Bart Gets an Elephant

"**Bart Gets an Elephant**"
"Bart Gets an Elephant"
The Simpsons episode
Episode no.	Season 5; Episode 17
Directed by	Jim Reardon
Written by	John Swartzwelder
Production code	1F15
Original air date	March 31, 1994
Episode features
Chalkboard gag	"Organ transplants are best left to the professionals"
Couch gag	The family's eyes run in with the lights off. When the lights turn on, the bodies run in and push the eyes back into their sockets.
Commentary	Matt Groening; David Mirkin; David Silverman
Episode chronology
← Previous; "Homer Loves Flanders"	Next →; "Burns' Heir"
	The Simpsons season 5
	List of episodes

"Bart Gets an Elephant" is the seventeenth episode of the fifth season of the American animated television series The Simpsons. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on March 31, 1994. In this episode, Bart wins a radio contest and is awarded a full-grown African elephant that he names Stampy. After Stampy wrecks the Simpsons' house and eats all the food, Homer decides to sell Stampy to an ivory dealer. Bart runs away with Stampy to save his pet, but the family finds the two at a museum exhibit, where Homer sinks into a tar pit. Homer is saved by Stampy, and so gives the elephant away to an animal refuge instead.

The episode was written by John Swartzwelder, and directed by Jim Reardon. It introduced the fictional elephant Stampy, and marks the first appearance of the recurring character Cletus Spuckler. The episode features cultural references to the songs "Sixteen Tons" and "Do-Re-Mi", and the La Brea Tar Pits cluster of tar pits located in Hancock Park in Los Angeles, California.

Since airing, the episode has received mostly positive reviews from television critics. It acquired a Nielsen rating of 10.7, and was the highest-rated show on the Fox network the week it aired.