Interview 20517 – Caption Index: 185
What’s this?… Read More
What’s this?… Read More
Pretty soon, you know why animals are well cared for, well labeled, and not wire sticking out of the animal cage. At that time, Hans Friedrich, the assistant director, was with us, he comes around, and he makes his own round on weekend. Read More
Nine o’clock, with jacket and tie, he would say good morning, and good morning. And by that time, he had the entire zoo in his hand. So they had animal meetings, at that time, the zoo had emperor penguins. They had a very skilled zookeeper who took care of them. Read More
The zoo director. Berlin Zoo, you’ve probably met him. Eight o’clock in the morning, senior staff gathers, rain or shine, into the lion house, or whatever. And he comes around, claps his hands, and says you, and you, and you, and you make a round with me. And the group… Read More
And at one point, he brings in the maintenance guy, looks at the little hole on the sidewalk, and you don’t have to know German language. He’s, ah, ah, ah, ah. So the maintenance head pulls up the notepad. Uh-uh. Read More
Or disadvantages?… Read More
Advantages outweigh disadvantages. Early in the morning, you walk around the zoo ground. I think I learned it from Dr. Koga, of Ueno Zoo in Tokyo. 6:30 in the morning, he lived in a small house inside the zoo. 6:30 in the morning, the door opens, he comes out with… Read More
Uh, he didn’t expect that. He probably thought I would fight. No, no, no. I was up to here. So that’s the day I’m leaving. He says, fine. His name was John Caltibiano. Read More
How important, you mentioned going around the zoo, in all these zoos that you’ve worked in, how important would you say it was for the curator to make rounds?… Read More
What were the advantages?… Read More
And the Staten Island Zoo?… Read More
Staten Island Zoo was well insulated from external politics and problems, and inside, there wasn’t much of political problems. I was given pretty much a freehand by Vincent Gattullo, who was, as I said, an educator and a biologist. But he eventually left, and a new one came in, who… Read More
I will choose the day I leave the zoo, so instead of him saying, I said how about December 31st this year, 2005?… Read More
What was the management style of Steve Graham?… Read More
He had a unique way of doing things. He gave you some freehand, but he wanted to do it hands-on himself, such as managing a parking lot on his day off, and so on. Unique way, but he eventually had political problems, and had to leave. Read More
Belle Isle, yeah. As I said, not an easy situation to be in. But then, well I’ll stick around for 10 years to qualify for pension. Read More
So that director of the Belle Isle Zoo was the same director as the Detroit Zoo?… Read More
Detroit Zoo. Steve Graham, yeah right. He was the one who kind of rescued me when I was unemployed. But eventually, he had to leave. And new one comes in, and so on. But by that time, I was qualified for pension, for comfortable out. Read More
Dave Zukoni. Great guy. We had differences, of course. But he had a wide range of tolerance to my idiosyncrasies. That was great. But Milwaukee was the one I had a problem, when the zoo director divorced his wife, had a new one who began to run the zoo, one… Read More
Got kicked out. So the next one was Detroit. Read More