Jimmy Buffett fans calling themselves “Parrotheads” reinforced the dolphin & manatee causes
SAG HARBOR, New York––James William Buffett, 76, born on Christmas Day 1946, known to the world as entertainer and entrepreneur Jimmy Buffett, died on September 1, 2023, at his home in Sag Harbor, New York, from complications of Merkel-cell carcinoma, a rare and aggressive skin cancer.
Originally from Pascagoula, Mississippi, Jimmy Buffett also lived during childhood in Mobile and Fairhope, Alabama. The son of U.S. Army Corps of Engineers staff member James Delaney Buffett Jr. and his wife Mary Lorraine (née Peets), Jimmy Buffett played trombone in grade school, but did not take up guitar until his freshman year at Auburn University in Montgomery, Alabama.
Unlikely rise to stardom
Neither did Jimmy Buffett show any particular interest in either animal or environmental issues while subsequently attending Pearl River Community College and the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.
There he finally earned a bachelor’s degree in history with a minor in journalism in 1969.
After graduation, Jimmy Buffett journeyed to Nashville, only to discover as The Lovin’ Spoonful sang in 1966, “There’s thirteen hundred and fifty two guitar cases in Nashville.
And any one that unpacks his guitar could play twice as better than I will.”
Instead of landing steady work as a musician, Jimmy Buffett found work in 1969-1970 as a Nashville correspondent for the trade magazine Billboard.
Fred Neil & Ric O’Barry
Knocking around Florida as a traveling musician with future country star Jerry Jeff Walker before recording his first and biggest hit “Margaritaville” in 1977, Jimmy Buffett met 12-string guitar player Fred Neil.
Neil wrote “Everybody’s Talkin’”, made famous by Harry Nilsson as theme song for the 1969 film Midnight Cowboy, along with several other hits, but lost interest in music after cofounding The Dolphin Project in 1970 with Ric O’Barry, then known as Ric O’Feldman.
Beginning in 1974, Neil arranged benefit concerts for Ric O’Barry’s Dolphin Project featuring stars including David Crosby and Stephen Stills, Dion DiMucci, Phil Everly, Richie Havens, Joni Mitchell, and John Sebastian, with Jerry Jeff Walker and Jimmy Buffett gradually working their way up from opening act to featured performers.
Neil, who quit performing in 1977, died of cancer at age 64 on July 7, 2001 at home in Summerland Key, Florida, but his influence on both O’Barry and Jimmy Buffet’s subsequent career lived on for decades. O’Barry remembered Neil, at the time, as his best friend.
Buffett saw himself as “an old manatee”
Jimmy Buffett included in a 1981 album called Coconut Telegraph a song with the lyrics, “Sometimes I see me as an old manatee, heading south as the waters grow colder. He tries to steer clear of the humdrum so near it cuts prop scars deep in his shoulders.”
Those lines inspired former Florida governor Bob Graham to found the Save the Manatee Club, with Jimmy Buffett as celebrity spokesperson.
But instead of just showing up for media events and circulating petitions at concerts on behalf of manatees, Jimmy Buffet took an active role for many years in leading the Save the Manatee Club, amplifying the voices of manatee biologists, detailed by longtime Florida environmental journalist Craig Pittman in his 2010 book Manatee Insanity: Inside the War over Florida’s Most Famous Endangered Species.
(See Will more boat kills than ever stop proposal to ease manatee safeguards?)
Inspired Great Lakes muckrake Tom Henry
Graham was far from the only influential voice for animals and the environment whom Jimmy Buffett inspired.
“The great sage of the tropics, Jimmy Buffett, helped nudge me along into environmental writing in a small way about 1988,” remembered Tom Henry, then an obscure beat reporter in Florida, covering environmental and energy matters for the Toledo Blade since 1993.
“He sent me a great typewritten letter about a major 60-inch profile I did on Save the Manatees. I still have it,” Henry wrote, now as the multi-time award-winning senior journalist on the Great Lakes news beat.
“Jimmy Buffett was particularly pleased that I didn’t fawn over his celebrity; the story was focused on the plight of manatees and he wasn’t even quoted until the jump page,” Henry continued.
“Said keep it up, you’re good”
“He said he was gratified to come across someone who quoted him accurately and was fair and balanced, and said I’m the kind of person who should be covering natural resources full-time. Said keep it up, you’re good.
“He also made a passing reference to his days as a reporter.
“I can’t say it was the defining moment for me per se,” Henry said, “but that and other things pushed me toward specialized reporting, and the environment was what I wanted to cover.”
“Parrotheads”
From time to time Jimmy Buffett drifted out of active involvement with the Save The Manatee Club, pursuing his career as singer and songwriter, authoring three best-selling books, and managing his many business interests, but he stepped back in when necessary, bringing with him the support of his loyal fan base, self-identified as “Parrotheads.”
Former Florida governor and eventual unsuccessful U.S. presidential candidate Jeb Bush, recounted Pittman, “took office [in Florida} in January 1999 at a crucial moment for manatee protection. The Save the Manatee Club and other environmental groups had spent years building a coalition that could take both the state and federal government to court. They based their lawsuits on the rising death toll of manatees clobbered by boats and the continuing loss of habitat to waterfront development.
Jeb Bush
“The groups were finally ready to take their first legal step toward suing in May 1999, but Save the Manatee Club co-founder Jimmy Buffett wanted to hold off. He wanted to personally inform Bush about what was being planned, and emphasize that this was the fault of the previous Democratic administration.
“Their meeting did not go as planned.
“For about 30 minutes,” Pittman wrote, “Bush raved about how much he loved manatees, recalled Save the Manatee Club executive director Pat Rose. Finally, Rose and Buffett said they were there to talk about a lawsuit. Bush shouted, ‘Lawsuit!’ and leaped to his feet, clearly angry.
“Afterward, Buffett tried to put the best face on the meeting for reporters, calling Bush ‘charming.’
Save the Manatee Club sued both feds & state
“Undeterred, the Save the Manatee Club and its coalition filed two suits on January 13, 2000 — one against the federal government, the other against Florida.”
The lawsuit led to better regulation of boat speeds in manatee habitat.
“In 2007,” Pittman continued, “after counts recorded more than 3,000 manatees, federal managers considered down-listing them but backed off,” after Jimmy Buffett wangled what was apparently a persuasive 10-minute private meeting with then-Florida governor Charlie Crist.
Last notes
Not solely focused as an environmentalist on manatees, Jimmy Buffett in 2010 funded Vero Beach boatbuilders Mark Castlow and Jimbo Meador in constructing a wildlife rescue vessel deployed in the wake of the April 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Fond of dogs, Jimmy Buffett in 2013 hired trainer Babette Haggerty to teach his Maltese terrier to dance to “Margaritaville.”
(Beth Clifton collage)
In February 2017 Jimmy Buffett sent one of his several aircraft, a seaplane, to help in the search for Canadian conservationist and documentary filmmaker Rob Stewart.
(See Sharkwater maker Rob Stewart, 37, saved five million sharks’ lives.)
Continuing to fish throughout his life, never a vegan or vegetarian, and never self-identified with animal rights advocacy, Jimmy Buffett nonetheless contributed substantially to the rise of advocacy for animals and habitat just by being there with his guitar many times when needed.
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This was interesting to learn and a feather in his cap for his efforts to help manatees.
My first encounter with these docile, gentle creatures was during the time my late fiance and I stayed on a houseboat in Miami and we would see them come up to the back door. I fell in love with them immediately. At the time, I was not involved in animal advocacy, so the thought that they could get easily harmed by boat propellers didn’t occur to me. But they sorely need protection and I support the Save the Manatees group for the important work they’re doing.
Thank you for providing this piece and focusing attention upon the need to protect manatees.
I know I am not the only resident of a landlocked state who first learned about manatees and their tragic wounding by boat propellers through Jimmy Buffett. Many memorial articles are remembering Mr. Buffett for his fun, beach-themed music and devoted fans, but fewer are even mentioning his advocacy on behalf of the manatee–let along going as in depth as this article. Thank you again for reminding society at large of the animal angle!