November 22, 2024 • 8 mins
It might shock you to know how recently human beings were kidnapped and used as exotic displays at world fairs, museums, zoos, and all sorts of shows for public entertainment. This is one man’s story about being trapped…in a human zoo.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, ask yourself, what would it be like to
be kidnapped, brought to a completely foreign place and put
on public display like you're not even human. It happened
as recently as the early nineteen hundreds. I'm Patty Steele
the Human Zoo. Next on the backstory. The backstory is back.
(00:24):
Imagine your life is in a small African village just
over one hundred years ago. It's pretty idyllic. All you
know is family and tribal culture among the Umbuti people,
like hunting, gathering in the forest, and living with nature
in a sort of isolated world until it all comes undone.
That was the life of Ota Benga in what was
(00:46):
then called the Congo Free State and later the Belgian Congo.
It was brutally run by King Leopold of Belgium, who
enslaved indigenous people into forced labor, brutalizing them if production
wasn't a to snuff with death, torture and even amputation.
Oda's tribe, the Imboudi people, were the smallest of the
(01:07):
pygmy tribes in Africa, with adults averaging around four feet
eight inches tall, and so they were looked at as
exotic by westerners. As well as much of the rest
of the world, and that meant there was money to
be made above and beyond forced labor in the two
big local industries, ivory and rubber. Oda was just twenty
(01:29):
years old and out on a hunting trip when local
slave traders attacked his village, murdering his wife and two
little children. When he comes home, he's kidnapped and sold
into slavery. Now around the same time, American businessman adventurer
as they called him, Samuel Phillips Werner, is asked to
travel to Africa to find a group of pigmies to
(01:52):
bring to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition better known as the
Saint Louis World's Fair of nineteen oh four. This is
his mission to bring back exotic people from Africa to
be displayed at the fair's anthropology days. It was talked
about as a scientific and cultural exhibition, but it was
(02:13):
really just a money making scheme intent on displaying what
they called the exotic savages from non European cultures. Odabanga
fits the bill, very small but young and strong, with
teeth that had been sharpened into points as per tribal custom.
So Verna makes a deal with the slave traders, and
(02:33):
he buys Oda for a bolt of cloth and some salt.
Werner later claimed that he'd rescued Odebanga from slavery, but
the rescue did not involve any choice on Oda's part.
So think about it. You're taken from the only home
you've ever known after the murder of your family, stripped
of your identity, and forced into a world you can't
(02:56):
even comprehend. So Odabanga arrives at the Saint Louis World's Fair.
It's a massive event with millions of visitors, grand pavilions,
technological breakthroughs, and human exhibits. There are other individuals as well,
from other parts of Africa, from the Philippines and other
(03:16):
colonized areas. They're called a living example of a primitive
culture and are said to represent the stages of human evolution.
Dressed in minimal clothing and carrying a bow and arrow,
they're all presented as living examples of prehistoric man. What
would that feel like? Nothing familiar, including language, clothing, shelter,
(03:41):
and culture, and fair goers are gawking, laughing and taking
photos of you. They poke, prod and treat you sort
of like an animal in a zoo, you are simply
an object of curiosity. Now, after the fair, Verna brought
Odebanga back to the Congo, where he tried to resettle
him among another tribe called the Batwa, but it wasn't
(04:05):
his tribe. He married a young woman there who died
soon after being bitten by a snake. And then in
nineteen oh six, with his village gone, his family dead,
and the Congo is still a very dangerous place, he
decides to go with Werner back to the US. Werner
claims the return is for Oda's safety. He takes him
(04:26):
to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.
He basically sells him to them. The museum houses him
and studies him like a specimen, but he is totally homesick,
missing nature and everything about his old life in Africa.
Later that same year, it gets even worse. If you
can imagine that, Oda is moved to the Bronx Zoo,
(04:49):
where at first he's supposed to maintain the animal habitats,
but after the head of the zoo sees that people
are more fascinated by Odebanga than by the animals, the
place him in the monkey house in a cage alongside
an orangutang and other primates. He's primitively dressed and described
as the missing link between humans and apes. Once again.
(05:14):
For weeks, visitors flocked to see him, staring and laughing
as he's forced to perform tricks or smile for their cameras.
The zoo director defends the exhibit, claiming it's a valuable
scientific and educational tool, but black ministers in New York
are furious. They organize protests and write letters demanding Oda's release.
(05:36):
One minister, Reverend James Gordon, claims the display is dehumanizing
in a blatant form of modern day slavery, since Oda
has no freedom to leave. Finally, the zoo releases him.
Reverend Gordon helps him settle in Brooklyn while he tries
to get comfortable in American society. He learned some English
(05:56):
dresses in Western clothing and takes odd jobs to support himself,
but he's still miserable, and in nineteen ten, Reverend Gordon
helps him move to Lynchburg, Virginia, where he lives with
a black family while working in a tobacco factory. He
is loved in the community. Folks say they knew him
to be kind and curious about others. Now, the problem
(06:19):
is Oda is still struggling with feelings of isolation. He
misses Africa, but the outbreak of World War One makes
a return impossible. By nineteen sixteen, his spirit is broken,
unable to go home, and so disillusioned with the life
he was forced into, he sees no way out, and
(06:39):
so on March twentieth of nineteen sixteen, Oda borrows a revolver,
walks into a barn, and takes his own life. He
was just thirty two years old. Disappointingly, the American Museum
of Natural History has a life mask and body cast
of Oda Banga, and the display is still lay Pigmy
(07:01):
rather than with his name. Ode Benga's life story is
a stark reminder of the dehumanizing effects of racism, of
exploiting rather than appreciating and celebrating our differences. I hope
you like the backstory with Patty Steele. I would love
(07:22):
it if you would subscribe or follow for free to
get new episodes delivered automatically, and feel free to dm
me if you have a story you'd like me to cover.
On Facebook, It's Patty Steele and on Instagram Real Patty Steele.
I'm Patty Steele. The Backstory is a production of iHeartMedia,
Premieer Networks, the Elvis Durand Group, and Steel Trap Productions.
(07:47):
Our producer is Doug Fraser. Our writer Jake Kushner. We
have new episodes every Tuesday and Friday. Feel free to
reach out to me with comments and even story suggestions
on Instagram at Real Patty Steele and on Facebook at
Patty Steele. Thanks for listening to the Backstory with Patty Steele.
The pieces of history you didn't know you needed to know.
All right, ask yourself, what would it be like to
be kidnapped, brought to a completely foreign place and put
on public display like you're not even human. It happened
as recently as the early nineteen hundreds. I'm Patty Steele
the Human Zoo. Next on the backstory. The backstory is back.
(00:24):
Imagine your life is in a small African village just
over one hundred years ago. It's pretty idyllic. All you
know is family and tribal culture among the Umbuti people,
like hunting, gathering in the forest, and living with nature
in a sort of isolated world until it all comes undone.
That was the life of Ota Benga in what was
(00:46):
then called the Congo Free State and later the Belgian Congo.
It was brutally run by King Leopold of Belgium, who
enslaved indigenous people into forced labor, brutalizing them if production
wasn't a to snuff with death, torture and even amputation.
Oda's tribe, the Imboudi people, were the smallest of the
(01:07):
pygmy tribes in Africa, with adults averaging around four feet
eight inches tall, and so they were looked at as
exotic by westerners. As well as much of the rest
of the world, and that meant there was money to
be made above and beyond forced labor in the two
big local industries, ivory and rubber. Oda was just twenty
(01:29):
years old and out on a hunting trip when local
slave traders attacked his village, murdering his wife and two
little children. When he comes home, he's kidnapped and sold
into slavery. Now around the same time, American businessman adventurer
as they called him, Samuel Phillips Werner, is asked to
travel to Africa to find a group of pigmies to
(01:52):
bring to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition better known as the
Saint Louis World's Fair of nineteen oh four. This is
his mission to bring back exotic people from Africa to
be displayed at the fair's anthropology days. It was talked
about as a scientific and cultural exhibition, but it was
(02:13):
really just a money making scheme intent on displaying what
they called the exotic savages from non European cultures. Odabanga
fits the bill, very small but young and strong, with
teeth that had been sharpened into points as per tribal custom.
So Verna makes a deal with the slave traders, and
(02:33):
he buys Oda for a bolt of cloth and some salt.
Werner later claimed that he'd rescued Odebanga from slavery, but
the rescue did not involve any choice on Oda's part.
So think about it. You're taken from the only home
you've ever known after the murder of your family, stripped
of your identity, and forced into a world you can't
(02:56):
even comprehend. So Odabanga arrives at the Saint Louis World's Fair.
It's a massive event with millions of visitors, grand pavilions,
technological breakthroughs, and human exhibits. There are other individuals as well,
from other parts of Africa, from the Philippines and other
(03:16):
colonized areas. They're called a living example of a primitive
culture and are said to represent the stages of human evolution.
Dressed in minimal clothing and carrying a bow and arrow,
they're all presented as living examples of prehistoric man. What
would that feel like? Nothing familiar, including language, clothing, shelter,
(03:41):
and culture, and fair goers are gawking, laughing and taking
photos of you. They poke, prod and treat you sort
of like an animal in a zoo, you are simply
an object of curiosity. Now, after the fair, Verna brought
Odebanga back to the Congo, where he tried to resettle
him among another tribe called the Batwa, but it wasn't
(04:05):
his tribe. He married a young woman there who died
soon after being bitten by a snake. And then in
nineteen oh six, with his village gone, his family dead,
and the Congo is still a very dangerous place, he
decides to go with Werner back to the US. Werner
claims the return is for Oda's safety. He takes him
(04:26):
to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.
He basically sells him to them. The museum houses him
and studies him like a specimen, but he is totally homesick,
missing nature and everything about his old life in Africa.
Later that same year, it gets even worse. If you
can imagine that, Oda is moved to the Bronx Zoo,
(04:49):
where at first he's supposed to maintain the animal habitats,
but after the head of the zoo sees that people
are more fascinated by Odebanga than by the animals, the
place him in the monkey house in a cage alongside
an orangutang and other primates. He's primitively dressed and described
as the missing link between humans and apes. Once again.
(05:14):
For weeks, visitors flocked to see him, staring and laughing
as he's forced to perform tricks or smile for their cameras.
The zoo director defends the exhibit, claiming it's a valuable
scientific and educational tool, but black ministers in New York
are furious. They organize protests and write letters demanding Oda's release.
(05:36):
One minister, Reverend James Gordon, claims the display is dehumanizing
in a blatant form of modern day slavery, since Oda
has no freedom to leave. Finally, the zoo releases him.
Reverend Gordon helps him settle in Brooklyn while he tries
to get comfortable in American society. He learned some English
(05:56):
dresses in Western clothing and takes odd jobs to support himself,
but he's still miserable, and in nineteen ten, Reverend Gordon
helps him move to Lynchburg, Virginia, where he lives with
a black family while working in a tobacco factory. He
is loved in the community. Folks say they knew him
to be kind and curious about others. Now, the problem
(06:19):
is Oda is still struggling with feelings of isolation. He
misses Africa, but the outbreak of World War One makes
a return impossible. By nineteen sixteen, his spirit is broken,
unable to go home, and so disillusioned with the life
he was forced into, he sees no way out, and
(06:39):
so on March twentieth of nineteen sixteen, Oda borrows a revolver,
walks into a barn, and takes his own life. He
was just thirty two years old. Disappointingly, the American Museum
of Natural History has a life mask and body cast
of Oda Banga, and the display is still lay Pigmy
(07:01):
rather than with his name. Ode Benga's life story is
a stark reminder of the dehumanizing effects of racism, of
exploiting rather than appreciating and celebrating our differences. I hope
you like the backstory with Patty Steele. I would love
(07:22):
it if you would subscribe or follow for free to
get new episodes delivered automatically, and feel free to dm
me if you have a story you'd like me to cover.
On Facebook, It's Patty Steele and on Instagram Real Patty Steele.
I'm Patty Steele. The Backstory is a production of iHeartMedia,
Premieer Networks, the Elvis Durand Group, and Steel Trap Productions.
(07:47):
Our producer is Doug Fraser. Our writer Jake Kushner. We
have new episodes every Tuesday and Friday. Feel free to
reach out to me with comments and even story suggestions
on Instagram at Real Patty Steele and on Facebook at
Patty Steele. Thanks for listening to the Backstory with Patty Steele.
The pieces of history you didn't know you needed to know.
Host
Patty Steele
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