He owned a Lion?!

Here is my copy pasted script for the episodes, and the photos of Adalord as promised!

I have to imagine Bremerton in the 70’s wasn’t too different from bremerton today, at least in one respect. and that respect, is morning coffee. Sailors and strippers and yardbirds and cable guys, We all get up, turn on our percolators. Take a warm cup over to the window, to see how to fog looks today. We listen to the sound of reveille, the crying of the gulls and… the roar of a lion?!

I know that seems crazy but for fifteen years, it was true.

In December of 1962, Dr. David Relling of Perry Avenue brought home a 2 day old african lion cub. The doctor had been working down at the point defiance zoo in Tacoma when the cub was born. Because the mother rejected the cub, The zoo saw fit to let Dr. Relling take the cub home. He named the little cub Adalord because he thought the name was stately. He was bottle fed in the beginning, and slept in the bed with Dr. Relling and his wife. Adalord would eventually grow to 400 lbs, eating 16 cans of dog food in a day.

Adalord became a fixture around town. Dr. Relling owned a veterinary clinic and folks would often hear the lion pacing about the deck above them while they waited for their appointments. Children would ask their parents, “Can we drive by the lion on the way home?”. He would roar at motorcycles and loud cars, enjoying a contest of sound. People started giving directions like, “Yes, go down perry until you pass the house with the lion, then make a left”. As a cub, Adalord attended a flower show and ate three prized chrysanthemums. This made the papers.

Dr. relling was a proud papa. He enjoyed showing folks Adalord’s “Baby book”, chock full of photos of little Adalord, sucking on a bottle. Of course, he had his own human children too. They were allowed to pet but not play with the lion because Adalord was, of course, a dangerous exotic animal. Though there is a rumor that they were allowed to bring him to show and tell at school. Yeah, I think they won that day.

We have laws against the ownership of exotic animals now, but they were passed surprisingly late. The Washington law was passed in 2007, and most states had laws on the books by 2014. But before that, it was fair game. And often, it was a rich man’s game.

Like MGM Grand, a casino and hotel in Las Vegas, with a built in Lion habitat from 1999-2012

Or Mike Tyson, who owned three bengal tiger cubs. Three was too many so he gave two to a wildlife rescue and kept one. This is the Tiger that appeared with him in the movie “The Hangover”.

https://www.the-sun.com/sport/7765428/why-did-mike-tyson-have-a-tiger/#:~:text=Tyson%20told%20GQ%20magazine%2C%20%22I,to%20play%20with%20the%20pet.

And of course, thanks to glory of netflix, we’ve recently had a peak inside of America’s “Private Zoo’s” in the reality TV show “Tiger King”.

https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/america-private-zoos-legislation/index.html

This is a feel good story about Bremerton so I’m not going to linger on this too long- Keeping exotic animals is dangerous, and Dr. Relling knew how dangerous this could be. Adalord was completely declawed and defanged. These practices are now considered inhumane and are banned in 38 other countries. My point is that it took extreme, invasive measure that could have affected the animals health to make “Adalord” quote unquote safe, making him into the local legend that I am talking about today. Dr Relling had more education and experience with animals from being a licensed Veterinarian and working with not just house pets, but also with zoo animals. I would guess that Dr. Relling had a big heart and couldn’t stand to think what would happen to baby Adalord. Because the truth is, when a mother rejects a cub, they die. Lion infanticide is common in the wild and mothers will reject cubs for a variety of reasons. We don’t know why Adalord’s mother rejected him but Dr. Relling was there to save him.

And at the time, people were literally adopting lion and tiger cubs into their families and their tiny new york apartments. If you could afford it, there was nothing to stop you until the animal became too much to manage and care for, like Christian the lion, from the 1971 documentary.

But it seems like Dr Relling was a professional and a realist. When the kitsap sun asked him how you housebreak a lion, he laughed and told them quote “You don’t. When he got up in the middle of the night, we got up too.” When the furniture started to break under the weight of a 400 lb lion, they built him his own house in the backyard where he could play and break things without worry. Dr Relling describes him as playful like a kitten, just not knowing his own strength, and sometimes being possessive of his toys.

So, Adalord the lion made his home in Bremerton until he passed away gently in his sleep, in 1978. He was 15 years old, which is geriatric for a male, african lion. They usually only live about ten years. Adalord was buried on the relling property in a funeral ceremony befitting the king of the jungle, the wild lion king of Bremerton.

I’ve got articles and pictures over on the blog if you would like to see Adalord, the Lion King of Bremerton.

Now, are you ready to hear about bremerton’s secret second lion?

While I was researching Adalord, I learned about Sheba. Sheba was a three day resident of Bremerton, living on Marguerite ave. A gentleman purchased her from someone down in Portland and brought her back to Bremerton. She weighed 70 lbs, and was about 4 months old. At that age, she slept 14-16 hrs a day and her owner took her out on a leash for a two mile run every day. This is how the Bremerton pd discovered them- Jogging down the street near 15th and Bloomington! The article goes on to say that the owner of the lion was put in touch with quote unquote local animal experts and includes many opinions from Dr. Relling. I have to imagine that Dr. Relling is the unnamed local animal expert. There’s certainly no one else more qualified. After some conversation, the owner of Sheba agreed that she would be better off in different hands and she went to live on the Olympic Game farm on the other side of the hood canal bridge.

10% blackberry

Launch day is here!