This Is Your Life: Mary Chipperfield

Mary CHIPPERFIELD (1938-2014)

THIS IS YOUR LIFE – Mary Chipperfield, animal trainer and circus entertainer, was surprised by Eamonn Andrews while giving a talk on circus animals to schoolchildren for the ITV children's programme Magpie at Stanley Road Junior School in Teddington.

Mary, who was born in Kentish Town, London, into a circus family, made her debut in the ring with dancing horses at the age of 10. She later trained with Circus Knie in Germany, specialising in equestrian horses, before returning to the UK to join the family circus in 1953. When her father, Jimmy, gave up the business two years later to take up farming, Mary joined him, opened a riding school, and began showjumping.

In 1961, Jimmy founded Southampton Zoological Gardens, and he and Mary used this as a base for training and providing a variety of wild animals for Chipperfield's Circus and film and television work. In 1966, Mary and her husband, Roger Cawley, began managing the Longleat Safari Park, Europe's first drive-through safari park. She later made regular television appearances and returned to the ring with a daring act involving tigers.

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