High in the hills of Griffith Park, hidden among hiking trails and picnic areas, sits one of Los Angeles’s strangest forgotten landmarks: the abandoned remains of the city’s first zoo. Built in 1912, the original Griffith Park Zoo was once a symbol of civic ambition, meant to prove that a rapidly growing Los Angeles could rival America’s great cultural cities. Instead, it became a cautionary tale of poor planning, limited funding, and an era that understood far less about animal welfare. In this