Born Free Foundation Born Free Foundation The Born Free Foundation is an international conservation and animal rights organisation based in the United Kingdom focusing on wild animals. It originated in 1984 as the "Zoo Check Campaign" by actors Virginia McKenna and her husband Bill Travers along with their son Will Travers and four associates. McKenna and Travers had been greatly affected by the plight of wild animals after starring together in the 1966 film "Born Free" which told the story of George and Joy Adamson as they returned Elsa the Lioness to the wilds of Africa. They appeared in several more films about
Joy Adamson each other to educate her, but after she died and her cubs were taken in by the park, their interests went in separate directions, as did their lives. While neither wanted a divorce nor a legal separation, their conflicting interests (George wanted to continue to work with lions and she with cheetahs) made it necessary for them to live apart (though they sometimes discussed living together again, they never did). They spent each Christmas together and they remained on good terms. Using her own notes and George's journals, Joy wrote "Born Free" to tell the lion's tale. She submitted it