SLATER PARK ZOO, This zoo, while not a large as Roger Williams,
was just as popular for a long time. Zoo started to show signs of “fading away”
beginning during the 1970s. It’s most popular resident was Fanny the Elephant.
A former circus elephant she resided in Slater Park Zoo in Pawtucket, RI
from 1958-93. She was moved to the Cleveland Amory Black Beauty Ranch
sanctuary in 1993 because the city closed the zoo exhibits due to financial crises.
She lived the last 10 years of her life happily and died in 2003.
A statue to her memory stands in Slater Park. Many, many Rhode Islanders
at one time or another had probably fed her a peanut or two!
photo courtesy of Robert Schwartz
I remember going to Slater Zoo as a child. My dad finally quit taking us there because he said the place was always dirty and smelled bad. I remember the animals in cages back then, not the habitats they had for them now.
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