Keep Wildlife in the Wild
Born Free USA united with Animal Protection Institute is a national animal advocacy nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, contributions to which are tax-deductible. Our mission is to advocate for the protection of animals from cruelty and exploitation.
Every year, millions of animals suffer in fur farms and circus cages. In our campaigns against such cruelties, we use powerful tools including legislation, public education, litigation, and grassroots networking. We also work actively with media to spread the word about challenges facing animals.
Our primary campaign areas currently include animals used in entertainment, captive exotic animals, trapping & fur, and the international wildlife trade.
The Born Free USA Primate Sanctuary, located in Dilley, Texas, offers more than 500 primates, many of whom were rescued from abusive situations in laboratories, roadside zoos, and private possession, life in as natural an environment as possible with minimal human interference.
API's History
When Kenneth E. Guerrero co-founded API in 1968 there were only a handful of national humane groups working on national issues that actually had members and mailing lists. The large shelter-operating societies in major cities such as New York, Boston, San Francisco, and St. Louis were primarily attending to the housing and care of animals and some state efforts, not major social reforms. The environmental movement was gradually coming out of the woods, but would not be joining forces with the humane movement for few more years.
When API was still an infant organization, Ken and his wife Marge with new son Barry traveled to dog shows, cat shows, horse shows, and rodeos all over California, gaining admittance everywhere with their California humane officer badges. They would set up their little card table in the nearest aisle and talk about API.
A couple of campaign memories from API's 40 years:
Velma B. ("Wild Horse Annie") Johnston had been championing the rights of wild horses for nearly twenty years when we named her as our Advisor for Mustangs and Burros. API gladly helped finance Annie's fight, and the early Mainstreams (as Animal Issues was then called) are filled with inspiring stories of her ongoing struggle. Sadly, Annie passed away in 1977 (just when she had accepted nomination to API's Board of Directors). Today we're still fighting for the kind of cause she believed in, although our focus has moved to other issues.
API was a forerunner in protesting the clubbing of the harp seals in Canada. Through constant petitions, we helped bring the Canadian government to an awareness of the tremendous international outcry against this barbarity. It was obvious that API was winning when in 1977 two staff members were briefly arrested for getting near enough to the seal hunt to photograph the skinning of live seals, a practice previously disputed.
That front-line visibility diminished somewhat in the 1980s as API moved more discreetly into the background, choosing to focus on educating people through campaigns and publications. Today, we do not rest on our past victories. To paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, The price of animal freedom is eternal vigilance. Some battles have to be fought over and over again, even after they've been won. And so API returned to the front lines, taking a leading role in the struggle for animal rights.
Forty years of fighting animal abuse and exploitation gave API tools that work. Whether using the courts, the legislatures, the ballot box ... the nationwide team of grassroots activists at the community level ... working closely with individual advocates ... forming coalitions with other national or state animal advocacy groups ... using its position as a major media resource to focus national attention on the abuse of animals anywhere and everywhere ... API got the job done.
On January 1, 2000, the Texas Snow Monkey Sanctuary merged into the API family, to be renamed the API Primate Sanctuary in June 2003 and now called the Born Free USA Primate Sanctuary. Located about 90 miles south of San Antonio, Texas, the Born Free USA Primate Sanctuary provides a truly free-range environment with minimal human interference for more than 500 rescued macaques, vervets, and baboons.
API encouraged grassroots activism through our Action Alert Team of volunteers throughout the nation.
API kept members and interested parties informed of its progress through the quarterly publication Animal Issues, numerous Fact Sheets and Reports, and this website.
Born Free USA's History
The Born Free Foundation was initiated in England in 1984 by Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna, the stars of the legendary film Born Free, along with their son Will. Having been deeply influenced by their time spent in Kenya, Bill and Virginia were inspired to act after the tragic and untimely death of Pole Pole, an elephant featured in the film An Elephant Called Slowly, who was sent to the London Zoo from the Government of Kenya after the making of the film.
In the subsequent two decades, Born Free has become an international force in wildlife conservation and animal protection, campaigning to save elephants, big cats, wolves, dolphins, bears, primates, and numerous other species. Born Free upholds a dynamic presence in international animal rescues, saving animals from miserable conditions, rehabilitating them, and either providing for their lifetime care in a sanctuary or, whenever possible, rehoming them to the wild.
A companion organization was established in the United States in 2002, Born Free USA, to carry on the work of the organization, involving the American public in our compassionate conservation campaigns. Born Free USA launched with a national office in Washington, DC.
Born Free is committed to spreading its brand of compassionate conservation across America and, indeed, across the globe. Our shared institutional mission is to alleviate animal suffering, protect threatened and endangered species in the wild, and encourage everyone to treat wildlife everywhere with respect and compassion.
