Go there now and you'll barely see a trace of it remaining.
Maybe a sweep of terrain, certainly a few footpaths that appear to follow the same route as they did a half century ago.
No, there is almost no hint that the Washington Park Zoo ever even existed on the southwest corner of the park along Vliet Street.
In fact, thanks to the construction of the stadium freeway, part of the park that once was home to the zoo indeed doesn't exist any longer. It is now under the road.
West Park Zoo – so named because it was located in what was originally called West Park, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted – began in 1892 with a small bird and mammal exhibit housed in a barn.
The first animals were a deer herd, an eagle and several bears donated by Gustav Pabst and Louis Auer.
The zoo expanded to include a bear den the following year and in 1899 the first permanent structure – the Herbivorous Building – was erected. A year later, the park and zoo were renamed Washington Park.
In the first two decades, the zoo – which had grown to 23 acres in 1902 and was the sixth largest zoo in the nation by 1907 – added a monkey cage, a sealion enclosure, a buffalo pen, an eagle aviary, a small mammal house and in 1910 a zoological society was created in 1910 to help support the growing zoo.
According to his 1942 obituary, architect Alfred C. Clas was likely responsible for most of the structures.
“He planned and supervised the construction of near all of the older park buildings in the county, including those of the Washington Park Zoological Gardens,” the Journal wrote.
Part of the stone wall that enclosed the buffalo pen, with a fence atop it, can be seen running near the Senior Center today.
In 1919, Zero arrived to become the first polar bear born in captivity in North America.
Current zoo fans may be interested to know the first monkey island was added to the zoo in 1925.
A sheep mountain, home to Bighorn Rocky Mountain Sheep gifted by the Canadian government, was built out of 5,000 tons of Lannon stone.
But by the twilight of the 1930s, the Washington Park Zoological Gardens was beginning to show serious signs of wear and was also hemmed in, with no room to grow. By 1947, the search for a new home had begun.
Fourteen years later, a new, 184-acre, $12.6 million zoo was opened in the Milwaukee County Zoo's current location.
But many Milwaukeeans had already gotten to know the new park as visitors were encouraged to come during its construction and as early as 1958 they could ride on the zoo train, which was completed that year.
Among the inhabitants making the move was the immortal gorilla, Samson, who had come to the zoo with Sambo in 1950 and remains a part of the zoo's mystique even today (despite the fact that his taxidermied remains are on display at the Milwaukee Public Museum Downtown).
After the animals were moved, over time, to the new facility, the Washington Park Zoo fell silent in 1963.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
