The Born Free legacy
In the years following the publication of Born Free and the completion of the film, George and Joy Adamson created an enduring legacy that continues to this day
Part two explores how the publication and film created a legacy that lasts to this day
JOY Adamson’s book, Born Free, was published in 1960 and was an instant hit. She had travelled alone to London wearing a huge lion skin coat made from the pelt of an animal that had been shot by George, with no sense at all of the irony in what she was doing. She would do a similar thing years later when she posed for press photographs cuddling a leopard cub while wearing a coat and hat made of leopard skin! In London she hawked her idea around the publishing houses before finding a sympathetic ear at Harvill Press. Many commentators believe that she relied heavily on George’s diaries for her book, and that her notes required vast amounts of editing by the publishing house before they were usable. This may have been so, but there is no denying that the book took the world by storm.
George was astonished by the reports of how well the book was being received, while Joy maintained that she always knew it would be a success! Joy’s publisher had kept the price as low as possible and filled the book with wonderful photographs. ‘Booksellers were bombarded with promotion displays; the Sunday Times were persuaded – quite against their better judgement – to carry a pictorial serial; and printed a very large run,’ wrote George. ‘The impact was instant and phenomenal. The Sunday Times begged for more pictures and copies of the book were gone in a week. We were told that people were unwrapping their books on the pavement to gaze at the pictures.’
It was not long before George and Joy were receiving the first in a long line of distinguished visitors. Julian Huxley and his wife were among the first, and Huxley described the powerful impact the lions made on him, both personally and as a scientist; the chairman of UNESCO came to stay; and so did David Attenborough, who made a television documentary about Elsa and her cubs for the BBC.
George estimated that Joy earned over half a million pounds from the book in the first ten years, and over time it certainly made her a millionaire. But astonishingly not a penny of it went to George. Sandy Gall wrote, ‘Whether out of stinginess or spite, Joy refused to share any of the royalties with George, who in a sense could be called the real author.’ Many of George’s friends thought that ‘she enjoyed having financial control over him’ and she was furious when George wrote his first autobiography, Bwana Game, and established a degree of financial independence. In fact, almost all the money Joy made was invested in trusts that she had set up with accountants in London and Nairobi, to accumulate money for the benefit of wildlife.
George had retired from his job as a wildlife warden in 1961 and devoted himself to raising lions that were unable to look after themselves, training them to survive in the wild and, just like Elsa, releasing them. His old boss, Willie Hale, was in no doubt that ‘Joy had spoiled George’s career as a game warden and forced him to retire early’. But Hale was equally clear that without Joy, the story of George and his lions, and the things he taught the world about the habits of lions and the importance of conservation, would never have been shared.
In 1964, the story was to be told on the big screen in a way that would dramatically change George and Joy’s lives, as well as the lives of the two actors, husband and wife Bill Travers and Virginia Mckenna, who played George and Joy in the film. George remembered the first time he met them, and wrote, ‘As Bill and Virginia walked up my concentration was divided. I was naturally curious to size up this enormous young man who was to take over my life, as it were. At the same time I could not take my eyes off Virginia; I was enchanted by her beauty and wonderful smile. Many thoughts rushed through my mind. How on earth would this very tall man get inside my modest figure, and what would he do with me? Even more disconcerting, what havoc would the rigours of Africa play with this lovely, fair-skinned and delicate girl?’ And how would they cope with the lions?
Astonishingly, 23 lions and lionesses were procured for the filming from a wide variety of sources around the world, and George was retained to decide which of them could be used, train them, and oversee all of their appearances on set. It is a touchingly beautiful film and it made its producers a great deal of money when it was released in 1966, also winning two Academy Awards and being nominated for three Golden Globes. Joy returned to Kenya from a worldwide speaking tour to be present on set, but she was forbidden to interfere with the shoot or have any involvement with the performances of the actors or the lions.
And, of course, there were the memorable scenes involving ‘Elsa’ sitting on the roof of the Series IIA as it drove slowly through an African village, past a bus full of tourists. Filming it was not quite so easy because Henrietta the lioness, who was usually more than happy to sit quietly on the Land Rover and be driven around, had spotted a chicken wandering through the crowded street. Quick as a flash she bounded from the top of the Land Rover and ran after the chicken, much to the dismay of the villagers, and then carried the dead bird back onto the roof of the Land Rover, where she ate it. The producers and directors were driven to distraction by such things because of the delays and the impact on production costs. Henrietta was far more nonchalant and just as the retake was underway she spotted another chicken, which met the same fate as the first one. As George said, ‘it was fun for the lion and the spectators, but hell for the director and the chickens!’
George was not at all keen on the film company’s executives and made it clear that things would happen his way, and only when he was good and ready. He was insistent that nothing cruel or unpleasant should be inflicted on any animals for the sake of the film, and this appears to have brought him into frequent conflict with the suits. George tried to argue that the lions should be released into the wild once filming was over, and he was profoundly upset by the complete lack of concern or interest on the part of the producers regarding the fate of the lions who had done them so proud. In his view, they were only interested in money and, once the shooting was over, they wanted the lions to disappear at as little cost to themselves as possible.
Much to George’s disgust, all but three of the lions used in the filming were sent to zoos in the USA and UK, and Henrietta was returned to the miserable life she had been leading in Entebbe Zoo. ‘George felt particularly bitter that the film company did not put a penny towards their rehabilitation,’ wrote Sandy Gall. ‘George had to cover the initial outlay himself, from his own meagre resources. They even refused to lend him one of their special Land Rovers fitted with a cage.’ George ensured the three lions he was able to keep out of captivity were released in the Meru Reserve in Kenya.
The story of what went on during the making of the film, how adversity and moments of great danger were overcome, the things that went well and others that did not, is a fascinating tale. By far the best account is in George’s book, My Pride and Joy, which is thoroughly recommended to anyone who wants to learn more about how the film was created.
George and Joy now lived apart in separate camps. Joy’s interests focussed on leopards and cheetahs while George remained devoted to lions, and these are not compatible on the same ground because they more or less hunt the same prey. If they come across each other’s young they will kill them, sensing the competition. George and Joy would never live together again, although they continued to see each other regularly, and the love-hate nature of their relationship continued.
Giles Remnant, who worked for George at the time, told Sandy Gall that Joy would often vent her frustration and exasperation by screaming at her African staff, who invariably did not understand what she was saying because her Swahili was awful and her English heavily tinged with an Austrian accent.
Remnant had already warned Joy about her behaviour towards her employees and told her that they wouldn’t put up with it, but she ignored his advice. Remnant’s concerns proved to be correct, because in 1980 Joy was murdered by one of her own staff. “She owed one of her staff 125 shillings,” Giles Remnant said. “She refused to pay him, told him to get out of her camp, never wanted to see him again, wouldn’t give him a lift, so he had to walk out. He was a young Turkana guy and he was very proud. He wasn’t going to take that sort of nonsense. He did leave camp, but he came back two weeks later to collect his money. She screamed and shouted at him again, and he pulled out his knife.” Joy died from a single stab wound to the heart.
‘George was appalled by the manner of Joy’s death,’ wrote Adrian House in his excellent book, The Last Safari. Joy left almost her entire estate to her Elsa Appeal, swelling its assets to over half a million pounds. Adrian House wrote, ‘She left George about £8,000 a year, which doubled his pension. Recurring reports that Joy had left him nothing and that he was on the breadline were nonsense. Even so, whatever he received was swiftly swallowed up by his work.’
George had for some years been settled in an area known as Kora. He built a camp there and continued to work with
“George tried to argue that the lions should be released into the wild once filming was over and he was profoundly upset by the complete lack of concern or interest on the part of the producers”
his lions. By now his global reputation had made ‘Kampi ya Simba’ an extraordinarily popular and trendy destination and he was often entertaining visitors. As Sandy Gall put it, there was also a succession of ‘pretty young women who flocked to Kora, attracted by the guru-like appeal of George’s personality’ who stayed for varying lengths of time as his assistant, secretary or helper. Visitors would typically arrive in a light aircraft and the pilot would buzz the camp to announce their arrival, before landing at the primitive dirt airstrip nearby.
On 20 August, 1989, an aircraft flew low over the camp and Inge Ledertheil, a German friend who was staying with George at the time, volunteered to drive to the airstrip to meet the passengers. She and a member of George’s team headed off in the newer of George’s two Land Rovers, but only after they had pushed it around the compound to get it started. On the way to the airstrip they were ambushed by three Somali bandits armed with automatic weapons.
The shots were heard back at the camp and George and four of his men set off immediately in the old Series III. They soon came upon the first Land Rover, abandoned in the middle of the road, and saw the three Somalis. George drove straight at them, firing his revolver as he went. One of the Somalis got off several bursts at the charging Land Rover and George was hit at least three times. He died instantly, together with two of his men. Sandy Gall wrote, ‘George died as he had lived, with great gallantry and instinctive courage’.
Virginia Mckenna and Bill Travers attended George’s funeral at Kora, where he was buried beside his brother Terence and Supercub, one of his lions. The following day, George’s friend Dougie Collins returned to the three graves. “I noticed lots of spoor and saw where the whole pride of lions had slept as though on guard,” he said. George had always believed that lions had a telepathic sense that humans had lost, so he would not have been the least surprised that his lions had turned up to pay their last respects.
Bill and Virginia had kept in close contact with George after the filming of Born Free, and Bill had involved George in the making of a new documentary about his lions entitled The Lions Are Free, as well as a new feature film, An Elephant Called Slowly, about an orphaned elephant named Pole Pole. Their friendship with George and their experiences with the lions had influenced them deeply and sparked a lifelong commitment to wildlife, and in particular they came to believe that wild animals belong in the wild and not in captivity. In 1984 they and their eldest son, Will, launched Zoo Check, a charity that in 1991 evolved into the Born Free Foundation. Bill Travers died in 1994 but Virginia Mckenna remains a committed and active trustee of the charity she and her husband had set up, while Will Travers is Born Free’s president.
Given Virginia and Bill’s close friendship with George Adamson, their roles in the Born Free film, and the fact that the film undoubtedly helped promote the Land Rover to a worldwide audience in a very favourable way, it was perhaps inevitable that the Born Free Foundation would become JLR’S Global Conservation Partner. What is perhaps surprising is that this did not begin until 2002, 36 years after the film had been released. Land Rover provided Defender vehicles to help with the Foundation’s projects in Kenya, Ethiopia, India and South Africa to support the charity’s vital field work, rescuing and protecting endangered species in some of the most remote locations on earth.
The Foundation also benefitted from one of the most highprofile events in JLR’S recent history, when the company created a unique Defender 90 that was to be auctioned as the
“George Adamson was well ahead of his time. Having lived virtually his whole life close to nature, he understood the need to respect the natural scheme of things. Man, in his view, had no right to upset the balance”
‘2,000,000th Defender’. All the proceeds from the auction were to be donated to the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, and the Born Free Foundation. Virginia Mckenna and her son, Will Travers, were among the group of celebrities, JLR executives and VIPS who ‘assembled’ the vehicle, which sold at a dedicated Bonhams auction in London in 2015 for a record-breaking £400,000.
Less inspiring, perhaps, was the rather surreal ‘Luey the Lion’ episode in 2012 when JLR’S engineers at Gaydon created 12 life-sized fibreglass lions. Each was painted pale green to match the colour of the very first Land Rovers, with a tailored canvas mane (as a nod to the original canvas tilts) and a large replica of the HUE 166 number plate of R01, the first Pre-production Land Rover, branded on their backsides, with the ‘H’ replaced with an ‘L’. Most enthusiasts were bemused and baffled by it all, but the plastic lions did raise significant amounts of money for the Foundation, which is really all that mattered.
Sadly, JLR quietly ended its association with the Born Free Foundation in 2018, saying, ‘Land Rover’s successful partnership with the Born Free Foundation has resulted in numerous conservation and wildlife projects across the world, a legacy that will continue to have a long-standing impact within global communities. The official partnership between Land Rover and Born Free Foundation will come to a natural end as of 1 April, 2018’.
George Adamson’s Series III 109in, the one he called ‘Nightingale’ that he was driving when he was killed in 1989, was partially restored after his death. It remains on display at Elsamere, the house that Joy lived in that is now a museum dedicated to the Adamsons and the Born Free story.
George created the Kora Wildlife Preservation Trust in the UK in 1979 to raise funds for the work being done in what in due course became the Kora National Park. A year before he died, George asked that the name be changed to the George Adamson Wildlife Preservation Trust so that projects could be undertaken that were not confined to Kora. The Trust is now working closely with the Kenyan government to rebuild George’s camp, which was destroyed soon after his death, and to develop the area further for tourism.
George concluded his second autobiography, My Pride and Joy, written three years before his death, with the poignant words, ‘Who will now care for the animals in the reserve, for they cannot look after themselves? Who will raise their voices, when mine is carried away on the wind, to plead Kora’s case?’ Hopefully, the combination of the Kenyan government and the Trust will provide a lasting answer.
I’ll leave the final word to Sandy Gall, who wrote, ‘In his belief that man had no God-given right to lord it over the rest of creation, George Adamson was well ahead of his time. Having lived virtually his whole life close to nature, he understood the need to respect the natural scheme of things. Man, in his view, had no right to upset the balance.’ George’s words are probably truer now than they have ever been. Maybe that is the real Born Free legacy…
Find out more about the charities that were created or inspired by George and Joy Adamson
• The Elsa Conservation Trust, elsamere.com/elsa/conservation-trust
• The George Adamson Wildlife Preservation Trust, georgeadamson.org
• The Born Free Foundation, bornfree.org.uk