My Wild Affair (2014–…): Season 1, Episode 3 - The Seal Who Came Home - full transcript

How did it happen
that a wild harbor seal

found life-long friendship
with a salty guy from Maine?

Why he's so popular?

He's great, that's why.

Over 25 years,
man and seal cemented a bond

That hundreds of miles
of ocean and even blindness

Couldn't break.

He thinks I'm his mother.

This is the story of Andre,

The seal who came home.

An animal born to be wild,



the rarest of bonds
with a human,

a friendship across the divide,

a story of unbreakable devotion.

"My wild affair"
was made possible in part

In part by contributions
to your pbs station

from viewers like you.

"Where is Andre?"

The rather famous
harbor seal is missing,

and his friends
are fearing the worst.

A seal named Andre
had been captivating

audiences for 25 years.

But on June 14, 1986,
national news reported

that this much-loved seal
was missing.

We come to see Andre every year,



and we're disappointed
to miss him.

I think it's a tragedy.

I'd love to see him.

Heartsick friends
and fans asked themselves

would Andre come home?

Home was rockport, Maine,

a tiny, picturesque
fishing village

on the rocky Atlantic coast,

known for its great scenery
and cheap lobster.

It's also home to a tribe
of rugged individualists

known as mainers.

This is where the story begins

in the spring of 1959

with a man named Harry goodridge

and a fateful encounter
that would change

his life forever.

Harry was rockport's arborist

with a thriving
tree care business.

For better or worse,
he was a typical mainer

with a low tolerance
for people he didn't like.

And here he is...

Looking out to sea.

That would have been April.

God love him.

His 4 daughters
still reminisce

about their no-nonsense,
straight-talking dad.

Daddy knew phonies a mile away.

If they weren't real,
he let them know.

My dad was smart, funny,
sometimes grumpy.

But as the family
knew, there was another side

to Harry
beneath the gruff exterior.

He was crusty, you know,
he was prickly sometimes,

And he wasn't
that way with the animals.

He had such a good rapport
with them all.

Daddy preferred
animals to people.

He was much more
tolerant with animals.

Harry turned
their home into a menagerie

of domestic and wild animals.

Daddy was understanding.

He could almost read
animals' minds, I think.

They were all welcome
inside the house.

My dad had a fascination
with all creatures,

but when he got a boat,
he had access

to a whole new world
of creatures

in seals, porpoises, sharks...

Any creature of the deep.

The Atlantic ocean was
right on Harry's doorstep,

And it became his playground.

One day in may, 1959,
Harry took a day trip

out to Mark island
and Robinson's rock

to creature watch.

While looking around,
he spotted a seal pup

floundering in the water.

I think dad
pretty much figured

that he had been abandoned.

There was no mother
around at all.

He was just swimming
around by himself.

Harry felt
compelled to save him,

Even though he knew
the chances of his survival

were worse than slim.

It was the 1960s,
and there was no manual

on how to raise
a motherless harbor seal pup.

Harry would have to go
on instinct.

It's very
difficult to get

a baby seal pup to maturity.

Seals would come ashore
that had been abandoned,

and people would pick them up

and take them home.

Usually they would die.

With no idea how to
raise a seal pup,

all Harry knew for certain
was that he needed to be fed.

He had formerly fed
baby squirrels

by soaking a rag in the milk

and getting the squirrels
to suck on the rag,

so he did the same for the seal.

The seal would suck on it,

but he couldn't get
enough nourishment that way.

Harry barely had time
to name the pup

before it died.

He called him marky.

I almost gave my father
hell for letting this happen,

and he was so
philosophical about it.

That made me even madder.

I was so angry after the shock.

He said, "well, that's
the way things happen

in the animal world."

Marky's death was
something Harry never forgot.

So two years later
in the spring of 1961,

when he came face to face
with another abandoned seal pup,

he was determined that this time
he would get it right.

I think he was swimming around,

looking for his mother,

and so he was just
swimming around.

He swam right up
to the boat because

I think his mother had
gone off and left him.

He netted Andre
and got him into the boat

and brought him home.

He was two days old,
and he weighed 19 pounds.

I love his flippers!

His little claws.

His little claws.

His eyes always
had those circles

when he fluffed up.

I was about 6 1/2
when dad brought Andre home.

He was adorable of course,

the cutest thing
you can ever imagine

With the big eyes and fluffiness

and just sweet.

When daddy brought
Andre home,

I was kind of afraid, I think,

That something was gonna happen,

but it didn't stop me
from being attached to him

by any means.

Harry felt the burden
of Andre's life in his hands.

He went straight to work.

My dad had read that
seal milk was very rich,

and so he took
all the rich things

he could think of,
like cream and egg yolks...

And added some COD liver oil
for the fishy part of it

and made them into a formula,

And that's what
he started out with.

However nutritious
the milk might have been,

the bigger challenge
was still to come.

My dad didn't know how
to get the seal to eat.

He tried a bottle at first,

but the seal would have
nothing to do with the bottle.

Harry looked
everywhere for a solution.

Inspiration struck
on a desolate Maine beach.

My dad found
a dead mother seal

and examined her mammary glands

and found that there
was a recessed area

around the nipple.

Harry set about making
a makeshift replica

Of that seal mother.

He put a filled baby syringe
into a hole

that he drilled
into a cedar log.

Then he hid it under
a neoprene skin

from an old wetsuit.

The hole formed
a dip just like that

on the mother seal.

He named Andre's
surrogate mother Sadie.

Harry nursed Andre
every few hours,

and in no time,

he began to thrive...

But the challenges
were just beginning.

The great white sharks
were around more then

because we had
a poultry processing plant

in belfast and there was
a lot of offal

and the smell of blood.

So of course a baby seal
would be in great danger.

Harry knew this,
so he kept Andre close to shore

while he was a pup.

When my dad would take
him swimming,

Andre would stay close by.

Andre thought
my dad was his mother.

For all Andre knew,
Harry was his mother.

Some baby animals show
an instinctive

attachment behavior
known as imprinting.

The time period
when a baby and its mom bond

is basically what
we call imprinting.

With harbor seals,
that time frame

hasn't been studied,
but with sea lions it has been,

and sea lions will imprint
on a caregiver anywhere

from within a couple of days
to a two-week,

maybe even a month period.

Andre became
very dependent on Harry

very quickly,
so I suspect that he was

imprinted on Harry.

I remember dad tossing
him in the water

and Andre not wanting
to be in the water.

He'd come right back out.

He'd scramble back
onto the rocks,

and my dad would have to
put him back in again,

and when he would be
in the water,

he would want to be
on my dad's back,

so he'd kind of cling to him.

It was quite funny.

You would think a seal would
take right to water,

but he didn't seem to.

Eventually,
Andre did take to the water

And began swimming around
the harbor on his own,

which gave Harry an idea.

I thought,
"man, a baby seal!

I'll train that son of a gun
to go diving with me.

Harry's daughters
could see it.

Their dad was changing.

Andre was getting
under his skin.

They had this
indefinable relationship.

It was like nothing
I've ever really heard about

with any animal.

He got a lot of pleasure
out of kidding around

and acting like one of the kids.

My mother always said she
had 6 children,

Harry being one of them.

Luckily for Harry,
his wife thalice goodridge

was as animal loving as he was.

My mom was always very laid back

about any animals
that came into the house.

Our mother was very
supportive of everything

that he did,
but the only stipulation was

he had to clean up any messes
that were made by the animals.

Thalice made the rules.

Everyone followed them,
even Andre.

Andre had the same rules
as our dogs had.

They couldn't go
in the living room...

On the living room rug,
and he knew it,

and he would sneak in there.

So that was fun, seeing
my mother go in there

and put her arms
on her hips... "Andre?"

And he knew.

He'd turn around
and flop out to the kitchen,

where he was ok.

It didn't take long
before the whole family

adored Andre.

Having a baby seal
around the house was delightful.

We all loved it.

We loved animals anyway...

We had inherited that...

And especially a seal
because they were so smart.

Andre became a sibling.

He was there in the house

and kind of sometimes
became old hat, you know,

"there's Andre
in the kitchen

or in daddy's office."

Family life
agreed with Andre.

Over the next 6 months,
he settled right in.

He'd feel so at home,
go in the living room,

watch a little TV,
and then go out the front door.

We weren't far from the harbor,

so he was just a little
flop down the road,

and he'd be in the water again.

As Andre grew,
so did his independence.

Still only a pup,
he flexed his flippers

and ventured out on his own.

Daddy would let Andre
loose in the harbor,

And he could go catch
all the fish he wanted.

We all loved Andre,

but we knew that we're gonna
lose him at some point.

If we lose him
by him swimming off

to be a wild seal
that's ok, too,

But sometime, he will be gone.

I was always worried
that Andre would take off,

And when Andre
was 8 months old,

he did just that.

I think dad probably
thought he might not come home.

Harry always felt
that Andre should follow

his heart if the wild
lured him out to sea,

but that didn't stop him
from wondering where

Andre had gone.

I remember
somebody calling

from Camden when Andre
first went missing.

Harry dropped
what he was doing

and rushed to Camden.

He was just like a new mom...

Was worried when his little boy
left for the first time.

It was probably
an inner conflict for dad

because he probably
felt that he should be

in the wild
with the other seals.

Andre played his game
of hide and seek

All that year.

Every time he came home,
the attachment

between this odd couple
seemed to grow stronger,

But as the year wore on,
their bond would face

its toughest test yet.

In the winter in rockport,

the harbor often freezes over,

and Harry was worried that
Andre wouldn't be able

to get food, that he would
go down to feed him,

but if the harbor was frozen,

there was no way Andre could
get up through the ice.

The ice
presented another

even more perilous threat.

During the winter,
harbor seals spend probably

more of their time in the water

than they do on land.

Harry was worried
about Andre getting crushed

between broken ice floes,

which I think is
a very real problem.

In the dead of winter
in 1962, Andre vanished.

There was a lot
of tension and suspense

And hope that he would be
safe and make it home.

A month went by,

the longest Andre
had ever been gone.

I had my doubts
that he would come home.

Everyone feared the worst.

I worried
about him every time.

No matter where he was,
I worried about him.

I used to have
bad dreams about him,

recurring dreams that I was
doing something wrong.

But one day,
Andre popped through the ice.

I do think that Andre
knew Harry could be trusted.

Harry could have hurt him,
Harry could have

turned him over
to a circus, or who knows.

There are many ways
that one person can

betray another or an animal.

That same winter,
Harry's concern

for Andre's safety pushed him
to do the unthinkable.

My dad was really
worried about Andre

being in that ice in the harbor

and that he might get hurt.

He decided to put him
in a tank in a building

next to the water.

He could look out
and see the ocean.

I remember going
with my father to feed him

in this tank
in this dark, cold building

And feeling so sorry for Andre,

Confined like that.

I always hated to leave
him there alone.

Harry hated
to cage Andre,

but he didn't know how else
to keep him safe.

Andre became depressed,
and we knew that

Because he would swim
around on his back

in circles for hours on end.

To relieve the monotony,

one day in February,

Harry brought Andre
up to the house

for a sleepover.

Andre had other ideas.

In the morning,
dad went down to the basement

to feed Andre,
and there was no Andre.

He didn't want
to be confined,

so he broke a basement window.

Anything was better
to him than to be confined

in such a boring,
sterile environment.

Harry raced out
to look for Andre to no avail.

Andre was among
the missing again.

This time, Harry didn't know
if he would ever come home.

I remember him going down
to the shore and looking

out beyond the harbor.

Andre was always
on his mind when he was gone.

He wasn't an emotional
or flowery sort of guy.

He would just say
"well, if that's it,

then that's it,"

but I'm sure he was
hoping that Andre

would come back because
I think he knew

he was different and special.

6 months later,
hope arrived.

Harry was sent
a newspaper article

About a friendly seal
in a town 200 miles away.

The locals had
even named it Josephine.

Daddy got in his car
and went down,

and we were all on tenterhooks

Wondering was it Andre?

It was a 5-hour
journey to Massachusetts.

Could Josephine be Andre
so far from home?

Turns out it was Andre,

And a very happy reunion ensued.

Heh heh heh.

It was a long way
back to rockport,

so Harry drove him home.

By now, Andre had become
somewhat of a local celebrity.

Papers all over
new england announced

his homecoming,

But what they didn't say was
that Andre's disappearance

had taught Harry a lesson
in how to love a wild animal.

Never again would he
keep Andre in captivity.

My dad figured that out,

That he was very capable
of taking care of himself.

Andre was
now allowed to stay

in the goodridge house
and go free in the ocean.

It was Andre's choice.

Daddy would say,
"well, if he comes back, great,

"if he leaves,
then that was the way,

that was the natural way."

Daily life became
just to me normal

with Andre around.

Over the next 10 years,

Andre grew alongside
the goodridge kids

and matured
into a full-grown seal.

At 200 pounds,
250 pounds,

It wasn't like
when he was a pup.

So that was a bit of an issue.

If he pooped,
it was voluminous.

Dad would have
to get the shovel,

shovel up the mess, take it out,

come back in, get the mop,

mop up the rest.

As Andre grew,
the times were changing,

and family life
with a seal called Andre

faced a new and totally
unexpected threat.

In 1974, the federal government
showed up to tell Harry he was

in violation
of the newly enacted

marine mammal protection act.

It was now illegal
to possess a seal.

The feds came and told
my father he shouldn't

be keeping a wild seal,

and my father said
he wasn't keeping him.

He had plenty of chances
to go free,

but he always came home.

I remember
the fed incident

as being a big concern.

My father was so angry.

He wrote a lot of letters.

Harry alerted
the local press.

He was about to find
out how many fans

Andre really had.

There was such an outcry
from the people of Maine,

especially our town of course,

that the feds gave up.

Andre was allowed to stay,

but he was becoming a liability.

He was scaring divers.

He would come up and grab
their flippers off their feet.

He would grab oars
out of people's hands,

So my father was really worried

About him doing some damage,

causing, you know,
some bodily harm

or death to somebody.

He became such a pest
to the fishermen,

not that he was vicious,

but he used to sleep
in their boats,

And he weighs
over 200 hundred pounds,

and when he gets in a boat,
a little small dingy

and he tips it over,

the boat fills with water,

and they didn't like that.

Seals had been shot,
so that started to become

a worry for me, for all of us.

Elray kimball use
to fish those waters

with his dad.

He remembers all too
well the dangers facing

An overly friendly seal.

There wouldn't be
a fisherman in rockport

that would would want
to harm Andre

but in the towns next door,
they wouldn't know Andre,

so he would be just
another... a seal

that they would shoot.

When Andre was
becoming a pest

With the fishermen, dad knew
he had to do something.

Harry racked
his brain for a solution

and came up with a plan.

Daddy decided to build a pen.

On one end of the pen,
there was a door

so that when Harry wanted
to let him out

He could get out,

And of course he never
had to come back in

if he didn't want to.

The idea of the pen
was to have a place

In the ocean
with circulating water,

a platform for people
to get on it

so that they could
feed him or visit him

And also a platform for Andre
to get out of the water.

The first time he let him
loose from the pen,

I was astonished
that he came back.

Harry had finally
figured out the perfect way

for Andre to have his freedom

And for Harry to have Andre.

When the door was shut,
he had to stay in his pen,

but he had daily
opportunities to go free.

The pen started
a new chapter

In Andre and Harry's adventure.

Harry had had no schooling

As an animal trainer,
but with a whistle

and a bucket of fish,

there was no shortage
of tricks Andre could learn.

It took
no Patience at all.

He's super intelligent.

He taught me!

One thing I really loved
about Harry was he was

really trying to test the limits

of harbor seals' abilities.

No one had worked
with harbor seals

as closely as Harry had.

They were used
as display animals,

but they were never
really trained for shows.

This was a whole new...
Whole new world.

Harry knew
this instinctively.

I watched him
develop a trick,

And I was astounded
at how quickly

he didn't need hand signals.

He knew it by the words.

He was only limited
by his anatomy.

He could have done
anything, I think,

Anything under the sun.

He was perfectly willing
to perform every night

for his supper in front
of increasing numbers of people

as the word spread.

Ok. Andre is quite a jumper,

and he does
several types of jumps.

How about
the big jump first, ok?

Daddy was a frustrated
frank Sinatra.

Ladies and gentlemen,
welcome to Andre's matinee.

It didn't take anything
for him to get up

in front of a crowd.

Ok. Do the twist.
Come on. Dance.

Come on. Attaboy.

Go ahead, that's it.

He just loved it.

Andre was a great vehicle
for my dad's

Frustrated showman personality.

Ok, Andre, yeah,
that's all right!

And as his fame grew,
he started to gain,

you know, the attention
of news people,

and he would be written up
in newspapers or on TV,

so he did become
more and more famous.

His name is Andre.

Andre has become
a small industry in rockport.

Books about him
for both children

and adults, souvenirs.

All of these people
are here to meet somebody

who is just as important
to this part of the country