Jinx (chimpanzee)

Jinx and Darlene in 1959

Jinx (1953–19??) was a performing chimpanzee, and member of the ice skating duo "Darlene and Jinx", with his owner and trainer Darlene Sellek.[1]

Early life

Jinx – a member of the Pan Troglodyte species – was born in late 1953 in the Belgian Congo, Africa, near Kinshasa (then called Leopoldville). Jinx was purchased for $600 (f.o.b. Africa) from a Miami, Florida, pet shop when he was 2 month old. “We had no idea of going into show business. We just wanted a pet”, explained Darlene Sellek in an interview during one of the act’s Ice Capades appearances in 1957.[2]

Performing career

Jinx and Darlene first appeared as an act at “The Homecoming” in Dekalb, Illinois, in August, 1954, when Jinx was 10 months old.[3] Jinx showed off his ability to walk a tightrope upside down and blindfolded. 4 months later, the act – billed as “Darlene and Jinx” – performed at the Chase Hotel in St. Louis, where the pair began a significant relationship with the major American circus impresario and director Al Dobritch.

In late January, Darlene started to train Jinx to ice skate, with the help of Baptist Schreiber, who is better known for his training of elephants. A few other show-business chimpanzees in the world were known to roller skate, but Jinx was the first to skate on ice. He first appeared on ice skates in the “Hollywood Ice Review” at Chicago Stadium in February, 1955, with the World and Olympic Ice Skating Champion Gundi Busch.

The relationship with Al Dobritch provided a number of bookings at various Shriner Circuses around the USA over the next few years, the first of which was the Zuhrah Shriner Circus in Minneapolis, Minnesota, at the end of February, 1955. The spring of 1955 found Darlene and Jinx in New Orleans at Pontchartrain Beach, working alongside Runyon and Edwards, and “Daddy Longlegs”, the man with the longest legs in the world.[4]

By June, 1955, Al Dobritch had negotiated a television contract for the act; Darlene and Jinx had signed a 3-year contract with “Super Circus” television show, produced in Chicago for station WBKB, “Chicago’s Family Station”.[5] While with Super Circus, Jinx worked with the children's television pioneer Claude Kirchner and the ever popular Mary Hartline. Darlene and Jinx were forced to leave the show after only 5 months when the production moved from Chicago to New York in November, 1955.

Jinx visited New York for the first time in late 1955 when Darlene appeared on the “What’s My Line?” television game show (Game 2, Season 7, Episode 282), hosted by John Daly. During that visit, Jinx was inducted into the American Airlines “Sky Cradle Club” for the flight from New York to Chicago in November, 1955.[6]

In November, 1955, Jinx began regular appearances with Ned Locke on the “Captain Hartz and His Pets” television show produced in Chicago for television station WMAQ, sponsored by the Hartz Mountain pet care company. (Jinx first appeared with Ned Locke as his WMAQ radio disc jockey assistant – the world’s first chimpanzee radio personality.)

From the end on 1955 through mid-1956, Darlene and Jinx appeared at a number of Shriners Circuses across the USA, including

In July, 1956, Darlene and Jinx appeared at Belmont Park in Montreal, Quebec. This was followed in August at the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) where they appeared with the television cowboy star Gene Autry, and then in September at the 4th annual Sudbury Rotary Exhibition in Sudbury, Ontario.[8]

New Year, 1957, found Darlene and Jinx at Jack Valentine’s Supper Club Restaurant in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, for a 3-month engagement with Jack Valentine’s Ice Show. Here he performed with the great figure skater Jack Paul, who is quoted saying “Jinx outdoes me in figure work”.[9]

In March 1957, the duo appeared on the Jackie Gleason Show “Cavalcade of Circuses”. In April, Darlene and Jinx made their first appearance in the Ice Capades at Chicago Stadium.[10] In July, they appeared in Las Vegas at The Sands Cirque Room and the Hotel El Cortez “Rhythm On Ice Revue”.

Back in Chicago in January, 1958, Darlene and Jinx filled in for “The Three Adaros” at the American Electroplaters Society 46th Educational Session and Banquet and performed an act called “Hi Jinx” in the Merriel Abbott Ice Revue at the Conrad Hilton Hotel.

Darlene and Jinx appeared on America’s then most popular television variety program The Ed Sullivan Show “John Harris’s Ice Capades Of 1958”, broadcast on CBS television from Madison Square Garden in New York City on Sunday, 7 September 1958.

Retirement

As Jinx aged, he began to become less controllable. At a Christmas Show in New York in 1960, he exhibited greater aggression toward his young audience.

Jinx’s 1966 appearance in “Jamboree On Ice” at Indian Rocks Palm Garden Restaurant, St. Petersburg, Florida, marked the end of his performing career. He retired in 1967 to the St. Louis Zoo.

Co-stars

Performances

Date Location Venue Event
12 Aug 1954 Dekalb, IL The Homecoming
26 Dec 1954 St Louis Chase Hotel
01 Feb 1955 Chicago Chicago Stadium Hollywood Ice Revue
28 Feb 1955 Minneapolis Minneapolis Auditorium Zuhrah Shrine Circus
01 Apr 1955 New Orleans Pontchartrain Beach
02 Jul 1955 Chicago Super Circus TV Show
31 Jul 1955 Chicago Super Circus TV Show
01 Oct 1955 Madisonville, KY Municipal Baseball Park Rizpah Temple Shrine Circus
30 Oct 1955 Garry Moore Show "Zoo Parade"
11 Nov 1955 Houston Sam Houston Coliseum Arabia Temple Shrine Circus
21 Nov 1955 Chicago Chicago Heart Assn Hilton Hotel
13 Dec 1955 Madisonville, KY Municipal Park Rizpah Shrine Circus
12 Feb 1956 Memphis Al Chymia Shrine Circus
01 Mar 1956 Kansas City Municipal Auditorium Police Circus
02 Mar 1956 Tokeka, KA Shrine Circus
16 Mar 1956 Wichita, KA Shrine Circus
17 Apr 1956 Bloomsbury, PA Hunt Armory Hamid Morton Shrine Circus
07 Jul 1956 Montreal Belmont Park
18 Jul 1956 Minneapolis Golden Strand Aqua Follies
18 Aug 1956 Toronto CNE
12 Sep 1956 Toronto CNE
14 Sep 1956 Sudbury, Ontario 4th annual Sudbury Rotary Exhibition
12 Jan 1957 Ft. Lauderdale Jack Valentine's Supper Club Restaurant Valentine's Ice Show
08 Mar 1957 Ft. Lauderdale Jack Valentine's Supper Club Restaurant Valentine's Ice Show
30 Mar 1957 Buffalo, NY Buffalo Shrine Circus Cavalcade Of Circuses
13 Apr 1957 Chicago Chicago Stadium Ice Capades
13 Jul 1957 Las Vegas The Sands Cirque Room
20 Jul 1957 Las Vegas Hotel El Cortez Rhythm On Ice Revue
02 Dec 1957 Municipal Auditorium
04 Jan 1958 Chicago Conrad Hilton Hotel Merriel Abbott Ice Revue
25 Jan 1958 Chicago Conrad Hilton Hotel American Electroplaters Society 46th Educational Session and Banquet
07 Oct 1958 New York Madison Square Garden Ed Sullivan Show
11 May 1959 Philadelphia Willow Grove Park
24 Aug 1959 Toronto CNE
25 Jul 1960 Hagarstown MD Hagarstown Fair Ice Skating Extravaganza
18 Dec 1960 New York Manhattan Savings Christmas Show
12 Jan 1966 St. Petersburg Indian Rocks Jamboree On Ice

References

  1. New Orleans Times-Picayune, "Chimp Heads Three-Act Program at Beach Today", 9 Apr 1955
  2. Chicago American, "World’s 1st Chimp on Ice Is Real Cool", 13 Apr 1957
  3. The Hinckley Review, "A Surprise Act", 12 Aug 1954
  4. New Orleans Times-Picayune, "Chimp Heads Three-Act Program at Beach Today", 9 Apr 1955
  5. Billboard, "‘Super Circus’ Adds Chimp to Regulars", 2 Jul 1955
  6. Houston Chronicle, "The Show Goes On", 11 Nov 1955
  7. Pittsburg Sun-Telegraph, "Chimp Writes Own Story", 17 Apr 1956
  8. Sudbury Daily Star, (untitled), 14 Sep 1956
  9. Miami Herald, "Night Life", George Bourke, 12 Jan 1957
  10. Chicago American, "World’s 1st Chimp on Ice Is Real Cool", 13 Apr 1957
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