|
This
costume was worn by an elephant named Mardji, who was a resident of Marine
World - Africa, USA in Redwood City (just south of S.F.) at the time.
The creatures, as they appeared in the film, go by the name of Bantha. They provided Vader's Imperial Stormtroopers with (somewhat clumsy) transportation while on the desert planet Tatooine. The closest thing to a Bantha in Earth's history is probably the woolly mammoth or mastodon. Both are extinct now. Hopefully, we won't send our elephants to the same fate. |
I must have been
a goofy little boy when I took this photograph in the late 1970s
or early 1980s.
That was way back in the 20th Century, by the way.