The Iron Zoo

Welcome to the one zoo where animals are always out to play, no matter the time of day. A collection of oil pumping jacks decorated as animals, insects, and people, the zoo was created by local artist Jean Dakessian in the early ‘70s as a way to lure people off of Interstate 5 and into the small town of Coalinga. It slowly became a community project, growing to include more than 150 pump jacks and being featured in various television shows and magazine articles.