"In his older years, he was a very loveable guy with one exception - the orangutan," Wyatt said. He frequently made obscene gestures to onlookers and threw the occasional tantrum. A zoo in Atlanta claimed to have an older chimp than Jimmy, but most experts sided with the Rochester icon.Īs he got older, Jimmy was described in news accounts as getting grumpier. Jimmy's exact date of birth was never established, and his advanced age later became the focus of worldwide attention. Zoo officials presented Jimmy with a banana cream pie at the annual celebrations, which always padded zoo attendance. About 5,000 children and adults showed up for Jimmy's 50 th birthday party in 1980. Jimmy particularly liked elderly people, his longtime keeper said, and did the same toward them while bobbing his head up and down.Ĭrowds of visitors shared the love. Jimmy recognized him, and the two threw kisses to each other. A 1979 Upstate magazine mentioned a retired zoo foreman who came back to visit after three years. Jimmy had his "favorite people" whom he treated gently, Wyatt said. I felt very privileged that he liked me." He would reach his finger out and just groom my arm very gently. "He would get very excited when he would see me. Jeff Wyatt, the zoo's veterinarian since 1982, said workers eventually built a barrier that was "Jimmy-proof." Jimmy, he said, was a "rule the roost sort of guy," but he connected quickly with Wyatt. Jimmy also once bit off a finger of Gambar's mate, Tanora.ĭr. Gambar reached in and choked Jimmy and only let go when Jimmy bit his arm. In 1975, the chimp got into a run-in with Gambar, a male orangutan housed next to Jimmy. At one time, his likeness was featured on boxes of popcorn sold at the zoo.Īlmost everyone loved Jimmy - with one major exception. Newspapers often ran photos of Jimmy and updated readers about his hijinks. Sister and Tuffy were traded to other zoos. Jimmy lived alone in his cage since 1938 and preferred it that way. "He put his arm around me and kissed me just to show how sorry he was," the curator said. The zoo's curator and animal trainer calmed Jimmy down and he demonstrated his tenderness. He upped and threw things - chairs, tables, pans, pots, everything he could lay his hands on as attendants fled the room." Saturday, for instance, he broke a chain in his cage and the attendants took it from him … That he didn't like. "Jimmy, the largest of the chimps, will take no bows this season," a 1938 Democrat and Chronicle story stated.
The show only lasted a few years, largely because of Jimmy's rambunctiousness. Jimmy quickly established himself as king of the chimps. He arrived with two other chimps, Sister and Tuffy, and the three were trained to ride bicycles, comb people's hair, eat at a table with silverware and more. Born in the wild somewhere in the African Congo, Jimmy was thought to be at least a year old when he got to the Seneca Park Zoo.
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