Back in 1889, a traveling circus left its animals in Grant Park rather than transport them further, and from that abandonment grew Zoo Atlanta, whose entrance you now face. The collection that began with those abandoned circus animals grew into a municipal zoo that served Atlanta for nearly a century but fell into serious disrepair by the 1980s, earning a place on a national list of the ten worst zoos in America. A public-private partnership in 1984 transferred management of the zoo to a nonprofit organization that undertook a comprehensive rehabilitation, transforming Zoo Atlanta into one of the most respected zoological institutions in the country.
The zoo is particularly celebrated for its giant panda program — it is one of only four zoos in the United States currently housing giant pandas — and for its gorilla research program, which has produced significant advances in understanding great ape behavior and social structure. Zoo Atlanta's story is itself an Atlanta story: a century-old institution that had declined to near-collapse, rescued and rebuilt through a combination of civic will, philanthropic investment, and professional management. The city has done this with its neighborhoods, its park, and its zoo.
Reinvention is Atlanta's oldest tradition.