, after his Giants left New York and moved west in 1958.

Photo by Nat Farbman/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation.

In 1956, Jayne Mansfield pondered the eternal question: why not just play with your dog?

Photo by Peter Stackpole/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation.

Alfred Hitchcock, at home with his Sealyham terrier Mr. Jenkins in 1939, offered a title for this photo: “A Dislike of American Fireplaces.”

Photo by Peter Stackpole/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation.

Steve McQueen was woken by his malamute during a hunting trip in the Sierra Madre Mountains, 1963.

Photo by John Dominis/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

Frank Sinatra checked in on Ringo in Palm Springs, 1965.

Photo by John Dominis/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

Jimmy Stewart once read a poem about his dog on The Tonight Show.

Photo by Rex Hardy/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

Actress Bette Davis and her dog were wheeled about in her Beverly Hills backyard, 1939.

Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

On this journey on a less-traveled road, poet Robert Frost chose not to walk alone.

Photo by Eric Schaal/The LIFE Picture Collection © Meredith Corporation

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Mane Event: LIFE’s 25 Most Memorable Horses

Wed, 13 Dec 2017 09:00:29 +0000

Horses are majestic creatures who have played many roles in American culture. They’re athletes (Seabiscuit), movie stars (National Velvet), military troops, and farm workers—not to mention beloved companions. In one 1952 gimmick, a horse that supposedly possessed clairvoyant powers even composed a headline for a LIFE story about herself. (She was clairvoyant, but not creative: the headline was “Talking Horse.”)

To celebrate horses now and then, here’s a look back at 25 of the most memorable horses in LIFE’s pages.

Polo ponies at the Peachtree Ranch in Texas, 1939.

Carl Mydans The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Championship horse Seabiscuit after winning the Santa Anita Handicap, 1940.

Peter Stackpole The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A doctor listened to a horse’s heart at University of Pennsylvania’s School of Veterinary Medicine, 1940.

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Moroccan soldier of the French expeditionary force held the General’s Arabian horse, 1940.

Margaret Bourke-White The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A stallion tried to make friends with a barn cat, 1943.

Hansel Mieth The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A man watched his work horse drink from a water trough, 1944.

Fritz Goro The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Elizabeth Taylor posed with a saddle horse after her smash movie debut in “National Velvet,” 1945.

Peter Stackpole The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

These boys rode their horse to school, 1946.

Bernard Hoffman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A lucky horse joined the roulette action in Las Vegas, 1947.

Jon Brenneis The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Gene Autry, astride his horse Champion, surveyed his Ranch, 1948.

Loomis Dean The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The foreman of the JA Ranch, Clarence, Hailey Long, sat with his horse, 1949.

Leonard McCombe The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Mary Breckenridge ran the Frontier Nursing Service in Leslie Country, Kentucky, 1949.

Eliot Elisofon The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

“Lady Wonder,” a clairvoyant 27 year old talking horse, could count and spell its name by tipping over lettered panels, 1952.

Hank Walker The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

This child could look his miniature horse in the eye, 1952.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Baby horses scampered down the stretch at Los Alamitos track, 1952.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The horse sailed gracefully toward its tank in Atlantic City, N.J., 1953.

Peter Stackpole The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Midget thoroughbred filly, Big Bertha, and her mother on Woodland farm, 1954.

Lisa Larsen The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A six-year-old cowboy learned how to shoe a horse, 1954.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

This young girl rode her pony as a colt followed, 1956.

Robert W. Kelley The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

“Misty of Chincoteague,” a wild horse, indulged before returning home to Chincoteague Island, 1957.

Grey Villet The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harness racing at the All-Russia horse show at the Hippodrome, 1958.

Howard Sochurek The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Trader Horn nuzzled a young friend at Roosevelt Raceway, 1959.

Donald Uhrbrock The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Israeli children of the Habad sect at a farm village, 1960.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A troika race at Hippodrome, 1963.

Stan Wayman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Jimmy the horse rollerskated in front of his farm, 1963.

Joseph Scherschel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post Mane Event: LIFE’s 25 Most Memorable Horses appeared first on LIFE.

Twenty-five Delightful Pictures of Cats

Tue, 08 Aug 2017 10:00:47 +0000

In addition to the cats, these photos feature some familiar, feline-friendly humans: There’s a 1959 photo of Ernest Hemingway, who collected six-toed cats, with a cat helping itself to a glass of water. (Hemingway’s cats may have drunk more than water, with one letter suggesting the author fed one named “Friendless” whisky and milk when Hem was feeling lonely and wanted to drink with somebody.) And there’s Fred Astaire palling around in 1962 with the Siamese cat that fellow film star Kim Novak, also pictured, had given him. “Animals loved Daddy,” Astaire’s daughter Ava later told Vanity Fair‘s editor-at-large, Sarah Giles.

But it’s also clear that a cat can be a star, whether or not its owner is famous. For example, in 1958, Navy doctor Dietrich Beischer used magnet boots to train a kitten to chase a mouse upside-down—to get a sense of how humans would deal with weightlessness. Thus, the cat played an important role in the history of space travel. And as for a cat in a funny hat or a cat eating corn on the cob well, some things never change.

Here’s a look at 25 of the best feline photos in LIFE’s iconic archive of 20th century photography.

A kitten emerged from pot of milk after falling into it, 1940.

Nina Leen The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Aspiring ballerina Edwina Seaver relaxed on the sofa at home with Siamese cat Ting Ling, 1940.

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A cat nestled in a carrier during an air raid, 1941.

John Phillips The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Portrait of Blackie, LIFE photographer Gjon Mili’s cat, 1943.

Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A husky Persian cat posed with his ribbons and trophy at the Atlantic City Cat Show, 1945.

Jerry Cooke The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Rudy the Dachshund and Trudy the cat engaged in hide and seek or ‘pounce on the dog” in prelude to a friendly roughhousing wrestling match between the pet housemates. 1946.

Frank Scherschel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Baby, the seeing-eye cat, 1947.

Loran F. Smith The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Cat on wheels, 1948.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A cat named Monkey had a large hat collection, circa 1948/1949.

James Whitmore The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Nipper, the corn loving cat, 1951.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Russian-born American operatic mezzo-soprano Jennie Tourel sang as a cat named Blackie sat on a piano, 1952.

Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Sharon Adams, 10, played in a snow drift as her cat maintained its comfortable perch atop her head, 1952.

A. Y. Owen The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Dutch billiards prodigy Renske Quax fed cream to his cat, 1953.

Nat Farbman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fresh milk at Arch Badertscher’s dairy farm. 1954.

Nat Farbman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Pets of the Lyng family: Mitten the cat, Tosen the dog and an unnamed mouse, 1955.

Jytte Bjerregaard Muller The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Composer Alan Hovhaness worked in a score-littered studio while a black cat nestled among the papers on the piano, 1955.

Gordon Parks The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Kim Novak played with Siamese cats that were used in one of her movies, “Bell, Book and Candle,” 1958.

Eliot Elisofon The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Naval researcher Dr. Dietrich Beischer tested effects of being upside-down for prolonged periods of time on a cat and mouse, 1958.

Grey Villet The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ernest Hemingway sat while a cat drank out of a water glass on the table, 1959.

Tore Johnson The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Otto Preminger looked at stray cats while attending the Venice Film Festival, at which his film “Anatomy of a Murder” was shown, 1959.

Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Black cats and their owners lined up for an audition for the movie “Tales of Terror,” 1961.

Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ordinary striped tabby cats waited on a beach as a man went into the water to catch fish, 1962.

Carl Mydans The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fred Astaire danced with his Siamese cat on his shoulder, 1962.

John Swope The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

The manipulation of light created emotive and visual effects, 1963.

Nina Leen The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Poet Rod McKuen played a record on his stereo set while a pet Siamese cat nuzzled his face affectionately, 1967.

Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post Twenty-five Delightful Pictures of Cats appeared first on LIFE.

How John Dominis Photographed Wild Antelope Without a Telephoto Lens

Tue, 27 Jun 2017 10:00:26 +0000

The photographers on LIFE Magazine’s staff did it all, taking on assignments wide and varied without a blink of the eye. John Dominis was no exception. He joined LIFE as a staff photographer in 1950 and would go on to shoot some of the biggest stars of the era Steve McQueen, Frank Sinatra and Robert Redford to name a few. He also shot one of the most iconic images of the 20th century: Tommie Smith and John Carlos giving the black power salute at the Olympics in Mexico.

Here, LIFE looks back at one of his lesser known shoots—the African Antelope, which was a cover story and a follow up to The Great Cats of Africa, which would earn him Magazine Photographer of the year in 1966 and later become a book. In the Editor’s Note that accompanies the story, Dominis described how he was able to get the dramatic photo of the “bizarre wildebeest” (the last slide in the gallery above) without a telephoto lens.

“I wanted to get low-angle shots that gave a dramatic sense of their speed. I built boxes out of plywood and mounted cameras inside of them,” Dominis explained. “John [Mbuthi, a local whom Dominis worked with on the story] and I worked for three weeks with them. We’d go a mile ahead of a herd and put down the boxes and camouflage them. Then we’d hide a quarter of a mile away and wait maybe for several hours. Meanwhile the light might change and there was no way I could alter the exposure on the cameras. If the animal reached the boxes, I pushed the button that triggered the motorized cameras by a radio signal and ran off a whole roll of film. I must have exposed 40 rolls, but ended up with only one really good frame.”

Featured in this gallery are images provided by the Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas at Austin of these contraptions that John Dominis set up. These rarely seen images show a photographer at work and just how resourceful Dominis was in getting the shot.

The Briscoe Center recently acquired the John Dominis archive after his daughter, Dori Beer, reached out to the center. His longtime friend and photo editor M.C. Marden organized the collection, which contains a comprehensive look at his professional and personal work and life. While his archive won’t be open to the public until later in 2017, the Briscoe Center the photojournalism collection of which also includes the work of Diana Walker, Eddie Adams, Dirck Halstead and others is open for research and focuses on a behind-the-scenes look at how Americans experience the world, from politics to war to wildlife, via the media.

“Pictures like [Dominis” animal series] have something to say about how Americans (though magazines like LIFE) perceive the outside world,” said Ben Wright of the Briscoe Center, in a statement to LIFE. “These pictures and collections are not only beautiful and interesting: they’re historical evidence that help historians to understand the past with accuracy and integrity.”

John Dominis on assignment in Africa, 1969.

John Dominis Photographic Archive/UT Austin’s Briscoe Center

There are few more spectacular sights than a herd of oryx striding across the grasslands, with scores of saberlike horns glistening in the sun.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Soaring above the thick brush of East Africa, two impala moved with a flowing grace unsurpassed in the animal kingdom.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The gazelle is one of the fleetest of the antelope. Among it’s natural enemies, only the cheetah has a chance of running it down.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

John Dominis on assignment in Africa, 1969.

John Dominis Photographic Archive/UT Austin’s Briscoe Center

The wildebeest (South African Dutch for “wild beast”) are the oddest and fiercest-looking antelope of all.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post How John Dominis Photographed Wild Antelope Without a Telephoto Lens appeared first on LIFE.

The Rabbit Show

Fri, 14 Apr 2017 10:30:44 +0000

The LIFE photo archives are full of mysteries, great and small—and in this case, furry. At some point around 1943, LIFE sent a photographer to cover a Long Island Rabbit Breeders Association show. There are no contact sheets, no notes or captions were saved, and the photographs were never published. All that can be said is that the event was clearly hopping.

However, while these rabbits seem to have been pampered pets bred for show, one possible reason why rabbit breeding might have been pursued at the time was a lot more practical.

“During the wartime era, when meat was rationed, rabbit breeding was promoted by the USDA as an inexpensive way to raise meat for your own family,” says Margo DeMello, anthropologist and president of the House Rabbit Society, who co-authored Stories Rabbits Tell: A Natural and Cultural History of a Misunderstood Creature. “Many breeders sell them as meat and pets, and that was certainly the case in the ’40s, so these rabbits shows would’ve appealed to both audience.”

The history of cuniculture—the agricultural practice of breeding and raising domestic rabbits—of course goes back much further than that. The Romans kept rabbits in walled gardens known as leporaria. Since rabbit meat was thought to be an aphrodisiac and a fertility aid for women, rabbit breeding was a female-dominated industry. “Men would be responsible for larger animals, and women would be responsible for smaller animals that could be raised at home, closer to the children,” says DeMello, whose nine rabbits reside in their own wing of her home with their own private courtyard outside Albuquerque, N.M. (alongside six chihuahuas, three cats and a parrot).

And, though the WWII push for rabbit consumption might unnerve the Easter bunny, breeding rabbits as food does have Easter-time roots. Catholic monks in southern France are believed to have been some of the first people to domesticate rabbits, and are said to have popularized the practice at their monasteries throughout the Middle Ages, at which point the church apparently considered the ancient delicacy of “laurice” rabbit fetuses or newborns more like fish than animal meat, thus allowing them to be eaten during Lent.

1943 Rabbit Show

Marie Hansen The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

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