Talk:Hannibal Brooks

Olga the Elephant
In 2012, a reference to a fictional event was added to this article which described the film as 'Based on the true story of Olga the elephant rescued from Vienna Zoo in 1944.' This event never happened, there is no evidence of it available on the Web that doesn't reference this article and it has caused confusion on a public internet forum. I am trying to edit this information off of the page but it keeps getting reverted. 86.161.112.189 (talk) 21:29, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Has Olga the elephant ever existed?

"Olga the elephant" was added to this article on the 3rd of February, 2012, by anonymous IP 213.205.224.77, without any citation. Unsourced anonymous edit

The citation I removed linked to a Google book about cycling. Despite extensive searching, I can find no verified evidence that any "Olga the elephant" existed in 1944.

Until a valid citation is discovered, I am deleting Olga from the article. GalantFan (talk) 20:13, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

In fact, not only is there no Olga, but also no Lucy, and Tom Wright never took an elephant out of the zoo. GalantFan (talk) 21:50, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Quora contributor admits that Olga the Elephant is a hoax to troll Wikipedia
"Just to be clear the story of Olga the Elephant is fictional, the Tutor has this story in his opening lecture every year when going over how to reference research papers, with glee. Needless to say none of his students reference Wikipedia anymore, and everytime we see someone do so, we start giggling." GalantFan (talk) 02:15, 9 April 2019 (UTC)


 * You may well be correct about the Olga story. I've looked, and can't find anything online that predates 2012, and that doesn't look like its come straight from Wikipedia. The cycling book isn't much of a ref- I'm sure its a very well researched book as per cycling routes etc, but..its not a specialist film book, and its unlikely they factchecked every bit of trivia in there. I would leave it out of the article, anyway, unless someone can find something better. Curdle (talk) 08:19, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Tom Wright

 * However, there was "a" Tom Wright that worked in a zoo as a POW. (whether he is the Tom Wright, poet etc that is linked to in the disambig page, not sure yet) I found this online; its a copy of the liner notes that accompanied the original record of the 1969 filmscore, dating from 2008 from Filmscore Monthly magazine, which looks like an RS...which predates the Tom Wright info that appears in our article.
 * offline, I found "Hannibal Brooks was developed from the war experiences of a British prisoner of war, Tom Wright, who answered an appeal by his captors for volunteers for a working party, and found himself at Munich zoo. He struck up a friendship with an elephant called Lucy, and after the war wrote a book, which was never published, about his unusual activities. Winner quickly spotted the story's potential and bought the film rights" from the book "films of Michael Winner" by Bill Harding, isbn 0584104499. page 51. It was published in 1978.
 * There's nothing in that article you linked to that says he wasn't a POW- although it does confirm there was a Tom Wright that was in the army and wrote for TV and Films. A bit more research needed to confirm whether there were one or two that were in the army and wrote for films, I guess. Neither source says anything about Olga, though. Curdle (talk) 08:19, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
 * forgot to ping Curdle (talk) 08:39, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Hello The problem with what you have just written is circular sourcing. Those places you have found saying Tom was a POW who worked at a zoo got that info from Wiki, where it was invented by vandals. "Had a reply back from Wright's friend. He says that Wright was never a POW!" Then future wiki editors see that fake info that has been copied to other sites and use them as sources. The offline story told in the obituary and alluded to in posts in the WW2 forum is that the result of actually talking to real world acquaintances revealed that Tom was never a POW and the story about Lucy is completely fictional, and Olga never existed either for real or in fiction, besides the invention of Wiki vandals.

I have even found info repeated at popular sites such as IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes that used Wiki articles as a source. That is why I am putting some effort into making Wiki accurate.

To be clear, Lucy the Elephant was never anything but a fictional story and movie, and Olga the elephant never existed, and the Tom Wright who wrote the story and movie was never a POW. GalantFan (talk) 18:12, 3 May 2019 (UTC)


 * The Tom Wright stuff isn't circular sourcing. How could a book written in 1978, and liner notes written in 1969, possibly use information from a Wikipedia article that wasn't written yet?. Tha'ts when the POW information about Tom Wright whose name is on the movie poster as a writer comes from, before Wikipedia and the internet even existed. The obituary may well be a different person. Its a common enough name.... who knows how many Tom Wrights were running around in the army in the 40's. The wikipedia disambig page linking the two may be a bit of original research, because there was no ref given for it (and that didn't happen until later, I think 2015). Shanghai Jim and Wrights anonymous agent/friend are from a random forum, could be anyone, and are not reliable sources. The 1978 book and 1969 liner notes are though.
 * Already agreed with you about Olga, that one does look like WP:circular as there are no sources older than 2012, the date the info was inserted, that I can find. Curdle (talk) 19:06, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Hello It is not clear to me that those liner notes are the originals from 69 or 78.

I do know that from Tom's own obituary in 2002, he was only described the following way, and that forum posts claiming to actually speak to a friend of his claim that he was never a POW. There are two mentions from his obit of events in 1944, and neither time was he a prisoner.

"In 1944 a young Scottish corporal staggered into Brussels a few hours ahead of the liberating army. For weeks he had occupied the no man's land between the advancing allies and the retreating Germans, calling in targets to shell.

When, several months later (still in 1944), he was sent back through Belgium after the defeat of the Germans, he saw posters up on every street corner of the capital - a photograph of an anonymous British soldier liberating the city. A hero. And he realised it was him."

There is the fictional character "Stephen Brooks, a British POW ... tasked with caring for Lucy, an elephant at the Munich Zoo"

"Had a reply back from Wright's friend. He says that Wright was never a POW! The rest of the bio info online is correct except the stuff about Lucy and Wright's capture." GalantFan (talk) 19:33, 3 May 2019 (UTC)


 * The liner notes here are for the 1969 score. However, on further inspection, looks like they were written in 2008 to accompany a rerelease of the score on CD as the website gives 2 copyright dates; 1969 for the artwork, and 2008 for the text.(plus they mention films later than Hannibal)- scroll down to the bottom of the page for the copyright notices.
 * Still, thats 7 years before the Tom Wright confusion appears to have occurred.


 * 1978 is the date of the other source, a book "Films of Michael Winner" by Bill Harding, isbn 0584104499. page 51 - that's where the quote above comes from. I can send you/post a scan somewhere if you cant get access to it. here for snippet view


 * But is that the obituary of the Tom Wright that wrote the story for Hannibal Brooks?; it talks about the TV shows he wrote for, and other work, but never mentions that film. So there is nothing to connect Obituary Tom Wright with the film at all. They could well be two different people; we have absolutely nothing linking them together except the name, and they were both in the army during WW2. The liner notes just describe him as a house painter, not as a poet or tv writer.


 * Got another one just now!Google books here
 * Its from 2013, but its written by Michael Winner, director of the film and the one who bought the story. He describes Tom Wright as a house painter from Norwich, who was a POW and looked after elephants. Curdle (talk) 21:35, 3 May 2019 (UTC)


 * And another and here Book is a bio of Oliver Reed from 2001, well before the Wikipedia article was written- lot more detail see page 114-115 The Obituary says its Tom Wright was Scottish....these all say Hannibal Brooks Tom Wright was from Norwich/Norfolk, plus this source dates the POW period in Munich from 1944, and says he stuck around a bit after the war,  when the other Tom was "staggering into  Brussels" and dodging shells. Sounds like there was two different Tom Wrights, so far  Curdle (talk) 22:50, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Hello Thanks for looking. Yes, the liner notes say Tom was a painter and the elephant story was "concocted". I found two websites that credit the SAME Tom Wright Born: 8 March 1923, Glasgow, with the Hannibal Brooks movie and also the High Road TV series that is mentioned on the obit site. But the obit never calls him a painter, never calls him a prisoner, and never mentions a zoo. https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1578668/ http://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b9ff12d3c

So it looks to me like there is one Tom Wright, and maybe Mr. Winter got the man confused with the fictional character, and the fictional elephant Lucy. GalantFan (talk) 23:00, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Hello Unfortunately I can't see the Google books links, you must need a login. Would you be able to copy and paste the text from the 1978 book? "Films of Michael Winner" by Bill Harding, isbn 0584104499. page 51 - that's where the quote above comes from. I can send you/post a scan somewhere if you cant get access to it. here for snippet view

I found a link with Tom a prisoner, and a zoo elephant named Stasi. http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/25230/4/kmf-TheBritishWarFilm2links.pdf

Hannibal Brooks (1969, Michael Winner) is based on the war memoirs of Tom Wright, who worked in a German zoo in the 1940s while a prisoner of war, eventually looking after and growing fond of an Indian elephant called Stasi.71 The unpublished manuscript was turned into a story by Michael Winner, who directed a variation of it based on a screenplay by Dick Clements and Ian LaFrenais, starring Oliver Reed as Stephen “Hannibal” Brooks, a POW who looks after an elephant, eventually escaping over a mountain to neutral Switzerland.72 71 Cliff Goodwin, Evil Spirits: The Life of Oliver Reed (London: Virgin Books, 2002), 115. 72 Susan D. Cowie and Tom Johnson, The Films of Oliver Reed (Jefferson, NC: McFarland Pub, 2011), 107

GalantFan (talk) 23:27, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Oh, wow, the Munich zoo did in fact have an elephant named Stasi! Found another copy of the same photo, dated both 1960 and 1965. This fits the timeline given by https://www.elephant.se/database2.php?elephant_id=1139.

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-1965-a-thick-hide-has-stasi-and-snow-also-if-it-falls-so-amply-as-97539003.html

GalantFan (talk) 23:32, 3 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Cute pic! pity we cant use it. Elephants can live up to 80 years according to our article- didn't know it was that long.
 * You don't need to log in for google books; sometimes you do only get a snippet view tho, and I have heard that what you see/pages etc can depend on where you are in the world.
 * The bio of Oliver Reed I linked to says pretty much what the British War film thesis says; mentions Stasi etc- but gives lots more detail. Checking their refs, they have used the same book as one of their sources.
 * IMDB is not regarded as a reliable source - anyone can write for it. see WP:RS/IMDB. BFI Film Forever is usually ok, although they don't say how the information is collected. (or what date it went in) But it is just an entry in a database; they have been known to be wrong, and there are currently 3 books, liner notes, and a thesis that say there was a POW Elephant keeper Tom Wright. Curdle (talk) 00:59, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

I have found more info about Stasi the elephant. Born in 1934, died in 1968. https://www.elephant.se/database2.php?elephant_id=1139 I have contacted the zoo to see if it is true that it was moved to Switzerland in the war. You can actually read the pages 114-115 from the Reed biography? GalantFan (talk) 02:05, 4 May 2019 (UTC)


 * They have databases for elephants! I see she was euthanised for aggression. That's awful. I can see from 114-117 - apparently Wright kept a diary, then "after the war he used it as a basis for "Hannibal Brooks" an unpublished novel which describes what might have happened if he and Stasi had escaped across the Alps to Switzerland" on page 115. So that is the part of the story that is "concocted"..the great escape/leaving the zoo part.
 * The sources don't mention any sort of elephant removal at all, just that he looked after, and bonded with the elephant while a POW. I uploaded a screenshot to flickr of the relevant part of the book here if you cant see it at google books. Curdle (talk) 13:17, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the screenshot. I am getting the impression that either Winner and Reed didn't know him very well or the biographers for Winner and Reed weren't interested in Tom. They keep calling him a house painter when he was also a stained glass craftsman, university graduate, poet, playwright, and screenwriter from the early 60s to the early 90s. Maybe house painter was his day-job. GalantFan (talk) 15:10, 4 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Well, the writers were interested enough to go into a fair bit of detail and research about him. The sources say nothing about Reed ever meeting him at all. How about the lead reading " Hannibal Brooks is a 1969 British-American war comedy film directed by Michael Winner and written by Ian La Frenais and Dick Clement based on a story by Winner and Tom Wright. It stars Oliver Reed, Michael J. Pollard and Wolfgang Preiss.
 * The original story was based on the experiences of Tom Wright who, while a prisoner of war, worked at Munich Zoo to care for their elephants. The film follows the hero's attempt to escape from Nazi Germany to Switzerland during World War II, accompanied by an Asian elephant. The title is a reference to the Carthaginian military commander Hannibal who led an army of war elephants over the Alps."
 * The obituary ref should go because it doesn't even mention Hannibal Brooks, and so doesn't support anything in the statement it is supposed to reference.
 * Any further details should go in a separate section, probably about pre production in the body of the article, where they can be referenced. Curdle (talk) 17:55, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

He went home from the war in 44 or 45, graduated from Glasgow in 63, when he was 40, and did most of his writing starting in the 60s, so he could have been a full-time painter for almost 20 years. I wrote a note to a couple other writers from his shows. Maybe I will hear back. It's a shame that his obit is the only biography written about him, besides his diary that he sent to Winner. GalantFan (talk) 18:46, 4 May 2019 (UTC)


 * so I take it you have no objections to the above suggestion and can edit the article accordingly?
 * Wikipedia is all about summarising what is in independent, reliable sources,WP:RS not what is known as WP:OR "original research". Any information you get from emailing people etc, cant be used in the article unless its been published by a reliable source so its possible for readers to verify it if necessary. And please read up on Indenting WP:INDENT for talk pages here. A lot of editors will get highly irritated if you don't indent your comments, and it does make things easier to follow. Curdle (talk) 20:17, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Okay, but if we both indent our comments, that would make it harder to follow. GalantFan (talk) 23:56, 4 May 2019 (UTC)


 * You say ok, but then don't indent. Makes me wonder, not for the first time, if I'm being trolled. Read WP:INDENT or WP:THREAD and take a look at any talkpage even the Teahouse. Its generally considered impolite not to indent.Curdle (talk) 12:35, 6 May 2019 (UTC)


 * But all of your replies are indented. If I indent too, it is much harder to see the difference.
 * Unless I DOUBLE indent. GalantFan (talk) 15:50, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Hannibal Brooks, persistent annual vandalism


The Hannibal Brooks page needs to be semi-protected against anonymous IP edits because this has been going on since 2012 by college professors and students attempting to prove that Wikipedia is unreliable. I think it needs to be permanent because it is clear that the professor is going to continue encouraging his students to vandalize this page every year.

Quora contributor admits that Olga the Elephant is a hoax to troll Wikipedia "Just to be clear the story of Olga the Elephant is fictional, the Tutor has this story in his opening lecture every year when going over how to reference research papers, with glee. Needless to say none of his students reference Wikipedia anymore, and everytime we see someone do so, we start giggling."

It has been discovered that the multiple anonymous IP edits are part of a concentrated attack on Wikipedia itself, to cause disrepute to Wikipedia, which have been organized and encouraged by a tutor at Robert Gordon University in the UK, who has been telling his students for several years that Wiki is an unreliable source and encouraging them to vandalize Wiki to prove it. See:https://www.quora.com/Why-is-Wikipedia-dismissed-as-an-unreliable-source/answer/Cai-Esson?ch=10&share=161cecfd&srid=n1aP3

If you will follow the "contribs" links of these anonymous IPs and their WhoIs info, you will see that they all come from the same little area of the UK, and none of them have ever contributed anything but to vandalize this article by reposting the exact same fake information, over and over again since 2012. GalantFan (talk) 21:40, 3 May 2019 (UTC)


 * The protection log shows that the page has only been protected twice before - once in February 2018 and this time - each time for 3 days. There needs to be a lot stronger history of need for protection before we implement protection indefinitely. The vandalism seems to comes in occasional spurts, as it did in February 2018 and again in April this year, and it can be protected when that happens. We are not going to permanently ban all editing by new or anonymous users when vandalism happens so rarely. It looks as some fake changes were added right after the February protection expired, and were not discovered until you deleted them more than a year later. That suggests that the protection during a “spurt” needs to be longer than three days - maybe a week or two - and I have extended this protection to be for a week. It also suggests we need more eyes on this page. Basically, since this is known to be a problem article, what it needs is for more editors to put it on their watchlists. I have done that and I suggest others do the same. -- MelanieN (talk) 23:02, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

I believe the Tom Wright in question, is the same Tom Wright linked to the discovery of a Lucian Freud painting in 2018. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.83.191.240 (talk) 16:27, 30 April 2023 (UTC)