Last captive thylacine died - September 7, 1936

On this day in 1936, the last thylacine, aka Tasmanian tiger, died at the Hobart Zoo in Tasmania. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class it's production of I Heart Radio. Hi,
I'm Eves and Welcome to This Day in History Class,
a show that uncovers a little bit more about history
every day. Today is September seven. The day was September seven,

(00:27):
ninety six. The last dial A scene, also known as
the Tasmanian tiger, died at the Hobart Zoo in Tasmania
in nineteen six. After no Dialocene had been spotted for
fifty years, the animal was declared extinct. The thala scene
scientific name Thalacenus sinocephalus, was a large carnivorous marsupial. Its

(00:52):
fur was short and yellowish brown or gray, and it
had dark stripes across its back from its shoulders to
its tail. Its head looked like a dog or wolves,
and its ears were small, and females had a pouch
for carrying their young. The thalacene was mainly nocturnal. It
once lived all over Australia, from New Guinea to Tasmania,

(01:15):
but in recent times it was found only in Tasmania.
The first recorded killing of a Dialocene by Europeans happened
in eighteen o five, after it was killed the Lieutenant
Governor of Tasmania. William Patterson sent a description of the
animal to the Sydney Gazette. He wrote, it is very
evident this species is destructive and lives entirely on animal food.

(01:39):
On dissection, his stomach was filled with a quantity of kangaroo.
This deprecating take of thalacenes was also evident in later
European communications. Tasmania's Assistant surveyor George Prudeaux Harris wrote that
the animal had a savage and malicious appearance, and that
it appeared inactive and stupid. Thyla scenes were also considered

(02:02):
a threat to sheep, though they were still quote cowardly
and by no means formidable to man, as later assistant
surveyor George William Evans put it in an e book.
Since the thi la scene was viewed as destructive to
flocks of sheep, it was hunted and people offered rewards
for killing the animal. But the rhetoric around the thalacenes

(02:24):
savagery was just myth. Minister John West of Lawn System
wrote in eighteen fifty the thylacene kills sheep, but confines
its attack to one at a time, and is therefore
by no means as destructive to a flock as the
domestic dog become wild, or as the dingo of Australia,
which both commit havoc in a single night. Still reports

(02:49):
exaggerated the abundance of thy la scenes, how many sheep
they killed, and how many bounties were paid to kill them.
Thyla scenes were being blamed for the attacks of wild dogs,
horror management, rural depressions, and other things that affected agricultural production.
Though some people spoke up against thy lacene killings, the

(03:09):
animal continued to get bad press and was the subject
of propaganda. The government even offered a bounty of one
pound for every adult thalacene killed and ended up sponsoring
the killing of two thousand, one d and eighty four
dialacenes by the beginning of the twentieth century, the number
of thalacenes killed and bounties offered decreased. Throughout the beginning

(03:33):
of the century, the animal became rarer as it faced
competition from wild dogs, the destruction of its habitat, and
disease in addition to hunting. The last known wild dialacene
was shot in nineteen thirty. The last captive thalacene, named
Benjamin after its death was held at the Hobart Zoo.

(03:54):
It died on September seventh, nineteen thirty six, probably from neglect.
The Thala scene was reportedly locked out of its shelter
and could have died from the cold that July. Before
Benjamin died, Tasmania had listed the Thila scene as a
protected species. The Thala scene was listed as an endangered

(04:15):
species until it was declared extinct by the International Union
for Conservation of Nature in nineteen eighty two and the
Tasmanian government in nineteen eighty six. In nine, Australia declared
September seven National Threatened Species Day. I'm each Jeff Code

(04:35):
and hopefully you know a little more about history today
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(04:57):
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