Save the Chimps | |
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27°27′55″N80°35′18″W / 27.4652°N 80.5882°W 32°52′48″N105°58′31″W / 32.8801°N 105.9754°W | |
Date opened | 1997 |
Location | Fort Pierce, Florida, US |
Land area | 150 acres |
No. of animals | >261 |
No. of species | Common chimpanzee Pan troglodytes |
Website | Save The Chimps.org |
Save the Chimps, Inc is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit American sanctuary specializing in the care of chimpanzees. The organization was founded by Carole C. Noon in 1997 with support from Jon Stryker of the Arcus Foundation. Save the Chimps is accredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries (GFAS) and a founding member of the North American Primate Sanctuary Alliance. The mission of Save the Chimps is to provide sanctuary and exemplary care to chimpanzees in need. Since opening, the sanctuary has saved over 300 chimpanzees (chimpadmin, n.d.-b).
The majority of the chimpanzees at Save the Chimps live in large social groups on 12 separate three-acre islands located on 150 acres in a rural area of Fort Pierce, Florida. [1] As a GFAS sanctuary, Save the Chimps is not open to the public but holds occasional events for members.
Carole Noon founded Save the Chimps in 1997 in a bid to retire the U.S. Air Force chimps, who had been put up for auction. After losing her bid to the Coulston Foundation, a biomedical research lab, Noon sued the Air Force and settled out of court for custody of 21 out of the 140 chimps. [2] [3] Coulston eventually lost its NIH funding due to repeated violations of the Animal Welfare Act and filed for bankruptcy in 2002. [2] Save the Chimps acquired all of Coulston's 266 chimpanzees, representing the single largest rescue of chimpanzees in history and transforming Save the Chimps into the world's largest chimpanzee sanctuary. [2]
Save the Chimps was featured in episode 4 of the 2024 HBO documentary series Chimp Crazy as the new home of Tonka, a chimp who had been rented out for Hollywood films and used to breed chimpanzee pets. [4]
Ham, a chimpanzee also known as Ham the Chimp and Ham the Astrochimp, was the first great ape launched into space. On January 31, 1961, Ham flew a suborbital flight on the Mercury-Redstone 2 mission, part of the U.S. space program's Project Mercury.
Cheeta is a chimpanzee character that appeared in numerous Hollywood Tarzan films of the 1930s–1960s, as well as the 1966–1968 television series, as the ape sidekick of the title character, Tarzan. Cheeta has usually been characterized as male, but sometimes as female, and has been portrayed by chimpanzees of both sexes.
The Great Ape Project (GAP), founded in 1993, is an international organization of primatologists, anthropologists, ethicists, and others who advocate a United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Great Apes that would confer basic legal rights on non-human great apes: bonobos, chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans.
Ngamba Island Chimpanzee Sanctuary, is an island sanctuary in Uganda, dedicated to the care of orphaned eastern chimpanzees, that have been rescued by the Uganda Wildlife Authority. Many of the chimpanzees were rescued from poachers and are unlikely to survive reintroduction to the wild. The Sanctuary is acredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries.
Experiments involving non-human primates (NHPs) include toxicity testing for medical and non-medical substances; studies of infectious disease, such as HIV and hepatitis; neurological studies; behavior and cognition; reproduction; genetics; and xenotransplantation. Around 65,000 NHPs are used every year in the United States, and around 7,000 across the European Union. Most are purpose-bred, while some are caught in the wild.
Chimp Haven is a non-profit sanctuary for more than 300 chimpanzees retired from laboratory research. The 200-acre (81 ha) sanctuary is located in Eddie D. Jones Nature Park in Keithville, Louisiana, approximately 22 miles (35 km) southwest of Shreveport.
Roger S. Fouts is a retired American primate researcher. He was co-founder and co-director of the Chimpanzee and Human Communication Institute (CHCI) in Washington, and a professor of psychology at the Central Washington University. He is best known for his role in teaching Washoe the chimpanzee to communicate using a set of signs adapted from American sign language.
In Defense of Animals (IDA) is an animal protection organization founded in 1983 in San Rafael, California, United States. The group's slogan is "working to protect the rights, welfare, and habitats of animals".
One Small Step: The Story of the Space Chimps is a 2008 documentary film produced and directed by David Cassidy and Kristin Davy which aired on History Channel UK and CBC Television. The film chronicles the real story behind the early use of chimpanzees in space exploration. The film was released on DVD in April 2008, after several delays. Cassidy is best known for co-producing the 2006 documentary Shut Up and Sing on the Dixie Chicks.
The Coulston Foundation (TCF) was a research facility established by the toxicologist Fred Coulston in 1993 at Alamogordo, New Mexico. At one point, the foundation may have had 650 chimpanzees and conducted research on AIDS and hepatitis C and other diseases.
Carole Cooney Noon was an American anthropologist and primatologist best known for founding Save the Chimps, a Florida non-profit chimpanzee sanctuary that is the largest such sanctuary in the world as of 2009.
The Center for Great Apes is an animal sanctuary for great apes located east of Wauchula, Florida. Founded as a nonprofit organization in 1993, the sanctuary has about 70 orangutans and chimpanzees who were formerly used in entertainment, scientific research, or the exotic pet trade. The sanctuary sits on 100 acres of land in rural Florida, southwest of Orlando.
Chimps Inc. was a nonprofit animal sanctuary located at P-B Ranch near Bend, Oregon, United States. Faced with a history of safety and labor violations, it closed in 2019 and transferred its chimpanzees to Freedom for Great Apes, also in Bend.
The Arcus Foundation is an international charitable foundation focused on issues related to LGBT rights, social justice, ape conservation, and environmental preservation. The foundation's stated mission is "to ensure that LGBT people and our fellow apes thrive in a world where social and environmental justice are a reality."
Rise for Animals is a national, registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit animal rights organization which aims to end nonhuman animal experimentation. It has been described as "one of the oldest and wealthiest anti-vivisection organizations in the United States".
The CHIMP Act Amendments of 2013 is a bill that would modify the Public Health Service Act to allow the National Institutes of Health to spend a larger portion of their budget on funding the care of retired chimpanzees in chimp sanctuaries. The bill passed the Senate during the 113th United States Congress. Its title is a five-letter backronym that stands for "Chimpanzee Health Improvement, Maintenance, and Protection Act of 2013".
International Primate Day, September 1, is an annual educational observance event organized since 2005 largely by British-based Animal Defenders International (ADI) and supported annually by various primate-oriented advocacy organizations, speaks for all higher and lower primates, typically endorsing humane agendas where primates are at risk, as in research institutions or species endangerment in precarious environmental situations.
Project Chimps is a privately funded 501(c)(3) nonprofit animal sanctuary for chimpanzees formerly used in research. It will eventually house 200 chimpanzees on an over 230 acre property in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Morganton, Georgia. Project Chimps is accredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries.
Chimp Crazy is an American documentary series directed and produced by Eric Goode. It follows Tonia Haddix, whose love for a chimpanzee spins into a wild game with authorities and the animal rights group PETA.