Description |
238 pages : map, portrait ; 22 cm |
Summary |
A resonant true story of small-town politics and community perseverance and of decent people and questionable choices, Zoo Nebraska is a timely requiem for a rural America in the throes of extinction. Royal, Nebraska, population eighty-onewhere the church, high school, and post office each stand abandoned, monuments to a Great Plains town that never flourished. But for nearly twenty years, they had a zoo, seven acres that rose from local peculiarity to key tourist attraction to devastating tragedy. And it all began with one mans outsize vision. When Dick Haskins plans to assist primatologist Dian Fossey in Rwanda were cut short by her murder, Dicks devotion to primates didnt die with her. He returned to his hometown with Reuben, an adolescent chimp, in the bed of a pickup truck and transformed a trailer home into the Midwest Primate Center. As the tourist trade multiplied, so did the inhabitants of what would become Zoo Nebraska, the unlikeliest boon to Royals economy in generations and, eventually, the source of a power struggle that would lead to the tragic implosion of Dick Haskins dream. |
Subject |
Haskin, Richard A., 1950-
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Zoo Nebraska (Royal, Neb.)
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Midwest Primate Center (Royal, Neb.)
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Captive chimpanzees -- Social aspects -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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Primates -- Social aspects -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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Zoo animals -- Social aspects -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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Captive wild animals -- Social aspects -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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Primatologists -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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Zoos -- Social aspects -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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Zoos -- Economic aspects -- Nebraska -- Royal.
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ISBN |
9781503901506 (hardcover) |
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1503901505 (hardcover) |
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