Ric O'Barry began working with dolphins after leaving the navy, capturing and training the dolphins that played Flipper which launched him into a lucrative career developing the captive dolphin industry. However, the death of a dolphin named Kathy led O'Barry to realize the psychological harm of captivity on dolphins and he has since dedicated himself to freeing captive dolphins and ending their exploitation worldwide through his organization the Dolphin Project.

1. RIC O’BARRY

2. BEGINNING OF A BIG
BUSINESS
After leaving the navy, O’Barry began working with
dolphins at the Miami Seaquarium.
Ric captured and trained the five dolphins who
eventually played the role of Flipper, which first aired
in 1964.
When Flipper first aired, Ric O’Barry was seen as the
best dolphin trainer in the world.

3. After the airing of Flipper, the demand to see dolphins
perform live spread through the world like wild fire.
Within less than ten years, Ric helped to build a
lucrative industry of capturing and training dolphins.
Like many other business operations, the industry
grew to focus on money rather than on the welfare
of captive dolphins.

5. THE PROBLEM WITH
CAPTIVITY
Dolphins are very social creatures, traveling in pods of
up to 1,000.
They can travel more than forty miles per day.
Tanks concentrate them in an area much smaller than
that of their natural habitat.

7. Ric knew that dolphins were intelligent animals that
were capable of emotion.
Like the industry, Ric justified the wrongful captivity
of dolphins with the immense profits that he made.
The loss of a close friend led O’Barry to become an
activist for the freeing of captive dolphins.

8. RIC BECOMES AN ACTIVIST
Kathy, the dolphin who played the role of Flipper, died
in Ric’s arms as dolphins breathe voluntarily. She
refused to breathe any longer.
From that moment forward, O’Barry began his
process of taking apart the million dollar industry that
he helped to create.
Following Kathy’s death, Ric was arrested on the
island of Bimini for trying to free a dolphin from a sea
holding pen.

9. Ric pictured with Kathy, the primary dolphin for the
role of Flipper.

10. On the first Earth Day in 1970, Ric founded the
original Dolphin Project.
The project seeks to end the exploitation and
slaughter of dolphins around the world.
Through Ric’s efforts, he has helped to rescue and
rehabilitate dolphins from countries all over the
world, including Brazil, Haiti, Columbia, Nicaragua,
Guatemala, The Bahamas, and the United States.

11. SPREADING THE WORD
Behind The Dolphin Smile was written by O’Barry and
published in 1989.
A second publication came in September of 2000
titled To Free a Dolphin.
Both of the books are about his work and dedication
in freeing captive dolphins.

13. The Cove, produced in 2009, focuses on the efforts
that Ric makes to end dolphin capturing and slaughter
in the town of Taiji, Japan.
The film was awarded the 2010 Academy Award for
best documentary feature.
The Animal Planet series, Blood Dolphins, premiered in
August of 2010. It highlights Ric’s efforts to end
dolphin dealing in the Soloman Islands, a chain of
islands in the south pacific.

15. AN EX-CON BECOMES A
HERO
Ric O’Barry has been arrested countless times over
the last fourty years for his attempts in freeing
dolphins.
In 1991, Ric was awarded The Environmental
Achievement Award for his contribution to rescuing
dolphins.
In 2010 Ric O’Barry’s Dolphin project celebrated the
condemnation of slaughtering dolphins along the
coast of Japan and negotiated an end to dolphin
hunting in the Solomon Islands.