When my daughter was two, we went to the Lincoln Park Zoo.

I remember two things besides her being asleep by the time got on Lake Shore Drive after we left the high rise where she was living within site of Lake Michigan (on Chestnut, I believe).

First, since I knew she was read “Madeline” often, when we got to the tigers, I tried to interest her in saying, “Pooh, pooh.”

She wasn’t interested.

Instead her attention was drawn to the pigeons near the fountain in front of the lion house.

She was fulling occupied and quite delighted to be chasing the pigeons around the fountain.

The second thing I remember was the huge statue of an elephant near, you guessed it, the elephants’ enclosure.

It was made out of chrome bumpers.

“Can I touch it?” Alexandra asked.

I gave her permission.

I think she was small enough to slip under the fence.

What brings that to mind is the 2009 photo of a chrome buffalo that is located in a pretty out-of-the way place in Springfield, Illinois.  (It can be seen if one takes North Fifth Streets–a one-way street–and looks right just past a grade school, which is on the left.)

This chrome buffalo statue is in Springfield, Illinois.

Compare it with the real thing, found in South Dakota.

These buffalo were in Custer State Park. This cow was leading her calves across Route 89, just a short drive from Rapid City, South Dakota.