Wednesday 22 October 2008

Dreamland Zoo

Interesting article in Thanet Extra today http://www.thanetextra.co.uk/news/default.asp?article_id=50020&newspage=1 about the recently discovered animal cages. I remember there being a zoo there in the 1970s when I took some time out of engineering to spend a summer season working as a maintenance engineer on the arcade slot machines.

Does anyone else remember the zoo and the unusual things about it like taking lion cubs for a walk on Margate sands in the early mornings?

Has anyone got any photos?

Here are the photos re comments below







27 comments:

  1. I remember when a Baboon and some monkeys escaped and were eventually recaptured in Queens Avenue, Margate.

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  2. i was born in dreamland in 1975 and my dad was the man who used to walk the lions on the beach he used to run the zoo in the 70s

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    1. my name was Maureen Taylor I sat in the entrance kiosk to the zoo in the 1970 ,i remember Derek Mollett who came from Dagenham and had a sister who was the girlfriend of Hywell Bennett.Derek lived in a caravan on the zoo site and had lots of alsation dogs.

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  3. One of them, I was another one, was he the Australian who ran the zoo for a while and lived in a campervan behind the Lido arcade, I have often wondered what modern elf and safety would think about taking a few lions for a walk on Margate sands in the early morning, to give them a bit of exercise.

    I guess no one would believe this was done anyway, but in a general sense if you take a few lions for a walk, it needs several people and a certain attitude.

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  4. was your dad named derek mollett from dagenham

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    1. I'm Derek mollett who managed the zoo in 1977 ,I've got a few pics to share with you

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    2. Hi Derek if you send me the photos I will put them on the blog my email is michaelchild@aol.com

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    3. hi derek any more pics of the zoo at dreamland love to see them mike frewer

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    4. Yes I've just e-mailed them over,should be uploaded soon

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    5. Yes I've just e-mailed them over,should be uploaded soon

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    6. Derek if you email them to me too I will put them on the blog

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  6. I've emailed you the pictures thanks Derek

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  7. I've emailed you the pictures thanks Derek

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    1. I haven't received the email Derek, perhaps it's lost in cyberspace

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  9. Hi Derek. Not arrived and not in my spam folder, as I said my email address is michaelchild@aol.com I also have a Gmail one thanetonline@gmail.com could you kindly send it to one and cc it to the other one so I can find out what’s going wrong.

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    1. Hi did u get the other pictures I sent ?

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    2. Hi did u get the other pictures I sent ?

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    3. Hi did u get the other pictures I sent ?

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    4. Hi did u get the other pictures I sent ?

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    5. Hi Derek no nothing at this end, I think last time I got them when you sent them to thanetonline@gmail.com

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    6. got one which I have put on the blog Derek

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    7. Think I have found all of them now and got them up as today's post

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Comments, since I started writing this blog in 2007 the way the internet works has changed a lot, comments and dialogue here were once viable in an open and anonymous sense. Now if you comment here I will only allow the comment if it seems to make sense and be related to what the post is about. I link the majority of my posts to the main local Facebook groups and to my Facebook account, “Michael Child” I guess the main Ramsgate Facebook group is We Love Ramsgate. For the most part the comments and dialogue related to the posts here goes on there. As for the rest of it, well this blog handles images better than Facebook, which is why I don’t post directly to my Facebook account, although if I take a lot of photos I am so lazy that I paste them directly from my camera card to my bookshop website and put a link on this blog.