Lucy the Elephant is a six-story elephant-shaped example of novelty architecture, constructed of wood and tin sheeting in 1881 by James V. Lafferty in Margate City, New Jersey, two miles (3.2 km) south of Atlantic City, in an effort to sell real estate and attract tourism.
Today, Lucy is a tourist attraction. Guided tours take visitors into the building through the spiral staircase in the left rear leg up into the interior, then up again into the howdah to see views of Margate, the Atlantic City skyline, and the Atlantic Ocean.
Famous quotes containing the words lucy and/or elephant:
“What fond and wayward thoughts will slide
Into a Lover’s head!
‘O mercy!’ to myself I cried,
‘If Lucy should be dead!’”
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
“So slowly the hot elephant hearts
grow full of desire,
and the great beasts mate in secret at last,
hiding their fire.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)