My proudest accomplishment, probably not a given specific exhibit at the zoo, but my proudest accomplishment I would say is making or is helping the Topeka community to develop into a zoo-oriented community with a sense of zoo, so to speak. And having and developing pride among the people in Topeka and Northeast Kansas, developing pride within them, of the zoo. Part of that was the world famous Topeka Zoo moniker. But they would go to bigger zoos, really great zoos, Lincoln park, Brookfield, San Diego, Bronx, St. Louis, and they’d love ’em and they’d come back and say, and they always wanna tell me. It’s like people who’ve been on safari would go someplace else and they’d go to the Amazon, and come in and wanna tell me about it. They would always wanna tell me about their visit to another zoo and what they saw and what they, then they say, “But we really love our zoo.” (Gary chuckles) And that probably was the greatest accomplishment. We’re not competing with other zoos, we’re cooperating, and we want them to see these other zoos, and they understand that we couldn’t do what they did, but they had a sense of pride. And that that was good.
