At the beginning, they were fabulous, but they got to the point where beyond some of these projects I just outlined, the board wasn’t structured to do more than that. They would get out and beat the bushes, but we didn’t have people on the board, the movers and shakers… Read More
I don’t know if it was negative press, because they just report what the proposal was and why, but it would get a letter to the editor or something. These days, oh my gosh, I feel sorry for zoos because everybody gets on the internet and the Twitter and just… Read More
Ultimately, how did the, well, how did the Topeka Zoo get its money, in the beginning, and as it progressed?… Read More
Fundraising is probably more important to zoo directors and zoo professionals today than are more critical maybe. It was still important in my day. When I started as zoo director in 1963, there’s nothing in the job description about fundraising. And of course, big zoos have a whole staff, a… Read More
Well, you don’t call on Tuesday to try to get a Wednesday morning, something in the paper Wednesday morning, ’cause this town is very politically on it, and the city council gonna be on the paper Wednesday morning. But I would always call, I would try to come up with… Read More
And I try to see it from their point of view and do what would be of interest and benefit to them. Read More
Did you have negative press, and how did you handle it?… Read More
I’m sure every zoo has negative press. We had negative press, what I would call negative press when we would have a death. It’s negative in that people don’t like to read that. And when we had the young giraffe that hung herself accidentally, that was terrible. But, gosh, it… Read More
The press, I did feel good about the relationship with the news media in the community. Read More
And the question could be asked, how do you nurture that?… Read More
I don’t know. Read More
I mean, to be real honest with you, I never sat down one day or one evening and said, how am I gonna nurture the press?… Read More
I guess that’s just not the way I function. From the moment I came into town, everything that I thought was of interest, possible interest to the media, I’d let ’em know. And I tried to do it on a personal level, not a press release. A personal phone call… Read More
Yes, they were. They were appreciative of the fact that this community got attention because of the zoo. And we brought a lot of people in, tourists, who then went to other facilities. They liked that. They didn’t always give us the money that we thought we needed or should… Read More
There were some things, quite honestly, that I felt were the responsibility of the city, that the city should have done, but because of the financial or bureaucratic structure of the city, they couldn’t just say, zoo, we know you need this. We’re gonna let you have this. So they… Read More
How did you nurture that? What were your secrets?… Read More
What role did politicians or politics play, if it did, in the success of the zoo?… Read More
Well, politics is important to, I mean, I complain about politics because I don’t like the negative asset. The other side of the coin is politics is a necessity. We have to get approval from them to do certain things. We have to get approval for funding even if we’re… Read More
To what extent was the city appreciative of your marketing efforts?… Read More
Particularly in increases in operational revenue or getting capital projects going?… Read More