Biography
John Victor Aspinall, known to all his friends as 'Aspers', was born in Delhi, India, on 11 June 1926, the son of Dr. Robert Stavali Aspinall, a British Army surgeon, and wife, whom he married before 1926, Mary Grace Horn (died 1987), daughter of Clement Samuel Horn, of Goring-by-Sea, Worthing, West Sussex, Sussex. Years later, when he pressed his supposed father for money to cover his gambling debts, he discovered his real father was George Bruce, a soldier.
Sent to boarding school, after his parents divorced, his stepfather Sir George Osborne sent him to Rugby School. Thrown out of Rugby School for inattention, Aspinall later went up to Jesus College, Oxford, but on the day of his final exams, he feigned illness and went to the Gold Cup at Ascot racecourse instead. He consequently never earned a degree.
Read more about this topic: John Aspinall (zoo Owner)
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