13 Facts About George Mottershead

1.

George Saul Mottershead was the founder of Chester Zoo.

2.

George Mottershead's father Albert Mottershead was a botanist and nurseryman.

3.

George Mottershead had two brothers Stanley Saul and Charles Saul, a sister Norah and a half-brother Albert.

4.

George Mottershead disliked seeing the animals confined in cages, and was determined to create a zoo without bars.

5.

George Mottershead left home aged 16 to become a fitness instructor.

6.

In October 1916, at the Battle of the Somme, George Mottershead suffered a bullet wound to his neck, injuring his spine.

7.

George Mottershead was initially paralysed, and recuperated at Highfield Military Hospital in Knotty Ash.

8.

Lance Corporal Albert George Mottershead was killed in October 1916 and is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial; Private Stanley George Mottershead died in December 1916 and is buried at Douchy-les-Ayette war cemetery.

9.

George Mottershead started to show his stock of birds and his private collection of animals to the paying public.

10.

George Mottershead founded the "North of England Zoological Society" in 1934.

11.

George Mottershead was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 1973 New Year Honours.

12.

George Mottershead was awarded an honorary degree of Master of Science, and served as president of the International Union of Directors of Zoological Gardens.

13.

The story of George Mottershead's founding of Chester Zoo is the subject of a 2014 BBC television drama serial, Our Zoo.