So I immersed myself in the construction. And I loved it. I just loved it. And that had a profound impact on me. It was, hey, you could dream of something, and then it gets built. There it is, you did it, you know. I had a lot of help,… Read More
And the gorilla exhibit in particular, it was showing that you didn’t need. You could have moats, but then you could have landscaping. And I was just and I saw it, I saw it. I went and saw it, and I was just, this is the greatest thing I’ve ever… Read More
Well, he just, he became obsessed with that concept. So when he designed the bird house, and he had a team of two local architects, and he would say, “This is what I want you to do.” There was never any, “Hey, have you thought?” No, that didn’t happen. He… Read More
It was just a mess. The building was rotting. It was awful. And that’s just one example of flaws that were throughout. Because he didn’t know. He didn’t know any better. And he wouldn’t listen to anybody. Now I don’t think another zoo person set foot on that site till… Read More
He wouldn’t, he didn’t want them to come. He didn’t want any zoo directors to come. So I spent 10 years basically fixing that. But within that 10 years, my first project was an education building. And I hired the same architects. They were good guys. I hired them, but… Read More
He did not have a single consultant. I learned over the years that he had virtually no experience in mammals and birds, but yet he built these exhibits. And all of them, almost every one of them had major design flaws in them. So, from that time in becoming director… Read More
But the bird house was the centerpiece. It was an icon. It was huge. It was 30,000 square feet. And to this day, again, everything in that original zoo was built in an oriental motif and was painted red and black, from the administration building to the snack bars to… Read More
But this bird house that was touted as maybe the best bird house ever built and touted by Mehrtens that way, and a lot of people felt that way ’cause they had an incredible collection, he had it built out of wood, and it started to rot before the zoo… Read More
I had a PR director. I had, and I’m using titles that were used back then. I had a, finally we had a guest relations manager. It just, things just started to change. The zoo’s attendance went from about 450,000 to 900,000 in a year and stayed there. We hired… Read More
And my whole life sort of changed. I became more… I guess I just was more at peace. I had two children by then. They became more of a focus in my life. And I think I became a pretty good manager. And I’d like to think that my staff… Read More
I don’t know what else to say. I just, it was like half of my career was this not very nice guy, and the second half of my career, I think I was pretty good at what I did. Can you tell me about the- You talked about you’re building… Read More
And how would your staff describe your management style?… Read More
Great question. So the first few years, I was a terrible manager. I guess I’d been director… Well, while I was still let’s just say a not very good manager, (laughs) I managed to get a bond issue passed and double the size of the zoo. And the zoo went… Read More
And one day I just said, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t, this is not good for me. It’s not good for the zoo.” And almost overnight, which is probably more like a year or so, I changed, and I completely changed. I began to… I gave the staff… Read More
They elected three directors, and I got the fourth number of votes. And I don’t remember to this day, but one of the three who was elected ahead of me left the profession soon after, and they moved me up to the board. So I had my fir- I actually… Read More
Can you describe your management style?… Read More
Did it change?… Read More
And at some point along that way, again, we’re still in the maybe 1980-’81-’82, I’m not sure, every year and still to this day, the AZBA, A, (laughs) AAZPA, now AZA, the incoming chair puts out a call for service if you would like to volunteer. And I sent a… Read More
So I got to talk on the phone to all these people who were budding directors, budding curators. I got to talk to their staff, not their staff, but to their supervisors. And just, I was networking. I was just, I guess that’s the word I would use. I was…… Read More
And that was another significant moment in my career, because now you… And I think accreditation at the time that I served, yeah, in fact, I know it was. The first term or two years, whatever, accreditation was voluntary, I became chairman of the accreditation commission the year that the… Read More