Several of the board said, you can’t do a thing like that. And, but the ones that counted said, okay, good. Stick to it. And yeah, several of them were fairly aghast and said, you just can’t do things like that. And, but we did it. And the guys that… Read More
Not all media is honest, as you well know. Read More
Was it your idea of the weather predicting Siberian tiger?… Read More
Necessary evil?… Read More
Some were, you know, really active pro-zoo supporters that, you know, that we’ve had over the years. Over the years, we’ve had, we’ve had a lot of reporters that we could sit down and let our hair down with and say, okay, I want to go off the record here… Read More
You board supported you?… Read More
So did you special events for them to come?… Read More
Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Read More
(chuckling) How did you view the media?… Read More
They don’t simply support projects that they don’t really believe in. They got to, they’ve got to really buy on to the project. And so there’s not a, there’s not a lot of gray in Nebraskans. They either like you, or they don’t like you. Now with like you and… Read More
How’d you nurture that relationship?… Read More
Well, I think, yeah, basically by being pretty honest and straightforward. You know, you never want to get, you never want to get absolutely caught in a lie with the media, or, or, you know, and, and it hasn’t always been, you know. I’ve on two different occasions in my… Read More
You know, and, and certainly we work at finding things that are interesting for them to publish. And the old, that old cliche I mentioned earlier about, you know, kids, animals, and a good fire. Why, you know, if you can team kids and animals up, it makes for a… Read More
And it’s a lot easier when you’ve got a product and a specific project to sell other than just raising pure endowment dollars is really tough to do. Read More
What makes a Nebraska such a giving community?… Read More
It just is. I think, you know, Nebraskans are kind of unique in, you know, I mean, they’re, you know, they’re kind of rabid football fans. If you’re going to do something like the jungle or the desert gnome or the (mumbles), that is kind of the biggest and best… Read More
Has it been difficult to do?… Read More
Endowment dollars, endowment dollars are the toughest hardest dollars to raise. What we’ve, what we’ve ultimately figured out and, and have done is that we put an endowment on every new project that’s not going to be a profit center, like, you know, a new gift shop or a new… Read More
Somebody leave you a 40 million in a will?… Read More
Something you didn’t expect?… Read More