So she’s on the phone and she’s saying, “So who’s the new director, what, who?” And I’m saying, “Who is it, who is it?” And she says, “Lucy Spelman,” almost fell over, it was kind of Lucy, who in the hell promoted Lucy Spelman from veterinarian to director, Larry Small… Read More
He was secretary, the Smithsonian. So again, they made a selection of the zoo director for the National Zoo without any kind of competition. So, I mean, I basically just wrote off the zoo at that point. Read More
No, it hasn’t. And I think part of the reason is that when keepers and curators alike, and including directors, when they were in the profession, I mean, even after the war, the Second World War, they got into the profession because they really wanted to work with wild animals… Read More
And mean, I went into the profession because I enjoyed it. It was a challenge and it was fun. In 2007, I just looked at myself and I said, this is not what I expected to come back to. And it’s not something I’m gonna wanna stay in and I… Read More
And in fact, if I can get into, do you want me to start talking about my second or have you got some more?… Read More
Tell us about how you entered, you retired from the zoo and then came back?… Read More
Because trying to get elephants in, you’re running into not only the federal government, but you’re running into the animal rights groups as well. And I don’t see that easing up anytime. I think it’s gonna just continue to get worse. So if you’re asking me why I wouldn’t wanna… Read More
It’s kind of insanity in a sense to see what’s going on. Read More
Well, how would you say that the role of the curator or even that of the general curator has changed since you entered the profession, has it evolved for the better?… Read More
Because it’s not the same profession that it was when I became a keeper, but certainly not the one that I was in during the ’60s and ’70s where it was an awakening of what zoos were all about, and we could get the collections that we wanted. We were… Read More
And where are you gonna get the elephants now?… Read More
Well, and speaking of that, the zoo business has changed greatly in the years you’ve been at it, knowing what you know today, would you have entered the field when you did and would you enter it today?… Read More
I would not even consider entering it today. Read More
Because?… Read More
But the biggest part of that facility was the fish tanks. But you’ve got a living exhibit that you can walk through and number of zoos have done that. Read More
Now, you’ve been involved in a lot of exhibit design, so what would you say is the ideal zoo exhibit design approach, what components are important?… Read More
Well, I’m really caught in kind of a quagmire to answer that because back in the ’80s and ’90s when these exhibits were really coming to fruition where all the zoos were building open exhibits, or like they were building indoor immersion exhibits, spending a lot of money on them… Read More
It’s not part of the zoo feeling when you go into a zoo, you don’t expect to walk in and see a carousel, but they’re starving for money and this was a money-making machine. I expect at some point, you’re gonna see roller coasters in a lot of these facilities… Read More
No, he just get up and walk out. And I mean, he was a very difficult person to understand even though I did well under him. But the other thing he did was in 1996, he had basically through his fiscal mistakes, basically bankrupted the zoo. We didn’t have enough… Read More
So in one fellow shoe, he wiped out six curatorial positions that represented something like 210 years of experience. And we never ever have gotten that back. And it was really a disgrace that, that could have happened under his watch. Read More