Herbert Edwin Bradley

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Herbert Edwin Bradley
Herbert Bradley with two lions he shot on the 1921–22 American Museum of Natural History expedition to the Belgian Congo
Born(1871-12-20)December 20, 1871
Brooklin, Ontario
DiedApril 22, 1961(1961-04-22) (aged 89)
Chicago
NationalityAmerican
Occupation(s)Lawyer, real estate investor and zoo director
Spouse
​
​
(m. 1910)​
ChildrenAlice Bradley Sheldon
With family 1924

Herbert Edwin Bradley (December 20, 1871 – April 22, 1961) was a Canadian-born American lawyer, real estate investor, big-game hunter and zoo director. Born to a farmer in

Brookfield Zoo
's animal committee in 1933, with responsibility for sourcing animals for the collection. He held this position and appointment as vice-president of the zoo until 1951, when he resigned to undertake an animal-collecting expedition in Africa.

Early life

Herbert Edwin Bradley was born in

Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law in Chicago.[1][2] After graduation he specialized in mining law and practiced in Chicago from 1901.[1][2] At around this time he became involved in real estate investment and erected apartments on South Side, Chicago.[2]

Bradley married Mary Hastings, a traveler and writer, in 1910.[3][1] The couple moved into an apartment at 5344 Hyde Park Boulevard in Chicago in 1912, where they would live for the rest of their lives.[4] The block has one building that had been built by Bradley, and they occupied the top floor, plus a penthouse and roof garden, and were accompanied by a staff of servants.[2] The couple had a daughter, Alice, in 1915; she later became a science fiction writer under the pseudonym James Tiptree Jr.[3]

1921–22 expedition

Bradley was a

Carl Ethan Akeley's American Museum of Natural History expedition to the Belgian Congo in 1921.[1] Some contemporaries described his decision to take his wife and child on the expedition as "madness".[5] The expedition searched for gorillas, which had been little studied up to that time.[5] As well as trailing and photographing the animals, the expedition shot and killed five for recovery and preservation as museum exhibits.[5][6][7]

Some of the gorilla meat was eaten by members of the expedition.[7] Akeley recalled that when Bradley shot one large and placid male that "it took all one's scientific ardour to keep from feeling like a murderer" and Mary, discussing the same event, noted she would "never forget the humanness of that black, upturned face". [6] She later campaigned for gorillas to be protected from game hunters and for protective reservations to be established.[7] During the expedition Bradley and Alice became ill, and a series of blood transfusions from Mary were required to save their lives.[4] The expedition returned to the United States in 1922, and Bradley spent the following two years in convalescence.[1][4] Mary wrote On the Gorilla Trail in 1922 about the expedition.[1]

Later life

Bradley and his family undertook a second expedition to the Congo in 1924, which was the first to move through the country west of

Indochina to hunt tigers.[1]

Bradley was involved with Chicago's

Brookfield Zoo and in 1933 became chair of their animal committee, tasked with gathering animals for the collection.[8] He later became a vice president of the zoo, though he resigned in 1951 to embark upon an animal-collecting expedition to Africa.[9] Bradley had aimed to bring okapis to the zoo since 1939 and achieved his aim in 1955.[10] He died in Chicago on April 22, 1961.[11]

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 0-313-25887-2
    .
  2. ^
    ISBN 978-1-4668-8911-8
    .
  3. ^
    ISBN 978-0-941028-78-3
    .
  4. ^ a b c "Plans to Return Again to the Wilds of Africa". Daily Tribune. April 5, 1924.
  5. ^
    doi:10.1111/j.1542-734X.2006.00374.x
    .
  6. ^
    doi:10.1111/j.1542-734X.2006.00374.x
    .
  7. ^
    doi:10.1111/j.1542-734X.2006.00374.x
    .
  8. ISBN 978-0-913934-24-1
    .
  9. ^ Inc, Nielsen Business Media (1951). Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. p. 54. {{cite book}}: |last1= has generic name (help)
  10. ISBN 978-0-913934-24-1
    .
  11. ISBN 0-313-25887-2
    .
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