Why Is This Chimp Smiling?
Seven apes arrived last year in Cle Elum. They’d been used up by medical science and the entertainment industry—and left to rot in tiny cages. Then one man showed them the depths of human kindness.
OH, IT’S CHAOS. Like a toy store after a hurricane. Scattered Fisher-Price play stations—with all those horns, buttons, and dials—thrown in with piles of brightly colored blocks, troll dolls, pink tutus, and neckties fit for circus clowns. And that’s before the residents, back from lunch, come knuckle dragging in to tear up the playroom some more, ripping cardboard boxes, tossing chairs. Some don mismatched socks on their handlike feet and build makeshift tents out of blankets. The ringleader, a chimp named Jamie, throws a tutu over her waist, goes Jackson Pollock with a fistful of Crayolas on a sheet of paper, and spits water at the humans gawking near the playroom gates.
The seven chimps at Chimpanzee Sanctuary Northwest, a 26-acre farm five miles east of Cle Elum, have never had it better. Until a year and half ago, the apes were the wards of a Pennsylvania company that rents out lab animals and had spent decades as medical test subjects—pumped full of drugs and split open for biopsies. At least two also had stints in showbiz.
The sanctuary, opened in 2008, is a far cry from the cramped, windowless warehouse basement the animals came from. Their 18,000-cubic-foot “chimp house” includes a roomy two-story play area, four interconnected front rooms, windows that look out onto the Cascade forests, and an outdoor area where the apes swing on the monkey bars of a 15-foot climbing structure. A staff of primatologists serves them fruit smoothies in the mornings, stages elaborate birthday parties involving fruit-filled piñatas, and films their daily antics, especially those of Jamie, a 32-year-old primeval Huck Finn whose knack for outwitting other chimps keeps the staff scratching their heads.
For Sarah Baeckler, who runs the sanctuary with two former Central Washington University classmates, the creation of CSNW came as a bittersweet triumph at the end of a painful and sometimes frightening decade of watching chimps suffer under the cruelest conditions. For Keith LaChappelle, who drained his life savings to create the sanctuary, CSNW culminates six years of labor, during which he was forced to confront the source of his once ample riches.
LaChappelle read a Discover article in 2003 that changed his life. A construction project manager at Immunex, a bioengineering firm on Seattle’s Western Avenue, LaChappelle was thumbing through a year-old copy of the magazine when he came across “An Embarrassment of Chimps,” a story about a sanctuary in Montreal that rescued 15 chimpanzees from a New York lab.
The article plunged LaChappelle into the world of captive chimpanzees. He learned how researchers infect hundreds of our closest relatives—chimps share more than 95 percent of our DNA—with viruses like HIV and hepatitis, inject them with unproven drugs, cut them open for organ biopsies, and discard them when they’re no longer of use.
Published: December 2009
Truly, amazing people.
compelling story, thank you for doing what you have done Keith. I am spreading the word to put a stop to this disturbing abusive lab tortures. I have seen these stories before on channel 9 this needs to be stopped asap. You have my support in any capacity I’m able to offer.
I thank you for your compassionate decision to do what you are doing!.
Much Empathy~ Robin M. Sanders
Thank you for a wonderful story. I too, support the chimps and am so thankful for the angels who rescued them and are caring for them. Our animals should never have to suffer the horrors of experimentation and the entertainment industry. I look forward to the day when this abuse will all be over for them.
Thank you for this WONDERFUL article about a place and people — human and chimp — I love.
I am a supporter of the Cle Elum Seven and CSNW and there has been a tremendous change in the chimps since their arrival. They are now happy, healthy chimps thanks to Keith LaChappelle and the staff at the sanctuary. I adore these chimps! This article is absolutely wonderful! Thank you for your excellent story.
Josh and I are proud to have played a part in this, however small, and very proud to claim Keith as an uncle. What a great person to have in our lives.
Living on the farm before the facility was built, and before seven chimps could claim it as home, was a great experience, and it has been amazing to see this progress from a dream into a full-fledged reality.
Kudos, everyone. You make us proud.
The Cle Elum Seven, and the people who care for them are inspirational.
CSNW is an awesome organization that I have been priviliged to support. I encourage anyone reading this to be active in contacting your government representatives to ask them to co sponsor the great ape protection act and anytime you see primates on tv to let the networks/movemakers know that they are supporting the exploitation and abuse of primates. After learning the truth it is hard if not impossible to speak up and out on the plight of chimpanzees here in the US. Bravo to everyone at CSNW and to the chimps who have endured so much but have chosen to move on and live in the moment something we all could learn.
Thank you Seattle Metropolitan for telling this story about the suffering that chimps in entertainment and in labs endure. I’m so very proud of Keith for pursuing his dream, and transforming the lives of these seven individuals, and to Sarah, Diana & J.B. who ensure that the years these chimps have left are the best they can possibly be. This is the kind of story that gives me hope that things can and will change for the better.
Thank you for your great article Seattle Metropolitan! These Chimpanzees, after all these years in labs probably feel like they are in heaven.
Bravo Cle Elum Sanctuary for your vision, hard work and dedication. A great success story!
Wonderful article! Kudos to the Seattle Metropolitan, CSNW, and all the supporters of such a true vision of compassion as a means to the end of suffering.
truely inspiring, . A gift of love that’s so precious.
What a wonderful article. These chimps had led such miserable lives. Now six females and one male, all of whom have endured hellish experiences, are safe in the hands of wonderful people. Keith’s vision never waivered, even before any chimps arrived. These are not the cutie chimps you see on TV commercials but battle-scarred veterans. May their retirement be full of joy!
please donate money to them – those chimps need all the support they can get.
kieth,you make your uncle and the rest of your family very proud of you ,best wishes to you and the staff at the sanctuary.
What I don’t understand is where is all the help from the drug companies and labs that use these poor animals? They and the rest of the country owe these animals more than can ever be paid, yet they pay nothing. Our goverment pays nothing. Keith gives all, his life saving and all his time.
We the people should call our Congressmen and demand they help support funding for CSNW. Mr. Lachapelle should be able to work full time at the sanctuary and not have to worry about feeding the animals or his own family.
With all the bailouts taking place how can they neglect to fund this one.
Way to go Keith, my hat is off to you.
Darrel
This is such an interesting and wonderful article. Most peopele don’t think about the lives some of these nimals have. What a great thing, that someone cares so much about their welfare.
Thank you for an excellent in-depth article!
Perhaps you could do a follow-up article informing the public of the Great Ape Protection ACT HR 1326 and how people can encourage (or thank) their legislator’s to co-sponsor this ACt http://www.releasechimps.org/take-action
Nearly $200 million taxpayer dollars will be saved by retiring the 500 federally-owned chimpanzees to sanctuaries, and tens of millions more through the prohibition on breeding and invasive research!
Last Christmas, I saw a short video on a local news website of the chimps experiencing snow for the first time. As a Christmas present to myself, I signed up to be a sponsor of Foxie – the chimp who always carries a troll doll. My year has been so enriched by daily checking the chimpsanctuarynw.org blog for videos and photos of the Cle Elem Seven. I am amused and honored and humbled and educated by watching their daily antics.
My life is enriched by supporting these chimps. I have come to “know” them and love each one individually – all through the Internet. The caretakers are brilliant and loving. They update the supporters via blog posts, photos and videos of our chimp friends. It is the most fun I have ever had donating to charity.
Great job on this article. I was so pleased to see it.
I am very proud of Keith’s accomplishment and happy to know we played a role in getting him where he is today. Most imporatantly we look forward to being with him into the future.
I wish there were CSNWs for all the chimps still locked away.
Thank you Keith and Sarah for the wonderful work you have done and thanks to the Seattle Metropolitan for wonderful article. These animals deserve so much more than those horrible cages and experiments. We are so close in DNA that chimpanzees can actually donate blood to humans! It horrified me to discover that when the chimps were on TV smiling, they were actually terrified. I look forward to the day that no more chimps are subjected to horrible experiments and living conditions. Again, thank all of you for helping rescue these wonderful, intelligent, loving beings.
Thank you for this article, it is so inspiring to read about people that are doing something to help the chimps.
Beautiful piece. I am inspired to action – thank you for bringing this issue to me and others who can be part of that change.