Behind an Egyptian gateway and a great plaster Memnon, Warren Frazee kept Nile crocodiles and Everglades alligators, some said to be centuries old. There were also pelicans, flamingoes and snake eggs. The shipment of some 2,000 alligators, lizards, turtles and possums arrived three days early, in February 1915, and threw the compound into confusion. A sea cow was accidentally dumped out of her tank.
Todd was unimpressed by the reptiles, who slept with their mouths open on the sandy rims of their tanks. The show had done well elsewhere but not here. Frazee died of pneumonia during the fair, and the concession's affairs had to be wound up.
At a glance
- Operated by Warren Frazee, who died during the Exposition.
- Animals arrived February 9, 1915.
- Entered through an Egyptian gateway beneath a great plaster Memnon.
Afterward
Closed after its owner's death; demolished with the Zone in 1916.
Sources
- Frank Morton Todd, The Story of the Exposition, vol. II (1921), ch. XXIX, p. 158
- Frank Morton Todd, The Story of the Exposition, vol. II (1921), ch. LXV, pp. 356-357
- Map of the Zone concessions, spring 1915 (reproduced in 'Let Me Get There', USC Scalar), Spring 1915 map of the Zone concessions