REMEMBERING THE LION MAN OF AFRICA

Conservationists from all over the world will next month converge at Kora National Park to commemorate the 24th anniversary of George Adamson’s death and to honor his work.

The George Adamson commemoration weekend in the wild will run from Friday (August 31) to Sunday (September 1).

WHY THIS EVENT

August 20, 2013 will be exactly 24 years since Adamson demise. Thanks to Adamson’s heroic action, others lived and his legacy remains. Though he was deeply loved and respected by so many people all over the world, not many have visited where he used to work, to see how he used to live, where he was buried and consider ways of continuing with the work he started.

BACKGROUND ON GEORGE ADAMSON

George Adamson, the ‘Lion Man’ of Africa is one of the founding fathers of wildlife conservation. He is best known from the book and film "Born Free", the story of Elsa, an orphaned lioness raised and released into the wild by Adamson and his wife, Joy. He was born in India in 1906 and first visited Kenya in 1924. After a string of adventures – not least as a gold prospector – he joined Kenya’s Game Department in 1938 and married Joy six years later. It was in 1956 that he shot the lioness whose cub was to become world-famous as Elsa. George Adamson retired as a game warden in 1963 and devoted his life to his many lions. In 1970, he moved to the Kora National Reserve in northern Kenya, working with Tony Fitzjohn as his right-hand man, to continue the rehabilitation of captive or orphaned big cats for eventual reintroduction into the wild. In 1989 at the age of 83, Adamson was murdered at Kora by bandits.

A number of activities have been lined up for the event’s participants, including:

• Camping at Adamson’s Camp and in Tana River Campsite
•  Climbing of Kora Rock
• Visit to cultural manyattas and exhibition of cultural artifacts from different cultures surrounding the Park,
• Cultural night on Saturday,
• Watching of George Adamson films, Gallery Exhibition – in the Adamson camp
• Visit to Kora Rapids
• Visit to George Adamson’s grave and main speeches during the visit to the grave
•  Entertainment by neighboring communities at the grave side and also in the campsite

The event in Kenya’s last wilderness area is organized by the Kenya Wildlife Service with support from other stakeholders.

The primary objective of the event is to build on the foundation laid by George Adamson’s conservation of lions in both Meru and Kora ecosystems.

Corporate organizations and individuals are invited to participate by sponsoring corporate teams or contributing towards the George Adamson Fund – a worthy cause.