Had no idea there were other zoo organizations out there. So I was a big fan. We had gone through, I took the Pittsburgh Zoo through five AZA accreditations, and we passed with flying colors. And so I’d been very involved with the AZA. Unfortunately AZA, like a lot of… Read More
We never have. And she asked a multitude of questions like that, that indicated that she had absolutely no clue, or had any experience with elephants. And yet she was on the news at night telling people how horrible our elephants were. Interestingly enough, what amazed me, or disappointed me,… Read More
How difficult was that decision?… Read More
And they wouldn’t go. That wasn’t their purpose of being there. Their purpose of being there was to try to get me to admit that we had done something wrong and not tried our absolute best. Well, when you speak about that kind of challenge, when you first started zoo,… Read More
Hand raising elephants is very, very hard, even for the people in Africa who we consulted with every single day. Very, very hard. And so we lost this baby elephant, who was premature, and we actually learned, premature, low body weight, and we actually learned later on, through the pathology,… Read More
No animal experience, right?… Read More
And I’m sitting there with her, and I’ve got my PR person with her. And she’s got this list of questions, which clearly she didn’t write. Somebody else wrote. It came from up above, from the PETA organization. And she’s like, “How often do you chain your elephants?” And I… Read More
And they have developed very, very good strategic plans. I mean, I give ’em kudos. They are 25, 30 years ahead of us in their strategic plannings. They very carefully have looked at, here’s the way we’re gonna close all zoos, and they have put together a plan to do… Read More
We haven’t done anything you are accusing us of doing. Let me take you to the barn. Let me take you to the exhibit. Let me take you to meet the keepers. So a lot of times it’s, they’ve simply been misinformed, and drank the Kool-Aid, and a hundred percent… Read More
And so we ended up, I literally rented a trailer, a little trailer, and parked it behind the little chalet in the Children’s Zoo, and wired it all up, and brought the Zoo Society on the grounds so that they were no longer sequestered miles away, but they now were… Read More
Oh, number one threat to zoos today, absolutely. Number one threat to zoos today. And it’s sad because the animal rights groups’ sole purpose is to put us outta business. The animal rights groups’ sole purpose is to put us outta business. And the extreme animal rights groups’ sole purpose… Read More
What was your relationship, as Zoo Director, to animal rights groups and Humane Society groups over the years?… Read More
Why can’t we play nice?… Read More
“Well, blah, blah, blah.” “Well, blah, blah.” I’m like, yeah, but that was in 1975, for God’s sakes. It’s been too long. Let’s play nice, let’s play together, for the good of the zoo. Read More
What’s gonna be good for the zoo?… Read More
They had no idea what the meeting was about, except that I wanted to talk to ’em about the zoo, right?… Read More
And they all looked at me. I mean, they didn’t know what the meeting was about. Read More
And so I said, why can’t we play together?… Read More
And I said, so, we’re done with this, “We ain’t talking to each other.” We’re done with, the Zoo Society’s gonna talk to the city, the city’s gonna talk to the Zoo Society, I’m gonna talk to both of you guys. We’re all gonna talk to each other. We’re gonna… Read More
Can we play nice?… Read More