I think of two instances specifically at Mesker while I was there. One was, we had two older chimps, female chimps that were in this old building That was probably 50 years old at the time. And one Saturday morning, I mean, literally it had like a half moon shaped… Read More
I mean, this is something that you should plan for, but then again, there’s almost so much planning you can wind up doing, because the chimps are 60 or 70 feet or 80 feet up a tree, there’s not much you that you could do with the capture equipment that… Read More
And in Mesker Park, when you were there as general curator or zoologist, did you have experience with animals getting out and what was your role and how was it handled?… Read More
And I’m thinking retrospectively, in San Francisco, at times we would have training stuff in terms of how we grabbing animals. I never remember doing that in Evansville. I mean, other than bringing the people with, whether it be curator and keepers, who didn’t have that experience that needed to… Read More
I mean, certainly the first five years I was there. I mean, at some point in time, I mean, I really had to embrace the role because we wound up hiring more staff in the late seventies due to the federal government making funds available. So all of a sudden… Read More
What is your feelings about the handling?… Read More
Well, once again, the business has evolved over thousands of years. But in my tenure it certainly has evolved, the things that were available or known in the seventies to me were still many of the old school ways. I mean, we didn’t have the darts that are available today. Read More
You talked about your relationship with the elephant and handling the elephant. You talked about netting, some of the skills like netting skills, some people would say are eroding because fewer animals have to be handled in that way. And there’s more training techniques and so forth, positive, negative. Read More
Probably about it’s eight inch tusks. And when she got the electric shock, she backed off and she broke off part one tusk. it was just split. And we knew we had to do something about it and we didn’t know how well she would do it. But once again,… Read More
And so we had enough sense on, okay, we’ll put a plate over this light switch and not use this. But we used to call bunny the educated elephant, this door, she would open this keep door, which wasn’t locked with her trunk. And there was another light switch and… Read More
That was a routine, which was common in zoos at the time. And we also, she was scared of thunder. And when there was a thunderstorm, which was pretty regular in event, we would chain her up. The chains, I mean, we used to say was a security product. I… Read More
There was a light, there was a door in front of the exhibit and this was the keeper area. It was about eight foot. And then about six foot wide. And then there’s little safety barrier to keep the public out. Or it was just open space. And there was… Read More
And she was trained. She would respond to verbal commands easily. She was very docile. I mean, I worked with her. I became like the elephant hoof trimmer by default. Maybe, I don’t know. It wasn’t something that I relished doing, I would working with the elephant she responded to… Read More
Well the elephants was elephant. They had one elephant that they acquired as a young Asian elephant. When the building opened in 1955, she lived in a stall, I’m guessing was probably 30 by 25 in the building. And then there was this large, I mean, large by standards in… Read More
Well, I mean you to hear John, John thought of himself as a teddy bear and Frank Thompson was the director. So I knew Frank in terms of talking to him, I started talking to him more for advice after John left, less than a year after I arrived. And… Read More
You didn’t have any real elephant experience when you came to Mesker Park Zoo, but how did that evolve with the elephant or elephants that were there and what kind of exhibit was it?… Read More
Did you feel from either what you heard or knew that there was a different type of style?… Read More
I mean, you could see the facility, but the diet or whatnot, how they were maintaining what they were giving the animal that they were successful with, and I say successful is, I want to say in the beginning, in the sixties, I would think that you were successful with… Read More
You mentioned the director, John Zara, when you were there, had more of a directorial management style, did you know Frank Thompson or did you hear things?… Read More
I thought it was tremendously tremendous. So important, one of the most important things you could do. A, networking, though we didn’t call it networking in the seventies, meeting people, learning who they are, learning who you are, what kind of person you are, the papers that were given, learning… Read More