Carl Hagenbeck (10 June 1844 – 14 April 1913) was a German merchant of wild animals who supplied many European zoos, as well as P. T.

[2] He was also an ethnography showman and a pioneer in the display of members of "savage tribes" in Völkerschauen, known nowadays in English as "ethnic shows" or "human zoos",[3][4] which were controversial at the time[5] and are now widely considered racist.

Hagenbeck left his home in Hamburg to accompany hunters and explorers on trips to jungle regions and snow-clad mountains.

In 1874, on the suggestion of Heinrich Leutemann, a painter and friend of the family, he decided to exhibit Samoan and Sámi people (then known as Laplanders) as "purely natural" populations, with their tents, weapons, sleds, near a group of reindeer, as the animal display business was undergoing a downturn.

Saint-Hilaire organized in 1877 two "ethnological exhibitions", presenting Nubians and Greenlandic Inuit to the public, thereby doubling the number of visitors of the zoo.

Hagenbeck's trained animals also performed at amusement parks in New York City's Coney Island before 1914.

[citation needed] In 1905, Hagenbeck used his skills as an animal collector to capture a thousand camels for the German Empire for use in Africa.

[1] After Hagenbeck's death, his sons Heinrich and Lorenz continued the zoo and circus business; the Nazis banned the Völkerschauen upon coming to power, as they were opposed to the possibility of sexual relationships between the performers and German citizens.