An Entertainment Abuses Article used with permission from All-Creatures.org

Courtney Scott reports that elephants Alice, Ginny, and Kate, who are currently imprisoned at the Roger Williams Park Zoo in Providence, Rhode Island, will be allowed to live out the rest of their days in peace at a sanctuary beginning next year.

Freedom is in Sight for the Elephants at Roger Williams Park Zoo
From Courtney Scott, IDA In Defense of Animals, idausa.org
June 2026

Images from Canva

African elephants Alice, Ginny, and Kate are scheduled to move to their new sanctuary home in Tennessee by late 2027. We are delighted that these three elephants, dubbed “the golden girls,” will be given a golden retirement in a warm, vast, and lush pastoral sanctuary setting.

Pumpkins may offer Alice, Ginny, and Kate brief moments of enrichment, but occasional treats cannot satisfy elephants’ deep, daily drive to forage for themselves.

Captured and forced into captivity

All three elephants were ripped from their home in Zimbabwe when they were 2 to 4 years old, likely darted during an adult elephant killing spree, a common way to capture wild elephants in the 1980s. After being orphaned, they were shipped to the US, spent time undergoing training and acclimation at other zoos, and then landed at the Roger Williams Park Zoo in Rhode Island, where they have lived for nearly 40 years.

Early training with bullhooks

In Defense of Animals called out the Roger Williams Park Zoo in the 2018 and 2019 10 Worst Zoos for Elephants lists for the zoo's continued use of bullhooks to manage and train them to perform for the public, and for spreading misinformation about elephant behavior. You can see from the zoo’s own images that the elephants were conditioned to perform tricks with the use of steel-tipped weapon-like bullhooks. Even after the zoo ceased using bullhooks and switched to target training tools, the elephants remember the pain of being prodded with the hooks and immediately comply with commands.

Free to be elephants at last

Elephants in the wild or sanctuary do not perform tricks. They don't all lift their front feet on command. They don't stand on their hind legs, or bob their heads for applause. Since elephants are rarely ever returned to the wild, sanctuary is their best option. And these fortunate three can look forward to finally experiencing the freedom to roam, forage, choose new friends, and just be the elephants they were born to be.

The path to progress, one zoo at a time

In Defense of Animals honors zoos that choose to release their elephants to sanctuary and then close their elephant exhibits. To date, 42 zoos have shut down their elephant programs. We don't know yet if Roger Williams Park Zoo will end its elephant program after Alice, Ginny, and Kate are moved to sanctuary. But if and when they do, we will be delighted to grant the zoo our Path to Progress. Award. The zoo has taken a big step towards this goal, and that is a victory to celebrate.

We are grateful to the more than 10,000 In Defense of Animals supporters who signed our alert calling for Roger Williams Park to give up the use of bullhooks. Thank you for speaking out. Your action called attention to this cruelty and helped to end it.

More elephants must be liberated from their tragic situations. We encourage you to call, post on social media, and send letters on behalf of all elephant prisoners.

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Posted on All-Creatures.org: July 24, 2026
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