Thousands in San Francisco mourn beloved albino alligator, Claude

Claude wasn’t much of a talker, he barely moved and never wore a costume to attract his audience – but on Sunday, hundreds of people gathered in San Francisco to celebrate the life and legacy of the city’s beloved albino alligator.

A New Orleans-style marching band, an eight-foot-long alligator-shaped white sourdough loaf, a drag queen story hour and even a street officially named after him, Claude the Alligator Way, the memorial was one of a kind.

The reptile certainly won millions of hearts during his lifetime, but he is also remembered for stealing a 12-year-old girl.

The 10-foot-long, 300-pound white alligator, with pink eyes and poor eyesight, stole — then gobbled up — the girl’s ballet shoe, recalls Bart Shepherd of the California Academy of Sciences, Claude’s home for 17 years before his death in December.

“It’s no small feat to pull a shoe out of an alligator,” Shepherd told a crowd of Claude fans at Golden Gate Park.

It took a lot of anesthesia, specialized tools and several veterinarians and staff members to extract the shoe from inside Claude — a task that was accomplished successfully, despite a building-wide fire alarm going off at the time, Shepherd said.

“It was really heartwarming to see San Francisco come out and celebrate this beloved San Francisco icon,” Jeanette Peach, the academy’s communications director, told the BBC.

Part of the reason people loved Claude so much, Peach said, was that he “embodied something that we consider to be a really San Francisco ideal, which is not just accepting but welcoming people in their differences.”

Claude’s albinism, extremely rare among alligators, has given visibility to people who feel a little left out, Peach said.

“Here is this wonderful animal that is a little bit excluded from the rest of its species, but is loved and cherished and has value,” she added.

Claude “has delighted and captivated more than 22 million visitors and shown us the power of animal ambassadors to connect people with nature and science,” the academy writes on its website.

The reptile, who died of liver cancer at the age of 30 in December, was hatched in 1995 on an alligator farm in Louisiana before coming to live in the academy’s swamp exhibit in 2008.

Since his passing, the academy has received thousands of letters from Claude fans, writing to say how much the alligator meant to them.

“Thank you for inspiring so many young children over the years,” one of Claude’s visitors wrote to him in a note. “You reminded us that our differences are what make us unique and special and should be celebrated.”

“You will forever be in my heart,” wrote another. “I will miss you so much and thank you for being a part of my childhood.”

Lana Krol, a senior veterinarian at the academy, said that of all the alligators she has worked with, Claude “seemed to me to be the most laid back of all of them.”

“I can confidently say that I will not meet another alligator like Claude in my lifetime. I will miss him terribly,” Krol said.