Post #210934 by Gigantalope on Fri, Jan 27, 2006 8:27 PM

In the early '60s my old boy sold insurance in San Diego, and later Orange County. One of his favorite stories (It might be bullshit) was about a guy he had insured who worked in some space program, and got fired when they did-away with using Chimps in the rockets.

The story goes that the employees were allowed to keep the chimps as they would otherwise be put down.

Apparently this fellow took his chimp (who was quite bright as chimps go) and made him into a pet. He taught the Chimp a few amuzing party tricks, and soon he had gigs where the Chimp would accompany him to bars, and dance or some such thing while the guy played the piano.

At some point after the bars closed, he was on his way home, stepped to phone his wife, and while the car was warming up, the chimp (who knew how to fly so driving must have been easy) slid across the seat, and put the car in D...and off he went... into a large Sears store.

I remember the detail the it was a Dodge Polara, and that the result was that the Chimp was deemed to be part of the family, and thus the owner of the chimp was at fault, but the insurance had to pay the costs. (Sears and Allstate were then the same company)

Also resulting from this, according to my Dad were litigations about whose fault it was this guy had a Chimp, and municipal ordnances about owning such potentially problematic animals...

Again, I don't know if it's true, but I sure hope it is. (Now I bet a bunch of people have different version of the same story..."only I heard it was a clown" or some such)