Ralph Helfer
(b. 1937)

Ralph Helfer is an animal trainer and an author. He and his wife, Toni, have developed a better way to train animals—they train by affection. Helfer got the idea for this method of training while recovering in a hospital bed after being mauled by a lion. Helfer says, "Violence begets violence … The big cat had been 'fear trained' with whips, chairs, and screams … and though he performed his tricks well enough, he had no love for humans …. If an animal could be trained by addressing its negative emotions (with threats and punishment), he could probably also be trained by appealing to his positive emotions."

Helfer has supplied trained animals for more than 5,000 movies and television shows. He trained Zane, the black longhorn bull that has been featured in ads for beer and for the brokerage house Merrill Lynch.

Helfer bought an aging, sick elephant named Modoc from a traveling circus and wrote her story in Modoc: The True Story of the Greatest Elephant that Ever Lived (1997). He also wrote The Beauty of the Beasts (1989), in which he tells tales of his adventures in animal training. Helfer lives in Los Angeles and in Kenya, where he leads safari tours.

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