Budapest’s 152nd birthday and the 75th anniversary of the creation of Greater Budapest provide a good opportunity to recall how the 1873 unification of the city and the large-scale urban expansion of 1950 shaped the history of the Zoo.
Our Zoo is one of the oldest institutions of the capital, as it opened its gates to the public in 1866, while its foundation took place even earlier, in 1864. In this respect, it predates the also long-established FŐKERT Ltd., founded in 1867, and the Metropolitan Ervin Szabó Library, operating since 1904. In fact, the Zoo is so old that it is older than Budapest itself, which was created in 1873 through the unification of the free royal cities of Pest and Buda and the market town of Óbuda, based on Act XXXVI of 1872. Of course, Pest itself had existed since the time of the Árpád dynasty.
The unification of Pest, Buda and Óbuda had already been “in the air” for quite some time by the second half of the 19th century. During the Reform Era, people already spoke of Pest-Buda, or even Buda-Pest. The efforts of István Széchenyi also pointed in this direction, the most characteristic example being the creation of the Chain Bridge, which provided a permanent connection between the two cities. It is therefore likely that if reforms had continued peacefully and the War of Independence of 1848–49, followed by the period of repression after its defeat, had not hindered the process, the unification would have taken place earlier.
The story of the Zoo followed a similar course. The idea of establishing a zoo, preferably in Pest, also emerged during the Reform Era, but its realization was likewise prevented at the time by the outbreak of fighting and the difficulties of the Bach era. As a result, the issue only returned to the agenda around the turn of the 1850s and 1860s, and the opening did not take place until 1866. This also means that of the two Reform Era plans, the Zoo was ultimately realized earlier than the unification of the city.
The unification of Pest, Buda and Óbuda in 1873 did not in itself mark a sharp turning point in the life of the Zoo. Rather, the broader process of which the unification was both a cause and a consequence also made its impact felt at the Zoo. Budapest’s population continued to grow, transport connections expanded both locally and nationwide, public utilities became more extensive, and the city increasingly took responsibility for important cultural and public education matters.
It should be noted that when the Zoo was established in 1866, the level of civic development was not yet such that the creation and maintenance of the Zoo as a public-interest institution could be undertaken by anyone, whether the municipality or the state. The initiative was led by a few scholars motivated by public spirit, and the Zoo itself was formally founded as a joint-stock company. It operated in this form during its early years, but in 1873—the very year of the city unification—it was transformed into the Animal and Plant Acclimatization Society, partly because this organizational form was much better suited to a public-interest, what we would now call a non-profit, institution.
After this, the unified capital played an increasingly important role in the life of the Zoo, among other things by voting each year a separate amount to support its public-interest activities. It is also worth noting that the land, which throughout belonged to the free royal city of Pest and after 1873 to Budapest, was made available to the Zoo by the capital for a symbolic rent of one gold coin per year.
More forward-looking city leaders also expected in the long term that the Zoo itself would eventually pass from the ownership of the society maintaining it into the ownership of the capital. This finally happened in 1907, and the takeover was followed by a large-scale renovation—essentially the creation of a new Zoo worthy of the capital—between 1909 and 1912. The idea that Budapest should not only take over the maintenance of the existing Zoo but also develop it generously was especially promoted by Gyula Andrássy Jr., Minister of the Interior, and by István Bárczy, the mayor known for his major urban development efforts.
István Bárczy was also the first to seriously consider the creation of Greater Budapest, that is, the annexation of settlements neighboring Budapest at the time. This, however, was realized much later, after the Second World War. More precisely, Act XXVI of 1949 determined the new territory of Budapest, annexing seven towns with county rights and sixteen large villages to the capital. The law entered into force on 1 January 1950, creating the capital in its present form in terms of its boundaries and area of 525 square kilometers.
These were difficult years for the Zoo. At the end of the Second World War, during the siege of Budapest, almost all animal houses were damaged, some reduced to ruins, and of the more than two thousand animals, only a handful survived the horrors of the war. Although reconstruction began almost immediately after the front passed and the Zoo reopened to visitors by 1 May 1945, both 1945 and 1946 were mainly about survival, and growth resumed only slowly thereafter. The complete elimination of war damage was therefore only achieved by the mid to late 1950s.
Even so, the year 1950—the year Greater Budapest was created—was an important milestone in the Zoo’s post-war recovery. At this time, the institution received a significant amount of funding for the first time, in foreign currency, to replace the animals lost during the war with exotic species. Only 23 animals had survived the war, and although by the spring of 1947 there were already 595 animals living in the Zoo, exotic fauna was still represented by only 14 mammals, 23 birds and 45 tropical ornamental fish. In 1950, however, more than one hundred exotic animals were acquired at a cost of around 300,000 forints, which was a very substantial sum at the time. These included polar bears, brown bears, hyenas, African wild dogs, lions, tigers, camels, llamas, crested porcupines, kangaroos, numerous exotic birds, grey crowned cranes and ostriches. By autumn, the animal collection exceeded 1,300 individuals representing 120 different species.
A characteristic phenomenon of the period was the rapid increase in visitor numbers. In 1948, 304,000 people visited the Zoo; in 1949, 411,000; and in 1950, already 554,000. In the following two to three years, attendance exceeded one million visitors. This was partly due to the growing number of attractions, but the creation of Greater Budapest was also an important factor. The city’s population increased not only through the annexation of neighboring settlements, but also because more and more people moved to the capital from the countryside in response to the employment opportunities offered by Greater Budapest. A larger population also meant more visitors to the Zoo.
