A Sea Lion Named Alice

"You see," resumed Laura, "I really have some grounds for supposing that my next incarnation will be in a lower organism. I shall be an animal of some kind. On the other hand, I haven't been a bad sort in my way, so I think I may count on being a nice animal, something elegant and lively, with a love of fun.”

~Saki, “Laura”

In life, Alice Parsons was an estimable, if ordinary woman, the last person one would think of as potential Strange Company material.  After she died, however, her life took a marvelous turn for The Weird.

Alice and her husband of many years, Lee, were both from Mississippi, but since 1917, they lived in California and the Pacific Northwest, where Lee worked as a salesman and saw sharpener.  Although they had no biological children, they raised their orphaned great-niece and nephew, Selma and Lee Darnell, whom they loved as their own.

In September of 1965, Alice died at their home in Santa Cruz, and Lee arranged to send her body to her home town of Terry, Mississippi, for burial.  At the same time, the Boyd Science Museum in San Rafael, California, was awaiting the arrival of a sea lion that was also being shipped from Santa Cruz.  This was when Fate arranged that the young sea lion and the elderly housewife would be forever entwined.

During the shipping process, the bill of lading that was meant to accompany Alice’s corpse somehow wound up in the crate containing the sea lion.  When the animal arrived at the museum, the employees were both intrigued and extremely confused.  Who was Alice Parsons, and why was a sea lion named in her honor?  They shrugged and decided to roll with it.  From then on, the creature was known as “Alice.”  

In March 1966, the famed San Francisco newspaper columnist Herb Caen somehow learned of the sea lion with an unusual moniker, and he thought the quirky little tale worthy of mention.  His column reached the eye of Selma Darnell, who was working at Harrah’s Club in Reno.  The next day, she flew into San Rafael to meet her relative’s namesake.  After spending the day gazing at the sea lion in the little enclosed pool and feeding Alice chunks of fish, Selma came to a momentous conclusion.  That mixup of shipping tags was, she now felt, no accident.  Somehow, her late aunt “had something to do with the switching,” because Alice’s soul now resided in this sea lion.  The only thing that puzzled Selma was that in life, Aunt Alice couldn’t swim.  Selma soon returned, this time with the sea lion’s widower.  Lee accepted the news that his wife of 55 years was now an aquatic mammal with an equanimity and broad-mindedness that did him credit.  “I consider it a compliment,” he said.

Selma was even more pleased with the unexpected reunion.  “We think it is beautiful,” she sighed.  She and her uncle vowed that they would often come back to visit their transmigrated loved one.

"San Rafael Independent Journal," April 14, 1966, via Newspapers.com

Alice became a justly well-known and popular member of the museum.  In November 1966, she made headlines by jumping her fence one night in order to do some sightseeing around San Rafael, until the lure of fish enabled rescuers to recapture her.  (She did the same escape act the following April, causing the museum to put in a higher fence around the pool.)  

Alice Parsons passed away--again--on July 14, 1969.  Where her soul went next, I unfortunately cannot say.