19: Signalman Jack the Baboon
Worked at a Railroad Station for Nearly a Decade
Born: Date Unknown, Probably South Africa?
Died: 1890, Near Uitenhage, South Africa (Present-day Kariega, South Africa)
As the story goes, one day in the 1880s, a railway signalman named James Wide was visiting a market in South Africa when he saw an amazing sight—a chacma baboon driving an oxcart through the market. Wide was instantly enamored by the baboon, and decided to purchase him, name him Jack, and make Jack his personal assistant.
You know, as one does.
Evidently, James wanted an assistant because he had lost both of his legs in an accident years before. James had made it a habit of jumping between moving train cars, and one day he jumped at just the wrong moment and was run over by the train, losing both of his legs around the knee. Somehow he wasn't killed in the freak accident, and instead made himself peg legs and went back to work.
At first, Jack the baboon would cart his boss back and forth to work every day, but soon he had picked up on how to help around the house, like sweeping floors, collecting firewood, and taking out trash.
It wasn’t long though, until Jack picked up on his boss’s job as a railway signalman for the Uitenhage train station. At the time, trains would blast their whistles a set number of times to indicate which track they wanted to use. The signalman, listening to the whistles, would then change the tracks according to the train’s wishes using a series of levers. Jack picked up on this system rather quickly, and began pulling the levers to change the tracks all on his own. Some sources state he was even able to deliver keys to various train conductors when needed as well.
James Wide realized he had made the wisest monetary purchase of his life. Soon enough, James would kick back and goof off during the work day while Jack—who was apparently CHAINED to the work area, would pull all the levers and literally do all the work, all without being paid because, well, he was a baboon.
One day, a train passenger noticed Jack pulling the levers and she filed a complaint. Not because she thought there was a case of animal cruelty happening, but because she was disturbed by the thought of a monkey doing a human’s job. Considering this was the late 1880s…I don’t blame her!
An official investigation was launched into the matter, and in 1890, a railway superintendent noted that Jack knew every lever and every whistle, possibly even better than the superintendent himself. Jack was actually promoted! He was given an official employee number and uniform, and was paid half a bottle of beer every week and twenty cents a day pay.
Jack ended up passing away in 1890—though what killed him is up for debate. Most sources say he died of tuberculosis while another said he was run over by a train. He had worked for the railways for nine years and never made a single mistake.
Apparently, Jack’s skull is on display in the Albany Museum in Grahamstown, South Africa.
...
I like this story, really, I do. But I have one glaring issue with it—all of the articles I have listed as sources below are pop culture articles, have no basis in cited historical works, and NONE of them list their own sources. There are several photos in the articles as well, but honestly, they all look photoshopped to me (including the one I posted in this article). I was able to verify that the museum in South Africa is real—it is actually apparently the second oldest museum in the country. The museum itself is a natural history museum with lots of different exhibitions and artifacts from South Africa’s natural history, but I couldn’t find anything on the website about Jack the Baboon.
Even the Wikipedia article has mostly sources that are the same as I found (including the same Mental Floss article I linked below). Wikipedia also says the famed actor Ricky Gervais talked about the story of Jack on a radio show during a segment titled “Monkey News” but evidently Gervais dismissed the story and found it just as unbelievable as me.
I even attempted to look up Jack's owner, James Wide, on Find a Grave to try and verify his story, but there are no burials for a James Wide in South Africa listed on the site. Even a simple Google search of his name turned up no results.
If any of you have ever visited the Albany Museum in South Africa and have seen Jack’s skull, please let me know! Without seeing some actual, verifiable, evidence however, I am going to take this entire story with a grain of salt…
Sources:
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/559031/signalman-jack-baboon-worked-railroad-south-africa
https://theexpeditionproject.com/jack-the-signalman-baboon-a-remarkable-tale-of-animal-ingenuity
https://fieldethos.com/jack-the-baboon