Jeremy Rich uses the eccentric life of R. L. Garner (1848-1920) to examine the commercial networks that brought the first apes to America during the Progressive Era, a critical time in the development of ideas about African wildlife, race, and evolution.

Jeremy Rich is an associate professor of history at Marywood University. He is the coeditor of "Navigating African Maritime History" and author of "A Workman Is Worthy of His Meat: Food and Colonialism in the Gabon Estuary."