What Are These Lizards?
By Pat Fireovid
If you have spent any time at Fulcrum Lifting, you’ve likely noticed the happy little sun-worshipping lizards lounging on the front steps. These little friends of ours soak up the rays on the concrete steps, and then bolt, lightning fast, into the brick retaining wall as soon as they spot you. They live in the retaining wall planter and occasionally find themselves inside our offices, but they are not easy to catch – believe us!
These little guys are known in Cincinnati as the Lazarus Lizards, and as the story goes, they were imported here in 1951 by a boy from the Lazarus Family (as in the Department Store). The boy’s name was George Rau, and his family was vacationing at Lake Garda in northern Italy. As any young boy would do, George stuffed about 10 of the local lizards in a sock, and then boarded the plane for the return home to Cincinnati. He released them in his back yard, not far from where Fulcrum Lifting’s Tri-State Wire Rope office is located today. The lizards thrived in the tristate area because our climate is similar to that of Northern Italy.
The Lazarus Lizards like to live in stone walls and terraces – and because of Cincinnati’s hills, the lizards found plenty of suitable housing. Lucky for them, because they are not native, they have no natural predators (other than some birds and a few determined cats), and so the Lazarus Lizards soon made the east side of Cincinnati their new home. Over time, the lizards have migrated beyond our local area and have become plentiful at the Falls of the Ohio Park in Clarksville, Indiana – Fulcrum Lifting’s Kentuckiana Wire Rope neighborhood.
If you see one of our little lizard friends at any of the Fulcrum Lifting locations, be sure to look quickly because they’ll be gone before you know it!