No new task. It was just a title change that the organization wanted to adopt. They were doing some title changes throughout the organization and so they decided to take general curator, retire that, and make it deputy director of collections. And so it didn’t change anything. It just was… Read More
Why did you leave San Diego Zoo?… Read More
As general curator for both institutions, you must have been dealing with the director of, who was that at the time?… Read More
Well, Doug Myers was the director at the time. And then he had a park manager who I think they turned out calling that person a director as well. But he was the executive director of the whole organization. So yeah, several meetings with Doug Myers. I wasn’t in the… Read More
‘Cause the zoo very healthy financially, park not so, so, you know, you’re always balancing those things back and forth. And so yeah, you know, starting to be in meetings a lot, you know, just to keep things going and to make sure that the animal department was getting represented. Read More
You must have had a huge staff to oversee. Yeah, there are 300 people at that time, roughly, between the zoo and the wild animal park. I would spend two days a week at the wild animal park, three days a week at the zoo. And then I started to… Read More
So I had to figure out that system. And then in all fairness, I had a secretary in both facilities who couldn’t have done it without them. I mean, they were excellent. And they finally sat me down and said, you gotta come up with a regular schedule here. You’re… Read More
So we’d have one day together at both facilities, which worked out great because then we could have meetings with the staff if we were together, we could, you know, go to staff meetings, whatever it may be. We worked it out. So there was always someone at the highest… Read More
I said are you okay with what I’m doing?… Read More
He goes, oh, absolutely. You got a lot to learn, but you’re on the right track. And you know, again, as they always say, that the rest is history. But that truly was some pivotal times in my career where I could have changed the course of where I am… Read More
During this time as the general curator for both the zoo and animal park, how did you spend your time?… Read More
Yeah, they knew me, I’d been in curator positions before, but now I’m their boss. I had budget issues at the zoo that were like, I didn’t put this budget together, I inherited this budget, but all of a sudden I’m the one that’s getting called in by the CFO… Read More
Nothing overnight. Now, there’s one person in this whole process that was key to my success at San Diego, and that was Tom Schultz, the guy that stepped aside. Tom could have made my life very difficult by continuing to make decisions and undermining me. And he was great about… Read More
He goes, it’s been six months. I said yeah. Read More
I was getting challenged by staff at the zoo, like, who’s this guy, you know?… Read More
Tom Schultz. He just wanted to be reptile curator. He didn’t want the general curator thing at all. So when Jim appointed me, I said, Jim, what I’d like is you gimme six months. If I like it in six months, then I’ll continue on. And if you like what… Read More
And so I had worked at the San Diego Zoo, right?… Read More
But I was a groundskeeper last time I was at the San Diego Zoo. Now, I knew everybody down there, I knew everybody, but I wasn’t their boss. And the gentleman that was the general curator at the zoo was ready to give it up. He just wanted to go… Read More
Who was it?… Read More
What were those responsibilities as general curator?… Read More