I thought it was everything a zoo could be in terms of interpretation. I mean, it was so far and so different and so far beyond what zoos were in my mind, that it was the catalyst for, there were two catalysts organizations and people that led me to build the kind of zoo that I wound up building. And one was the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum from its focus of just immersing you in the environment that they were trying to teach you about. And then one was Gerry Durrell who said, “Zoos need to be breeding endangered species.” And I took those two thoughts and eventually meshed them into Living Desert, but backing up, I was absolutely enamored with Arizona Sonora Desert Museum and what they were doing. And I got to know Bill Woodin well enough, and he offered me a job if I’d come there and be a graphics artist for them. And I said I would do that as soon as I finished my teaching contract and the folks that were looking for somebody to start a nature center in Palm Springs went over to see Bill Woodin and said to look at Arizona Sonora Desert Museum. And the first thing they said to themselves at least was, “Well, we’ll never build anything like this. This is way too big,” but they still were out looking around at nature centers in their minds and they happened to ask Bill, he said they were looking for somebody.
