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''I hit him over the head, trying to get him to let go.'' In the 1970s, along with his friend, respected Miami physician Ben Sheppard, Haast distributed PROven, a venom-based serum. Well I then came to his web site to find out how old Mr. Haast is today or if he is still alive. This is greatl so good to know that Doc is still alive and doing at least some of what he loves best. In 1949, he began supplying venom to a medical researcher at the University of Miami for experiments in the treatment of polio. Haast could not make the ceremony, so part of the ceremony came to him. Haast went to the pit with a pistol the very next day and shot the croc. However, the venom eventually did affect him, and he was taken to a hospital where it took him several days to recover. LIVES SAVED But if a life was lost at the Serpentarium, Haast wants it known that transfusions from his immunized blood to snake victims helped save 21 lives. Find out more about our policy and your choices, including how to opt-out. Across the street, a Haast lived in a nice house. Bill and Nanvy were the guest attraction and Bill has with them a 12' hamadrayad, (King Cobra) which was un a 4x4x8 gkass fronted cage identical to that in which the sidewinders were displayed. RESEARCH WAS GOAL For Haast, the bites, the snakes and the Serpentarium were only a means to an end. There were eyewitnesses here who certainly saw the child taken under the water, Sheriff Demings said. That was South Dade, Florida, relatively free of the most venomous snakes because Bill Hass and the Serpentarium. Julio. He inspired a life long love of reptiles for me and now my two children.. Great job on the article! It's a shame that everything is gone now. Inside, the snake shows were pure drama with no frills, no fanfare, no drum roll, no silence please, no ladies and gentleman. What a rush. It was damaged by a hurricane in 2005 and they just built a new one. But I always felt I would live this long. Regarding Bill Haast's killing of Cookie the crocodile, bothe Bill Guest and jesse are wrong. Dr. Ben Sheppard mentioned in the article helped me with my drug addiction in 1974. Everyone sold them to the Serpentarium for $1.25/Ft, good money in those days. How did he get them through Customs? Sheriff Demings identified the young boy as two-year-old Lane Graves of Nebraska, whose parents are Matt and Melissa Graves. The man who mesmerized generations of paying customers from 1947 to 1984 by extracting venom at his Miami Serpentarium as a spine-tingling South Florida attraction is dead. Im standing outside watching them search for someones baby, she wrote on Twitter. The findings were very encouraging, Haast said. Jaws dropped. In 1946 Haast decided he had enough money saved to start his snake farm. A rare survivor, he declared himself doing "very well, anxious to get back to work.". The night of the accident, he took his Luger, walked out to the pit and shot Cookie in the head. Sheppard gave injections to patients with MS. His clinic became famous and was featured on CBS's 60 Minutes. Zoo director Thane Maynard said the zoos dangerous animal response team decided the boy was in a life-threatening situation and they needed to put down the 200kg male gorilla. Haast saw that a boy had fallen into the crocodile pit. Bowker, of New York, pleaded guilty for his role in arranging for 22 snakes to be delivered to the Serpentarium in an apparent swap for the same number of American alligators. As a result of the damage, Haast gave up handling venomous snakes, and no longer kept any at his facility. I remember Cookie on the lawn, too! As he announced at the time, Bill killed the croc because he did not want her to become the inevitable freak show instead of a crocodile.Neither revenge nor stress induced fuzzy thinking was involved. He later received commendations from President Gerald Ford and Miami Mayor Stephen Clark. We also used to go to his show at the Serpentarium, and it fascinated my brother. I don't remember which one was the infamous "Cookie". The 35' cobra ended up on the roof (south side) of South Miami Senior High-my old high school-where it served proudly for many years. All times AEDT (GMT +11). I visited the Serpentarium in1969 as an 18-year-old on spring break with a buddy. Funny thing is, he had different ideas about that. Zoo Miami's Ron Magill Has Earned His Place in the Spotlight We lived in Southern California. Thank you for reminding me about this incredible man. 1, my mother carrying a large snake onboard an airplane, and no. Bill Jr. eventually left, having lost interest in snakes, but not before he had been bitten four times by venomous snakes. A crocodile attacked and killed an 11-year-old boy in Malawi, a landlocked country in southeastern Africa, on Monday. When our son was very small, he was afraid of snakes. My father used to deliver popcorn to the Miami Serpentarium in the late 60's early 70's and I used to love to watch Mr. Haast handle the King Cobras. Boy Dies After Falling Into Crocodile Pit, https://www.nytimes.com/1977/09/04/archives/boy-dies-after-falling-into-crocodile-pit.html. I read the part of this article where Mr. Haas had to shoot an allegator because a boy fell into the pit and the alligator ate him (is'nt that what allegators do eat anything including yu?) Thanks for the memories, as Bob Hope would say. My dad and I still talk about this over 40 years later! Haast's mental trauma over the boy's death eventually led to the closure of the Serpentarium on South Dixie Highway. When walking down a hallway, I passed an open door. The boy and his father, David Wasson, 42, were throwing grapes at the crocodile, hoping to see it move, when the boy slipped off a retaining wall on which he had been sitting and fell into the crocodile pit. Haast routinely injected himself with venom to build up resistance to the ill effects of the inevitable bites. Now, he believes, the long-term benefits of the shots have spared him from many of the maladies of old age. I recall going with my brother to the airport to pick her up upon her arrival. I remember seeing an alligator gulping down whole chickens and being allowed to handle an Indigo snake after Mr. Haast's presentation. He died of natural causes on Wednesday in Punta Gorda, on Florida's west coast, where he had made his home. "We're the only fire-based response team in the world." I . Donated several snakes over the years also, mostly coral snakes from Opa Locka area. When I was a child in the 1950's, Mama made us stay in the house. Eventually Bill charmed that snake and on one of its downstrikes quicker than the snake could react Bill had it behind the head and then as a finale milked a big load of venom. By the mid-1960s he was putting on five shows a day, dressed in a white lab coat, extracting venom to sell for scientific experimentation. "We can't be here, because we spend every time remembering how nice it was to have him here with us. I remember reading Bill Haast book Cobras in My Garden, one of the most interesting books I have ever read. In North Carolina, a chemist offered this salute: "Resssssssst in Peace Bill Haast.". Nya used to take us after hours to the Serpentariumm to watch her Dad and his workers feed the animals. Haast's death-defying act didn't disappoint. Did you know that Charlie Baxter aka MT GRAVES IS STILL ALIVE & is one hell of a nice guy. In my Junior high days, I was a snake enthusiast. Quite a memory! i would love to read a biography on bill haast or should we say DR.HAAST? We will have to go and visit the place that a man built who was inspired by Mr. Haast. Look at how big the transplanted Pythons get and that they thrive and fight the alligators in the Everglades. At the same time his work saved dozens of lives. All this may be imaginative conjecture of a teenage boy.. .Once thing sure, though, Him and his wife sure looked scary, to we boys, in those white Drs. I couldn't take the anti-venom so Dr. Haast instructed the hospital on how to treat me. After leaving Miami for the Air Force and then marriage, my bride and I returned to the Central East Coast of Florida to live, and on a trip to the Keys, I just had to take my new bride to show her Bill Haast's work. He was a local celebrity known for something really worthwhile (unlike so many celebrities nowadays). TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. In the late 1940s, it occurred to Haast that the symptoms of polio mirrored the nerve and muscle disruption caused by a cobra bite. But at the Serpentarium, there was a monster 14 foot rattlesnake from upper Florida, probably from around the Gainesville area. I'm sure they still carry around enough guilt, even after all this time, without you adding to it. Join the New Times community and help support Even though this article is of the Snakeman as we called him I want to comment a special person. He said the body was found completely intact near the attack site, leading authorities to believe the alligator drowned the toddler. The injections are a routine he began in 1948 -- the year he opened the Serpentarium -- and continued after he closed it in 1984. He is truely an extraordinary man. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. Behind him rose an 8-foot concrete cobra statue that once decorated the serpentarium. He received the key to the city.Those same hands that for decades eased venom from the world's most poisonous snakes held the key to the city of Miami on Thursday. His powerful blood also rescued 21 snake-bite victims. He made special trips, bringing back such perilous species as cobras and saw-scaled vipers. He soon learned how to handle the snakes and found one timber rattler so easy to handle that he posed for a photograph with the snake lying across his lap. Thanks again Bill.. "Bill Haast, a Man Charmed by Snakes, Dies at 100", "Owner destroys crocodile that killed boy, may close serpentarium", "Icon: Bill Haast Snake handler, venom researcher, age 97", "100 years and kicking: Happy Birthday, Bill Haast", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bill_Haast&oldid=1079333500, This page was last edited on 26 March 2022, at 06:33. See the article in its original context from. "He's like an icon to people that know him," Cruz said. haasti is different from the parent species only by virtue of an unusual configuration of white coloration on the head and chin. "It was his adopted city. As far as I recall, the Cobra on the roof was the one from the Serpentarium. No. The couple moved back to New Jersey, where Haast studied aviation mechanics, and was certified after four years. Bill Haast and a cobra at the Miami Serpentarium by Don Boyd I visited many times in the 60's - 70's. Good memories of a time long ago. When I was a small boy of 8-9 years old in the mid sixties, a distinguished gentleman would walk by our house in the early morning like clockwork. I told my mother how I'd really like to get an Indigo and she kind of shrugged it off. It was intuitive. Worst time of my life!!! More animals than anyone I ever knew, and of every variety. Newsweek has contacted crocodile experts for comment. This subspecies, restricted to the Florida Keys, obviously was named for Bill Haast. It was an incredible place. He was a great neighborhhod Dad, and I will always remember the fun we had with he, his wife and his children. Most of the family agreed it was better than any other stops we made, including the newly opened Disney World. Staff at the resort were unwilling to comment on the incident. [8], Haast closed the Serpentarium in 1984, and moved to Utah for a few years. Back in the 1980's, I lived in the Pepperwood S/D (about one block south of Kendell Drive, just west of Palmetto Expy). Julio Otero Fernndez was wading knee-deep in the Matina River in Limn, eastern Costa Rica, when the reptile lunged at him, pulled him under and killed him. I'm very glad I did. By 1965 the Serpentarium housed more than 500 snakes in 400 cages and three pits in the courtyard. "He was into it for the science on how snake venom affected the body," said the grand-niece who worked at The Serpentarium as a teen in the 1980s. Green mambas. We visited the Serp many times as a family visiting from Illinois and I have an autographed copy of Cobras In His Garden along with several movies that I gotta get moved over to DVD's.. Doc always took time to shake hands or pose for a picturetime that in retrospect I know he didn't really have to give, but he always did. Boy, 8, cut from 26ft crocodile which swallowed him whole while he was All he did was yell ouch and that concludes the show for today. Supposedly, this Timacuan sub-species and the nearby Mexican Bush Master are the largest poisonous snakes in the world and Bill Hass had both of them in his World famous Serpentarium. At the time of the TV airing Mr. Haast was 87 years old and quite handsome he looked no older that early 50s. World; North America; Alligator drags child into lake near Disney's Grand Floridian Resort & Spa. My Dad would take me there often, we lived in South Miami (as I do againlong story). These Valuable Pennies Are Worth Thousands. On two trips to Florida in the late 60s, my parents took me to The Serpentarium. Im just here to say a prayer, he said. Haast still grows somber when retelling the story: It was a Sunday. These flights took him to South America, Africa and India, where he bought snakes to bring back to America, including his first cobra. As many families do, the Malaysian family had a get together with some friends. Haast retained custody of their son, Bill Jr. and continued to work as a mechanic for Pan Am while he built the Serpentarium. A doctor at the hospital where the boy, was taken said the child was practically dead on arrival from drowning in association with multiple traumatic injuries., See the article in its original context from. He had so much venom in him that we were told even a bee sting could kill him. Haast eventually returned home, where his mother had leased a concession stand at a lakeside resort. We considered him the Patron Saint of Junkies in those days. I thought that was pretty cool back then, and still do. Mr. Hasst brought out a huge 16 foot long King Cobra and kept it controlled on the lawn in front of us. I will enjoy looking over this site over time. Does anybody on this herpetology board know either the author or title of a novel, published roughly 20 years ago. I'm surprised to hear the stories about the cobra being damaged enroute to SMSH. A massive crocodile attacked and ate an 8-year-old girl while she was bathing in the river with friends. MIAMI, Sept. 3 (UPI)A 6yearold boy tumbled into a crocodile pit at the Miami Serpentarium today and a 14 foot, 1,800pound African crocodile snapped its jaws around the child's middle and dragged him to his death in a small lagoon. The animal was of no harm to anyone other than the fool who would allow his self to fall in. Keepers were forced to shoot and kill the 17-year-old gorilla named Harambe. The Reptile Centre in Northampton, England, declared him "an inspirational man within the world of reptiles." By then Cookie, the 12-foot, 2,000-pound crocodile, had the boy in its mouth. Unfortunately, in 1977 a six-year-old boy fell into the crocodile pit at Miami Serpentarium and was killed by "Cookie", a 12-ft-long crocodile. "When he closed his doors there was a lapse and there were some fatalities related to exotic snake bites," said Chuck Seigert, of the Miami unit. BOY KILLED The attraction prospered until a tragedy in 1977. Once I found an albino snake and she paid me for it, and then took it to Bill Haast. Dr. Haast met my pediatrician at Baptist Hospital in Miami. My first visit to the Serpentarium was in the summer of '56 when I visited family friends who lived on Key Biscayne. There was a croc that had lost its tail because it had bit at it after thinking it was another croc coming to steal its food. She would take some of her snakes to Bill Haast. His dream of creating a snake sanctuary grew nearer. . Every year we took a field trip there, and every year I looked forward to it. ''I miss the excitement of the Serpentarium,'' Haast said. I could see their fears fade as they got the nerve to touch a real snake and realize that is wasn't slimy. From The Miami Herald, August 3, 2006 FLASHBACK | THE MIAMI SERPENTARIUM 'Miami snakeman' is 95 and still injects himself with venom BY LUISA YANEZ [email protected] IN PUNTA GORDA: Bill Hasst sold his Miami Serpentarium site in Pinecrest in 1984, and settled in southwest Florida. I still have his autograph and some great snapshots of that meet & greet. Authorities found the remains of the . THAT WAS THE MOST MEMORIBLE PART OF THAT VACATION. Wow the good old days and funny thing is my name is Cookie!!! boy killed by crocodile at miami serpentarium. Shame on Hass and the parents this poor animal was slaughtered. The last snake I had was a 12' burmese python that I owned a few years ago. "If I live to be 100, I'll really make the point. When you left his exhibit, you loved the snakes, and I hasve never been afraid of them for the rest of my life. CANCUN -- A 12-year-old boy who was bitten by a crocodile at a Mexican resort spoke to "Good Morning America" on Wednesday in his first television interview. He applied the standard snake-bite treatment of the time (making crossed cuts over the fang marks and applying potassium permanganate) and then walked four miles to the camp's first aid tent, by which time his arm was swollen. This is a digitized version of an article from The Timess print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. Horses had developed resistance to the poisons through the same process, and the blood of those horses was used to create life-saving antivenin. Small world. "I could become a poster boy for the benefits of venom," Haast boasted. Today, Van Horn owns Reptile World Serpentarium near St. Still recognized as a top authority on venomous snakes, Haast, who moved his snakes to a lab on his sprawling Charlotte County complex in 1990 (he no longer has snakes there), said he answers questions from callers every day. Besides the mayor's key, they gave him a firefighter's helmet bearing the unit's name: Venom 1. We watched Mr. Haast with fascination as he milked the snakes. In 1964, a book was written about him. I got my love of snakes (I'm a girl) growing up in Miami going repeatedly to the Serpentarium. The Serpentarium was my childrens favorate place to go on weekends, especially my son who is now grown and still holds a fasination for snakes. Serpentarium | Flashback Miami According to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, population growth and increasing participation in water-related activities are resulting in more frequent alligator-human interactions. When she got in the car she said she had a suprise for me. I have returned to see his show at thye Serpentarium and have watched him with his wife on the Merv Griffith show & others ( I think also the Jonny Carson Show) many years later. Haast started collecting snakes and, after initial opposition from his mother, was allowed to keep them at home. The crocodile is believed to measure 2.5 to three . It had been bit my Cookie while trying to stop Cookie from getting out on US1.Also their pet lion jumped across the roof of the Shelby and the chain scratched the roof. I remember one time that one got the better of him and bit him in the neck. I remember it sliding around my leg and shaking my leg till it feel off. I didn't know what to do with it, so I call the Miami Serpentarium. We entered the Serpentarium and a fellow (Haas) walked out of the back office to greet the tourists and said" he's dead" referring to John F. Kennedy, President of the USA. It was'nt the aninmal's fault that boy fell into the pit (the alligator was where he was suppose to be. I have such respect for Mr. Haast and for all of his work. His wife Nancy and I had been pleasantly talking an she was so fearful that she held my arm and squeezed hard, all the while telling me that a bite from that king cobra would likely kill Bill , because up to that point he had been bitten some 23 times , but never by a king cobra one drop of which can kill 5 men. THIS SOFT SPOKEN WOMAN TURNED TO HER FAMILY AND SAID "I'VE COME ALL THE WAY TO MIAMI TO HAVE SOME SNAKE S__T ON ME". For almost four decades, Haast charmed curious tourists who flocked to his South Dixie Highway attraction, the Miami Serpentarium, to watch his snake show. His hands are gnarled and deadened, some fingers hang immobile, some look stunted in growth, and a pinky and index finger have been amputated at the knuckle, photographs taken by his wife reveal. American Model Killed By Crocodile In Australia - YouTube 0:00 / 1:46 American Model Killed By Crocodile In Australia Strange Deranged Unexplained 1.08K subscribers 743 80K views 11. I was fascinated watching them put Mr Haast's feeding tube down and feed the snake. For years, Haast tried to prove that venom could treat multiple sclerosis, lupus, arthritis and Parkinson's disease. As I was sitting there I heard a big CHOMP and turned around to see one huge animal falling back into the pitmissed me by about a foothorseshoes and hand-grenadeseh? The location of where the 2yr old is missing. flashbackmiami.com/2013/11/26/serpentarium-2/, Mozilla/5.0 (iPad; CPU OS 15_5 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko) GSA/219.0.457350353 Mobile/15E148 Safari/604.1. May he live far past the hundreds. Friday, his wife Nancy put his lifetime tally at 172. I lived across South Dixie Highway from the Miami Serpentarium. David Mark Wasson was apparently sitting on top of the wall around the pit, dangling his feet during an inter mission between shows when he lost his balance, the authorities said. Yep, I was a snake kid, read all the books in my library, found "Cobras In His Garden" and was as surprised as my parents when Bill Haast wrote back to me a few times. I never forgot Mr. Haast and his snakes, and, to this day, I am not scared of snakes or any other animals. AJ Jain, a guest at the hotel, told The Orlando Sentinel he and his family were playing at the beach just hours earlier. Horror as remains of '14-year-old boy' are cut from massive crocodile's THE body of a two-year-old boy snatched by an alligator at a Disney resort has now been recovered. MIAMI, Sept. 3 (UPI)A 6yearold boy tumbled into a crocodile pit at the Miami Serpentarium today and a 14 foot, 1,800pound African crocodile snapped its jaws around the child's. It is unclear whether the attack was fatal. But his wife said that the crocodile, named Cookie, was killed and buried in the same pit where it. His first king cobra bite was in 1962. 76. In 1984, Haast, who is said to have never fully recovered from the . The incident comes after a four-year-old boy fell into the gorilla enclosure at Cincinnati Zoo last month. Katherine White Popp, whose room is directly outside where the child was taken, said she overheard the mothers screams. Sincerely, an understanding and appreciative person! While the rest of the crew was out having fun in the exotic locales, he bought exotic snakes. 12-foot crocodile . The 2-year-old boy grabbed by alligator at Disney hotel has been found dead, a source says https://t.co/SyWdOq9L87 https://t.co/xLMVr0orfE. Authorities said the boy, who fell about three metres, was expected to recover after being picked up and dragged by Harambe for about 10 minutes. "I am not going to stay here, because just as they protect those animals, they are capable of leaving the river to attack more people and the truth is that it is scary that something like this will happen again.