Tony Fitzjohn
Encyclopedia
Anthony Raymond Fitzjohn, OBE
is a conservationist
who has worked extensively with George Adamson
at Kora in Africa.
Tony Fitzjohn was adopted as a baby and brought up in north London. His birth mother was a Waaf and his father was a married man in the RAF; it was a wartime liaison. He was awarded a bursary to Mill Hill, a London public school. 'He was always a very striking individual,' says the Labour MP Bob Marshall-Andrews QC, the chairman of trustees at Gawpt and a lifelong friend who used to play rugby with Fitzjohn at school. 'And he's always been a non-conformist. Anyone who knew him back then would have said, "He'll either be an immense success or quite the reverse." '
After he left school Fitzjohn worked for Express Dairies, then went on an Outward Bound course where he met a man who used to be a ranger in the Serengeti. At the age of 22, he left a dead-end job and hitchhiked from South Africa
to Kenya
. His only ambition was to work with animals. He got himself to Africa where he did odd jobs, such as building and working on boats, and then he came across Joy Adamson
of Born Free fame, who was working at Lake Naivasha, setting up her Elsa trust. She told him that her husband, George, was looking for an assistant, because his previous one had been killed by a lion. Fitzjohn thought that sounded like a job that would suit him perfectly, and when he got to Kora in 1971 he felt totally at home. 'It was just magic. About a week later, George asked me, "How long can you stay?", thinking I'd say a couple of months. And I said, "I don't know, George – about 10, 12 years?" '
In the end he stayed for 18. 'George's relationship with his lions, and with all animals for that matter, was extraordinary,' Fitzjohn says. 'He was a genuine, humble St Francis of Assisi. We'd go off tracking in the morning and the kudu would come out of the bush, the tree squirrels would twitter away, birds would start bombing. They'd never do that to me. And I saw his relationships with lions – they would greet him so gently. I would look at George and think, that's what I want in life.'
When Fitzjohn arrived at Kora there was a lion there who was to become famous. Christian was a captive-bred lion cub that had been bought from Harrods by two young Australians, had grown too big to be exercised in Battersea Park, and had been brought to Kora to be rehabilitated into the wild. (He became famous when a YouTube clip was posted of the reunion between him and his owners after a year in Africa.) 'In appearance and temperament,' George Adamson wrote in his book, 'Tony was Christian's counterpart. He had a fine physique and good looks; he was fearless in dealing with lions. Like Christian he had an unnerving habit of disappearing from camp without warning, for weeks on end, and of materialising again just as unexpectedly. There the parallel ended, for his dexterity with girlfriends was in a different league from Christian's, and I never once found Christian with a bottle at his elbow…'
Life at Kora was simple and remote – there were no communications and it took two days to get to Nairobi. George's brother Terence was a year younger; he loved the landscape but he didn't like lions, he was an elephant man. But he built 300 miles of roads, and found water by divining. 'He was a good old boy,' says Fitzjohn, though he and Terence never really got on. 'We used to vie for George's attention.'
Nor did Fitzjohn get on with Joy ('dreadful woman'), who by the time he arrived was living far away (although she and George never really split up), working on her own projects with cheetahs and subsequently a leopard. In 1980 she was murdered by a former employee, whom she had sacked after accusing him of stealing.
There was no Gawpt back then. They lived off George's colonial pension and the small income that came in from his book and a trickle from the documentaries made about his work. Any money they had went into buying camel meat for the lions.
. Setting up camps, creating airstrips and cutting more than 300 miles of bush roads, was punctuated by fighting numerous battles with ivory poachers and Somali
bandits, as well as Fitzjohn being mauled by a lion and almost killed in 1975.
The years at the Kora National Reserve proved an invaluable learning experience for Fitzjohn which helped him build the Mkomazi Game Reserve
. Kora made Fitzjohn an expert in capturing, collaring and radio-tracking Africa's top predators, as well as raising and returning them to the wild.
The challenge facing him at Mkomazi demanded all these skills, and more. It required someone who was an experienced wildlife manager, fluent in Swahili
, a bush pilot, a skilled engineer and mechanic who could build roads, cut boundaries, strip down and re-assemble 4WD vehicles and plant machinery, set up two-way radio
networks, construct and de-silt dams, maintain electrical and power equipment, organize anti-poaching patrols, deal with the bureaucracy, and keep a remote camp supplied. All this, and the ability to establish breeding programs for highly endangered species whilst constructing and repairing schools in the villages around Mkomazi Game Reserve, helping with medical dispensaries and maintaining friendly relations with the local communities.
Arriving in 1989 with nothing but a Land Rover and a hangover, he put in all the infrastructure himself: an airstrip, 600 miles of roads, dams, electricity, water. He built a house and learnt to fly, married Lucy and had four children. He has now established a black rhino sanctuary, and set up a programme for breeding and releasing the endangered African wild dog. In 1980 there were 10-12,000 rhinoceros in Tanzania; five years later there were about 25. The rhino sanctuary at Mkomazi was established in 1997, and now has 13 rhinos in it, which amounts to 20 per cent of Tanzania's rhino population. Some came from a zoo in the Czech Republic (a gift); the rest from the Addo national park in South Africa ($45,000 each and a further $55,000 to transport). Their enclosure is big – 17 square miles with solar-powered electric fences to stop poachers getting in and rhinos getting out. | url = http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/7589992/Conservationist-Tony-Fitzjohn-born-to-be-wild.html
The modern-day requirements of this operation, staffed only by volunteers, means that Fitzjohn has to spend a lot of time traveling in order to raise funds and generate publicity for the project. He lectures at the Royal Geographical Society
, schools, zoos, wildlife parks, and talks to diverse groups of supporters. He has also testified on wildlife issues on behalf of the Tanzanian government at a Congressional Sub-Committee hearing in Washington, D.C.
. Having spent his life committed to the conservation of East Africa, he believes that Tanzania
can provide the perfect refuge for some of the continent’s most endangered animals.
In recognition of his service to wildlife conservation, Fitzjohn was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2006.
Born to be Wild: A BBC documentary released in 1999, about the translocation of the elephant, Nina, to the Mkomazi Game Reserve after 27 years in captivity. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0330085/
Mkomazi: Return of the Rhino: Produced by Henson International Television, this documentary follows the capture in South Africa of four black rhinos and their journey back to their original homeland of Mkomazi in Tanzania. http://www.parthenonentertainment.com
To Walk with Lions
: This 1999 film is the dramatic continuation of George Adamson's (Richard Harris) fight to save Kenya's wildlife. Together with his young assistant Tony Fitzjohn (John Michie), Adamson battles to keep the animals on his game reserve Kora from dangerous poachers and deadly shifta warriors who are determined to destroy rhinos and elephants for their tusks, and lions for their rich pelts. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0132563/ http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00005LOUNhttp://www.variety.com/review/VE1117914317.html?categoryid=31&cs=1
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
is a conservationist
Conservationist
Conservationists are proponents or advocates of conservation. They advocate for the protection of all the species in an ecosystem with a strong focus on the natural environment...
who has worked extensively with George Adamson
George Adamson
George Adamson , also known as the "Baba ya Simba" , was a British wildlife conservationist and author...
at Kora in Africa.
Tony Fitzjohn was adopted as a baby and brought up in north London. His birth mother was a Waaf and his father was a married man in the RAF; it was a wartime liaison. He was awarded a bursary to Mill Hill, a London public school. 'He was always a very striking individual,' says the Labour MP Bob Marshall-Andrews QC, the chairman of trustees at Gawpt and a lifelong friend who used to play rugby with Fitzjohn at school. 'And he's always been a non-conformist. Anyone who knew him back then would have said, "He'll either be an immense success or quite the reverse." '
After he left school Fitzjohn worked for Express Dairies, then went on an Outward Bound course where he met a man who used to be a ranger in the Serengeti. At the age of 22, he left a dead-end job and hitchhiked from South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
to Kenya
Kenya
Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...
. His only ambition was to work with animals. He got himself to Africa where he did odd jobs, such as building and working on boats, and then he came across Joy Adamson
Joy Adamson
Joy Adamson was a naturalist, artist, and author best known for her book, Born Free, which describes her experiences raising a lion cub named Elsa...
of Born Free fame, who was working at Lake Naivasha, setting up her Elsa trust. She told him that her husband, George, was looking for an assistant, because his previous one had been killed by a lion. Fitzjohn thought that sounded like a job that would suit him perfectly, and when he got to Kora in 1971 he felt totally at home. 'It was just magic. About a week later, George asked me, "How long can you stay?", thinking I'd say a couple of months. And I said, "I don't know, George – about 10, 12 years?" '
In the end he stayed for 18. 'George's relationship with his lions, and with all animals for that matter, was extraordinary,' Fitzjohn says. 'He was a genuine, humble St Francis of Assisi. We'd go off tracking in the morning and the kudu would come out of the bush, the tree squirrels would twitter away, birds would start bombing. They'd never do that to me. And I saw his relationships with lions – they would greet him so gently. I would look at George and think, that's what I want in life.'
When Fitzjohn arrived at Kora there was a lion there who was to become famous. Christian was a captive-bred lion cub that had been bought from Harrods by two young Australians, had grown too big to be exercised in Battersea Park, and had been brought to Kora to be rehabilitated into the wild. (He became famous when a YouTube clip was posted of the reunion between him and his owners after a year in Africa.) 'In appearance and temperament,' George Adamson wrote in his book, 'Tony was Christian's counterpart. He had a fine physique and good looks; he was fearless in dealing with lions. Like Christian he had an unnerving habit of disappearing from camp without warning, for weeks on end, and of materialising again just as unexpectedly. There the parallel ended, for his dexterity with girlfriends was in a different league from Christian's, and I never once found Christian with a bottle at his elbow…'
Life at Kora was simple and remote – there were no communications and it took two days to get to Nairobi. George's brother Terence was a year younger; he loved the landscape but he didn't like lions, he was an elephant man. But he built 300 miles of roads, and found water by divining. 'He was a good old boy,' says Fitzjohn, though he and Terence never really got on. 'We used to vie for George's attention.'
Nor did Fitzjohn get on with Joy ('dreadful woman'), who by the time he arrived was living far away (although she and George never really split up), working on her own projects with cheetahs and subsequently a leopard. In 1980 she was murdered by a former employee, whom she had sacked after accusing him of stealing.
There was no Gawpt back then. They lived off George's colonial pension and the small income that came in from his book and a trickle from the documentaries made about his work. Any money they had went into buying camel meat for the lions.
Partnership
Fitzjohn turned out to be a natural with the lions. Within days of his arrival, he managed to assert control over an aggressive male lion, armed with nothing but his own supreme self-confidence and the sheer force of his personality. So began a working partnership (with Adamson) which lasted nearly 18 years. During their time together, Adamson and Fitzjohn reintroduced more than 30 lions and 10 leopards into the wild and pioneered the development and management of the Kora National ParkKora National Park
Kora National Park is located in Coast Province, Kenya. The park covers an area of 1,788 square kilometres. It is located 125 kilometres east of Mount Kenya. The park was initially gazetted as a nature reserve in 1973...
. Setting up camps, creating airstrips and cutting more than 300 miles of bush roads, was punctuated by fighting numerous battles with ivory poachers and Somali
Somalia
Somalia , officially the Somali Republic and formerly known as the Somali Democratic Republic under Socialist rule, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. Since the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in 1991 there has been no central government control over most of the country's territory...
bandits, as well as Fitzjohn being mauled by a lion and almost killed in 1975.
The years at the Kora National Reserve proved an invaluable learning experience for Fitzjohn which helped him build the Mkomazi Game Reserve
Mkomazi Game Reserve
Mkomazi Game Reserve is located in North Eastern Tanzania on the Kenyan Border. It was established in 1951 and is found in Kilimanjaro Region and Tanga Region...
. Kora made Fitzjohn an expert in capturing, collaring and radio-tracking Africa's top predators, as well as raising and returning them to the wild.
The challenge facing him at Mkomazi demanded all these skills, and more. It required someone who was an experienced wildlife manager, fluent in Swahili
Swahili language
Swahili or Kiswahili is a Bantu language spoken by various ethnic groups that inhabit several large stretches of the Mozambique Channel coastline from northern Kenya to northern Mozambique, including the Comoro Islands. It is also spoken by ethnic minority groups in Somalia...
, a bush pilot, a skilled engineer and mechanic who could build roads, cut boundaries, strip down and re-assemble 4WD vehicles and plant machinery, set up two-way radio
Two-way radio
A two-way radio is a radio that can both transmit and receive , unlike a broadcast receiver which only receives content. The term refers to a personal radio transceiver that allows the operator to have a two-way conversation with other similar radios operating on the same radio frequency...
networks, construct and de-silt dams, maintain electrical and power equipment, organize anti-poaching patrols, deal with the bureaucracy, and keep a remote camp supplied. All this, and the ability to establish breeding programs for highly endangered species whilst constructing and repairing schools in the villages around Mkomazi Game Reserve, helping with medical dispensaries and maintaining friendly relations with the local communities.
Arriving in 1989 with nothing but a Land Rover and a hangover, he put in all the infrastructure himself: an airstrip, 600 miles of roads, dams, electricity, water. He built a house and learnt to fly, married Lucy and had four children. He has now established a black rhino sanctuary, and set up a programme for breeding and releasing the endangered African wild dog. In 1980 there were 10-12,000 rhinoceros in Tanzania; five years later there were about 25. The rhino sanctuary at Mkomazi was established in 1997, and now has 13 rhinos in it, which amounts to 20 per cent of Tanzania's rhino population. Some came from a zoo in the Czech Republic (a gift); the rest from the Addo national park in South Africa ($45,000 each and a further $55,000 to transport). Their enclosure is big – 17 square miles with solar-powered electric fences to stop poachers getting in and rhinos getting out. | url = http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/7589992/Conservationist-Tony-Fitzjohn-born-to-be-wild.html
The modern-day requirements of this operation, staffed only by volunteers, means that Fitzjohn has to spend a lot of time traveling in order to raise funds and generate publicity for the project. He lectures at the Royal Geographical Society
Royal Geographical Society
The Royal Geographical Society is a British learned society founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical sciences...
, schools, zoos, wildlife parks, and talks to diverse groups of supporters. He has also testified on wildlife issues on behalf of the Tanzanian government at a Congressional Sub-Committee hearing in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
. Having spent his life committed to the conservation of East Africa, he believes that Tanzania
Tanzania
The United Republic of Tanzania is a country in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.Tanzania is a state...
can provide the perfect refuge for some of the continent’s most endangered animals.
In recognition of his service to wildlife conservation, Fitzjohn was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2006.
Track record
- Established and stocked the first successful RhinocerosRhinocerosRhinoceros , also known as rhino, is a group of five extant species of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. Two of these species are native to Africa and three to southern Asia....
sanctuary in Tanzania. - 30 years of successful rehabilitation of zoo animals into the wild.
- Gained National Park status for two game reserves.
- Completed the construction of a new secondary school for 400 children.
- Provided local communities with clean water supply, dispensary and Flying Doctor service.
- First successful captive breeding program for endangered African Hunting Dog in East Africa.
- Ground-breaking veterinary research into disease of endangered species.
- 20 years of developing and supporting Anti-Poaching Units.
Films
The Leopards of Kora: A BBC documentary released in 1992, about the release of two leopards into the Kora Preserve in the mid-1980s.Born to be Wild: A BBC documentary released in 1999, about the translocation of the elephant, Nina, to the Mkomazi Game Reserve after 27 years in captivity. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0330085/
Mkomazi: Return of the Rhino: Produced by Henson International Television, this documentary follows the capture in South Africa of four black rhinos and their journey back to their original homeland of Mkomazi in Tanzania. http://www.parthenonentertainment.com
To Walk with Lions
To Walk With Lions
To Walk with Lions is a 1999 film starring Richard Harris as George Adamson and John Michie as Tony Fitzjohn.Adamson spends the latter part of his life protecting the lions and other wildlife in the Kora National Reserve, Kenya...
: This 1999 film is the dramatic continuation of George Adamson's (Richard Harris) fight to save Kenya's wildlife. Together with his young assistant Tony Fitzjohn (John Michie), Adamson battles to keep the animals on his game reserve Kora from dangerous poachers and deadly shifta warriors who are determined to destroy rhinos and elephants for their tusks, and lions for their rich pelts. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0132563/ http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00005LOUNhttp://www.variety.com/review/VE1117914317.html?categoryid=31&cs=1
External links
- GAWPT UK Website
- Mkomazi US Website (WildLifeNow.com)
- Mkomazi German Website
- Mkomazi Netherlands Website
- Tony Fitzjohn Interview Plum TV, Aspen
- Today Show Interview with John Rendall and Ace Bourke Re: Christian the LionChristian the lionChristian was a lion originally purchased by Australians John Rendall and Anthony "Ace" Bourke from Harrods department store of London, England in 1969 and ultimately reintroduced to the African wild by conservationist George Adamson. One year after George Adamson released Christian to the wild,...