The chimpanzee Julius grew up with humans and fascinated the whole of Norway in the 1980s. But the famous monkey has lived a turbulent life since she was born on December 26, 1979.
In the spring of 1983, the creator of “Kaptein Sabeltann” Terje Formoe composed a song about the chimpanzee Julius:
“Here is Giulio that everyone wants to see,
Swing on top of a tree.
We hear it and know it’s coming,
oh, Giulio, we are waiting for you!
The song becomes a super hit and sells for a silver disc. As well as the children’s book about Julius, which in 1983 took second place in the bestseller list.
Julius souvenirs sell like dung for hoeing in Dyreparken. In 1989 it was named “Sørland of the Decade”. When he turns 18, he receives a driving license as a birthday gift from the National Road Administration (which will be destroyed as soon as the Norwegian Motor Vehicle Safety Authority learns of the gift).
But fame has a dark side. In Terje Formo’s song about Julius from 1983, it is stated: “It costs a lot to become popular!”.
The story of Norway’s most famous animal is also about an abandoned baby chimpanzee, a violent attack on a garbage man and a drug psychosis.
And the story begins on Boxing Day 1979.
Then Dyreparken in Kristiansand receives a very special Christmas present: a small chimpanzee weighing 2.5 kilos.
The baby chimpanzee is discovered by a zookeeper who thinks the newcomer is a girl. And since it’s Christmas, the name will be Juliane. When the mistake is discovered, the chimpanzee is named Julius.
Julius’ life quickly takes a dramatic turn: In February 1980, a zookeeper finds Julius bleeding and screaming on the floor outside his mother’s room.
The tip of one of his index fingers was bitten off. Julius was rejected by his mother Sanne (8) – and now something must be done.
It is the director of Dyreparken, Edvard Moseid, and Dr. Billy Glad who take the responsibility. They wrap Julius in a warm blanket and take him home to the doctor’s family.
– He was a chimpanzee and not a human. We should try as much as possible to treat him like an animal, Moseid previously told the website Rings of the year.
First he lives for a long time with the Glad family, then he alternates living there, with the Moseid family and with the animal breeder Grete Svendsen.
This is because he shouldn’t get too attached to a family.
The life that lives in these early years bears little resemblance to the life of chimpanzees in the wild. Nor about animal life in Dyreparken.
Julius takes a boat trip to the Glad family cottage, “helps” the children with their homework, and sometimes gets to sleep in the “siblings'” beds.
On December 1, 1980, the first documentary film about Julius airs on NRK. The special chimpanzee that lives with humans is fast becoming a celebrity. NRK is making a children’s TV series about Julius.
At the same time, he will return to “normal” chimpanzee life in Dyreparken. Julius is nearly two when he visits Apeøya for the first time since he was rejected by his mother when he was a six-week-old baby chimpanzee.
There live the mother Sanne and the other chimpanzees: Lotta, Little-Billy and Bølla. That same fall, a separate room was built for Julius next to the other chimps’ rooms, where he stayed for a few hours at a time. In late autumn he spends the night there for the first time.
However, there are other rules for Julius: he can run freely in the Animal Park and steal pieces of cake from the restaurant guests.
Julius escaped five times before 1992. But in June of this year the shocking news arrives: he escaped and attacked the garbage man Oddvar Ivarson.
According to Dyreparken, Julius was annoyed that Ivarson made noise when he was picking up rubbish outside Tropiaret, where Julius lives, and interpreted it as a challenge to power.
– Once he jumped out of the window to scare me. Then I hit the window again, but then Julius pointed his finger at me, Ivarson added The newspaper I 2009.
Julius waited behind the souvenir stand and lunged for the garbage truck and the driver’s window. Then he bit Ivarson, who tried to defend himself and screamed as loud as he could, into his hand so that his blood splattered.
– Of course he wanted to bite and there was nothing particularly good in the car, Ivarson told Dagbladet.
“Ivarson avoided amputation, but never regained fine motor skills in his left finger,” Dyreparken writes on his website.
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The pressure on Julius to have children is great. When the female chimpanzee Miff is taken to Norway, VG writes that “the bride has landed.” She eventually she has more children.
As of 2005, it has been more than 25 years since Julius was part of the chimpanzee herd. But when the pack leader, Champis, dies, he’s accepted back… and pack leader. He moves in with the rest of the chimps.
But life as a pack leader is no cakewalk, it’s not just about keeping track of other chimpanzees.
In the spring of 2016, a fierce fight broke out for the role of the alpha female of the pack. Julius fights desperately to keep the chimpanzees Miff and Dixi apart, but ends up getting his lip bitten. He needs to be put under anesthesia and have the wound stitched up.
Over the course of the year the same thing happens again. Again Julius is injured, again he has to undergo anesthesia.
This won’t be the last time Julius is drugged.
In 2019 he falls seriously ill after having drank the contents of a plastic bottle someone threw at him. Blood tests show Julius ingested amphetamines, which a vet said could have killed him.
How many years of life Julius, 43, has left is unclear: Chimpanzees have a life expectancy of 40-45 years, according to Excellent Norwegian lexicon.
But regardless of what he wants to do in his later years, it’s probably safe to say that a chimpanzee will never again make such a big mark on the Norwegian public.
