 Packy's History
Packy Premier Press
Packy's Birthday News Release
PACKY'S HISTORY
A Portland elephant icon named Packy, who has been the city's pride and joy since the day he was born, continues in 2002 to be the centerpiece of the Oregon Zoo.
April 14 will mark the 40th birthday of this world renown Asian elephant . Yet despite his fame, Packy remains the most mellow and laid-back resident at the zoo's large pachyderm complex.
"At 40, Packy is the perfect gentleman," said keeper Jeb Barsh. "He is calm, trustworthy, and easy to work with." Barsh believes Packy's docile temperament is because he's at ease and happy with his zoo environment. "He has no memories of other places," Barsh said. "He was born here, it has always been his home and he is content."
On April 14, the zoo will present Packy with a special birthday cake topped with veggies, fruit and other goodies he likes. The cake will weigh some 35 pounds. If past performances hold true, Packy will excitedly bat at it with his trunk, maybe stomp on it, perhaps even sit on it -- but consume it down to the last tasty bite.
Of course, a 35-pound cake is a mere morsel for an elephant who daily consumes 250 pounds of timothy hay, another 30 to 50 pounds of seasonal fruit, not to mention grain, some brouse and bambooand numerous nutritional minerals and vitamins.
"He loves to eat,"Barsh said. "But it all must agree with him -- he's always in excellent health."
As the zoo's main attraction for the last 40 years, Packy's upcoming birthday bash is expected to bring in a large crowd of zoo visitors that day, rain or shine. Besides eating free birthday cake themselves, they will be entertained by a number of special zoo events. Packy's yearly birthday party is a simple reminder that he has always been a very special "Elephant King" to Portlanders.
He is the first elephant in captivity to ever be conceived, born and raised in a zoo. At his birth he was the first elephant to be born in the  Western Hemisphere in 44 years. Previously, only 8 elephants had been born since the first one was brought to America in 1796 -- of which only one lived past seven months.
He was the beginning of an Oregon Zoo elephant dynasty, which has brought international fame to Portland. The zoo's animal husbandry techniques in the art of producing and rearing endangered Asian elephants will likely long outlive Packy himself. In the last four decades, there have been 27 baby elephants born at the zoo, seven sired by the birthday boy.
Over the years, the zoo has had pachyderms as high as an elephant's eye and in all shapes and sizes ranging from six-ton bulls to squealing infants. They have provided zoo visitors a constant spectacle of delight -- and zoo professionals with a wealth of research and information on the art of "bringing up elephants."
Packy is the only second generation captive bull elephant to become a successful father in world zoo history. Two of his offspring, Rama and Sung-Surin, are presently residing with him at the zoo. Packy's father, Thonglaw, (who died in 1974) may easily have been called "The Elephant Father of the World." Besides Packy, he fathered a record 14 other babies.
This year's 40th birthday story all began in 1960 when Thonglaw and two cows, Belle and Pet, were brought to the zoo by noted animal trader Morgan Berry of Woodland, Wash. Berry at the time had sold the zoo several of its larger, exotic animals and had sometimes rented space at the zoo's elephant house for some of his pachyderms.
The zoo's veterinarian at the time, Dr. Matthew Mayberry, always called the start of the zoo's baby explosion a "happening," rather than any planned situation. Belle came into heat shortly after her zoo arrival and she and Thonglaw mated only once, July 19, 1960.
From then on, Mayberry kept a meticulous day-to-day chart on her pregnancy. Always a quiet, docile animal, Belle (who died in 1997) behaved normally in the succeeding months of her pregnancy. She didn't even look the part until her 16th month. But by her 18th month, Belle began to show quite a bit of discomfort, particularly when she lay down. For Mayberry and senior elephant keeper Al Tucker, it was the beginning of a hectic time. Like zoo men everywhere, they knew little about elephant births and there were few books of any use on the subject.
A tough-minded pragmatist with broad wildlife obstetrical experience, Mayberry had delivered lions, tigers and buffaloes at the zoo -- but no elephants. Mayberry always said in those days that "I learned from Belle and she learned from me."
By the 19th month, Mayberry both felt and heard a fetal heartbeat. As Belle continued to suffer discomfort, he though it was "just a matter of time." No one then even was sure what an elephant's gestation period was. Packy's birth and succeeding ones at the zoo established that it ranges between 21 and 23 months.
But in 1962, Mayberry had nothing to go on. Neither he nor anyone else at the zoo had even witnessed an elephant birth. And so everyone at the zoo kept their fingers crossed and hoped for the best.
Meanwhile, zoo director Jack Marks decided it was time to let Portlanders know they had a pregnant elephant on their hands. The city immediately went elephant crazy.
Radio stations launched hourly "Belle Bulletins." Downown stores did a landoffice business in stuffed pachyderms of all shapes and sizes. Schoolchildren drew elephant pictures for their art classes. Newspapers created headlines with words like "elephanticipating." The zoo was deluged with baby shower gifts for Belle. Florists sent huge papier-mache booties with roses, the city's previous claim to fame.
Later, a citywide contest to name the new baby drew 35,000 entries. Packy won over such suggestions as Belle Boy, Ding Dong, Porty and Nogero (Oregon spelled backwards). The winning entry was submitted by Wayne French, a Gresham school teacher.
By late January, the baby's kicking was quite visible -- and often, violent. The zoo professionals waited, and waited and waited some more. Both the Portland media and international press kept calling Marks almost daily asking: "When?" The delayed, or what was thought to be delayed, pregancy brought letters of advice and strange remedies to the zoo from all over the globe.
Mayberry's main problem was he didn't know what to expect. Nearly a century before, a circus elephant had attempted to trample each of her four babies when they were born and refused to nurse them. Mayberry didn't take any chances with Belle. He had plans to feed the baby a special formula based on powdered milk, if he had to.
 He also had a resucitator, respirator and a special 110-volt electric prod available near the maternity room to prevent Belle from trampling the baby. He even had a plan to weigh the baby on a set of shipping room scales, an idea he admitted later "was real crazy."
During the final weeks of Belle's pregnancy, Mayberry actually slept at the elephant house and Marks was up to his ears with newsmen from all over the world. Belle had become the hottest animal story in the past few decades. When she finally did give birth, Marks collapsed from the strain of it all -- and spent most of Packy's first day resting up in a hospital bed. The actual birth came at 5:58 a.m. on a chilly Saturday morning.
It was preceded by five hours of Belle squatting and straining in the maternity room she shared with Pet and Portland's own two elephants, Rosy and Tuy Hoa. Thonglaw was off in another room by himself but he knew what was going on, according to Mayberry.
Elephants use the "auntie" system when babies are born; the mother selects another female to stand by in case care or help is needed. Pet was Belle's auntie.
When Belle was in labor early that day, she would frequently lie down and Pet would kneel beside her and gently massage her stomach with her knees. Whenever the pain was sharpest, Belle would squeal -- and Pet, Rosy and Tuy Hoa would gather around her and squeal in unison.
Shortly before the birth, Belle began bellowing loudly, her eyes wide and bulging. She constantly strained and pushed against the walls and bars and alternately kneeled and stood. Then she stopped bellowing and began to cross and uncross her hind legs. She started to spin about rapidly and silently in circles. And then -- plop! Suddenly Packy came, feet first, falling in a heap on the floor.
Outside the room watching were Mayberry and keepers, each holding his breath. Suddenly, Belle turned and started to kick the baby and they all were about to open the gate and rush in to save it. Then they realized that Belle was doing what any good doctor would do -- spank the baby to start it breathing.
When Packy began to breath, Belle immediately started to gently push him with her trunk to get him to stand up on his unsteady legs. It took her 10 minutes to get him righted. Then, with her trunk, she led him to her breast. He quickly got the idea and minutes later was noisily nursing.
Meanwhile, keepers had moved Pet, Rosy and Tuy Hoa to another room where they began trumpeting Packy's arrival. The trio were quickly joined by the nearby Thonglaw. The din was deafening and continued for some time, waking up West Hills residents who were the first to learn about Portland's new baby elephant.
Packy stood 3 feet tall and weighed 225 pounds at birth. News about him spread rapidly. Newspapers, television and radio stations around the world announced his birth. Life magazine covered the event with an 11-page spread written by Shana Alexander. Later she wrote a book on elephants -- and dedicated it to Dr. Mayberry whom she called "her elephant teacher."
During his first days on public view, Packy attracted some of the largest crowds ever seen at the zoo. He was responsible in 1962 for the zoo topping a million in attendance figures for the first time in its history.
Shortly after his birth, Portlanders raised $30,000 to purchase the mother and son from Berry, who had been offered as much as $50,000 for the pair. But Berry wanted them to remain at the Portland zoo where he knew his good friend Marks would see they had the best of care. Then, in a beau geste, Berry gave Thonglaw and Pet to the city as a gift rather than break up the elephant family.
 Packy is now the biggest known Asian elephant in captivity, standing 10' 6" at the shoulder and tipping the scales at 13,500 pounds. But to zoo pros like Mike Keele, assistant Oregon Zoo director, he is much more than that. "He is this nation's symbol of elephant conservation today and for the future,"said Keele, who noted Packy ranks No. 1 among all Asian elephant breeding bulls in North America.
Keele holds the Asian elephant breeding book for the American Association of Zoological Parks and Aquariums, the basic "stud book" for North America. The book is the official resource for the the Asian elephant's computer dating service -- and ensures the proper genetic management of the present elephant population.
Already an endangered species, the Asian elephants number an estimated 34,000 or so in the Far East wild tracts of such nations as India, Cambodia, Thailand,Ceylon, Malaya and Myanmar (formerly Burma). This compares with 750,000 African elephants still in the wild.
"And their conditions are not improving," Keele added, noting that the human population of the Asian elephant's native countries is expected to double in the new century. "For humans to survive, it will be necessary to turn much of the Asian elephant's current terraine into agricultural land, drastically reducing their already dwindling habitat." He stressed that thanks to data gathered from Packy's birth and growth the zoo world has been furnished with numerous breeding and rearing techniques for Asian elephants. "In that sense, Packy's legacy of his first 40 years of life has been pivotal towards helping conserve his species on earth," Keele said.
An Asian elephant's life span is roughly some 55 to 65 years -- and, given proper care, perhaps more. Portlanders thus know that on April 14 they hopefully will have another quarter century to celebrate birthday parties with their Elephant King.
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