Interview 5420 – Caption Index: 134
Were there things that surprised you about working at the zoo that you didn’t expect?… Read More
Were there things that surprised you about working at the zoo that you didn’t expect?… Read More
I can’t think of anything that I would necessarily call as a surprise. It was all a lot of eye-opening. I learned a lotta new things. There was in the very beginning we were under the city of St. Louis. And so some of the people that were hired was… Read More
Were you learnin’ anything about the media that would stand you in good stead later from either Marlin or his experiences or maybe Hattie?… Read More
Well for one thing, Marlin always said. First of all, he loved animals and he wanted everybody else to love and appreciate animals as much as he did. And he felt that the best way he could do that was to make them very familiar. So he encouraged all of… Read More
Were there things at the zoo?… Read More
Now Marlin was a pretty famous figure in St. Louis with his TV shows. Read More
Did that impact him moving around the zoo?… Read More
Well because he was out of town a lot, it was his intention to train a larger cadre of staff. That’s where he was training Bob Fru and Jerry Lentz and Mike Fleig and I to help Moody Lentz and Henry Sanders manage the zoo so that he could be… Read More
There was some animosity between the governing body that kinda resented Marlin being gone quite a bit. But if he would’ve allowed the developing staff as we gradually got more authority and were able to operate the zoo, it would’ve been a smooth operation. But that was his intention to… Read More
So we would get the letters that were written to Marlin Perkins. That’s how I learned how to type. We had to type out the answer. A lotta times we had to go to library and learn because we didn’t know the answers so we had to research it. And… Read More
And if they’re okay, they went out in the mail. If they weren’t, he’d call us up and yell at us and tell us what we did wrong and what we should do right. And we had to go back and rewrite the letter. So it was a training program. Read More
Were you part of this?… Read More
It impacted us in a lotta ways. First of all, Marlin Perkins loved to inspire young keepers. And if he recognized ambition in a keeper, he encouraged to read all he could, learn all he could and invited us to write signed copy, invite us the right information bulletins. There… Read More
Yes, I can tell you one. Well we were not allowed ever to open a venomous snake box. When it came in, we had to call Marlin and he had to come over and open it up. And he came over one time and we had this crate sittin’ on… Read More
Got one on ya now?… Read More
No. (chuckles) Now Marlin was doing Wild Kingdom. He had come from zoo parade. He was doing Wild Kingdom at the zoo. Read More
Did that impact the zoo in any way or you?… Read More
Now since moody Lentz was also the general curator, also we raised all the baby animals that were born or orphaned like baby lions, baby wolves. And sometimes when Marlin would buy animals for the children’s zoo, they would be sent to the reptile house and we’d have to hand… Read More
Marlin Perkins and Carol would come out to the zoo at night and they’d see the light on in the kitchen of the reptile house. And they would come in. And when they’d see us takin’ care of these animals, they always had advice on how to clean the nipples… Read More
Any unique experiences with Marlin?… Read More