I think the one granddad, the last survivor, we actually ended up having to euthanize ’cause it had numerous organ failures, but it was kind of a cool animal, even though all it did was lay on the bottom once in a while, come up and take a breath of… Read More
Yep. Yeah, we acquired two Australian Lungfish, 1933. The then director reached out to the Australian government and for the Chicago World’s Fair, the, it was at the century of Progress World’s Fair. He wanted some unusual animals that had never been seen in the United States. And so we,… Read More
Can you talk a little about, you mentioned the lung fish, which was one of your longevity?… Read More
Just very unusual animals that most other facilities had never heard of. Much less exhibited. Read More
Ooh, you know, might have been some of the sea horses that were difficult to come by, especially sea dragons, leafy sea dragons, Woody Wheaty, sea dragons, difficult to acquire. People had a hard time getting ’em to breed. Although several aquariums have now had success. Those were tough. The… Read More
Man, that’s a tough one. Yeah, you know, I’m a fishes guy so, you know, I’m likely to say fish, but I would, I would say if I had to have a favorite, it’s probably sea otters. They’re, they’re pretty interesting animals. They’re a challenge for sure. But we did… Read More
What animal species would you consider to be the most significant that you acquired?… Read More
The freshwater river dolphin. Everybody loved Chico. And, but you know, after we expanded the collection, I’m like, they’re all cool. Read More
And she was in one of the highest paid school districts in Illinois working Glenbrook South High School. And I’m like, eh, I don’t know that you’re gonna get the same money. And she goes, you know, we got the two kids, we had two young daughters, you know, and… Read More
Did you have a favorite animal?… Read More
How do you feel about moving to this part of the country?… Read More
And she’s, well I, you know, would there be a guarantee that I’d be making the same money as a teacher in this new area?… Read More
Do you want me to pursue this?… Read More
But I was like, oh my gosh, what do I know about that?… Read More
You know? And it turned out I was gonna be in competition with a university that was going for going through the same people for essentially the same money. And I thought, oh my gosh, this is not gonna work out. And I, I would come home, you know, after… Read More
Wanted that you wanted to stay so long in one place?… Read More
Well now you, when you say you retired, you, you had 40 years with the institution, which is unusual, but can you discuss the reasons that would, that you thought about that a lot?… Read More
Here’s the deal. I so was so fortunate in my career at Shedd with the advancements and the increased responsibility and the ability to basically follow my passion directly for most of the positions I held that I just felt didn’t feel a strong desire to move on. And I… Read More
You know, what, what, here’s what they’re probably gonna ask. What are we doing now? So it was, you know, kind of a, an oversight thing again. But I was the lone wolf with that. I had no staff or anything. It just felt like, I’m not sure how long… Read More
So-and-so about this aspect of our operations now, you know, can you gimme an update?… Read More