the elephant

Lucy the Elephant is located in Margate, NJ. She was built in 1881
by James V. Lafferty, a real estate developer with a gift for promotion.
Standing six stories tall, weighing 90 tons, covered with 12,000 square
feet of sheet metal, Lucy was more than an object of fright, she was a functioning
building, serving first as a hotel, then as a tavern. Since 1973 enough money has
been collected in determined "Save Lucy" campaigns to restore the structural
uprightness and exterior of the 90-ton wood-and-tin pachyderm.

The main room inside Lucy is 18 feet square, and 22 windows pierce
Lucy's frame. The body is 38 feet long by 80 feet in circumference.
Lucy's neck is 6 feet long by 48 feet in circumference; the legs are 22 feet lonng
by 10 feet in diameter. Lucy's ears are 17 feet long by 10 feet wide; each one
weighs approximately 2,000 pounds. Lucy's tusks are 22 feet long, the tail is
26 feet long and the eyes are 18 inches in diameter.
    She nearly didn't. By the late 1960s, Lucy was an abandoned wreck on the
verge of collapse. Rescued by the city of Margate, a major renovation began, centered on the
volunteer "Save Lucy Committee". Lucy has been designated a National
Historic Landmark by the National Park Service. Lucy proved very useful.
Jim L. made a bundle and went on to build other, even larger elephants in
Cape May and Coney Island. Sadly, only Lucy has survived.