Well, I think we all look at, nowadays especially, not so much in years and years ago, we didn’t look at education as much as we did experience. I was always taught that and I was taught by the old time keepers, “You ain’t got enough experience.” That’s what they’d… Read More
I did. In fact, I think we got the Bean Award for that particular birth as well as we did for Colo and Fred didn’t, we didn’t have the Bean Award when he had the whooping crane in San Antonio, but. Read More
Did that type of birth help the marketing of the zoo and the fundraising?… Read More
It certainly did for the year that that animal was very small. Everyone wanted to come and see the white rhino. Of course they thought it was gonna be pure white. That’s always a difficult thing to explain to people who don’t really come to the zoo often, but they’re… Read More
What were some of your guidelines when you were looking to bring staff on board to your zoo?… Read More
Did you bring them back or were they just shipped to you?… Read More
They were shipped from Gelsenkirchen to us. Fred was holding them in Europe till he found a buyer. And that was one of his techniques to hold animals in the European zoo, let them exhibit them for awhile. And then they would ship them off to zoos, whichever zoo bought… Read More
So, you must’ve gotten very big public relations from this birth?… Read More
Did it take time to, did you approach the rancher instantaneously?… Read More
How did you convince him that this was a good thing for the San Antonio Zoo?… Read More
Well, this rancher was a member of my board. He was an excellent conservationist, still is, hunted in Africa, he loves animals. He saw the plight of the rhinos. And when we talked about my getting the white rhinos, he said, “Let’s do it.” And we did. Read More
Where were you searching?… Read More
And how did that come about?… Read More
Well, there weren’t many available, so it took years to find some, and I found a pair that was in the zoo. I think they were perhaps five years old. I thought, okay, that’s pretty good. I probably won’t find some that young anywhere else. So I better grab onto… Read More
We had the first birth in any zoo outside of Africa of the white rhino. I brought in a pair of rhinos. I took years to find just the right pair that I was looking for. And I found the pair that Fred Zeehandelaar, a good old Fred J. Zeehandelaar,… Read More
However, and even Marvin Jones didn’t know this, we had the first birth from the pair that I brought in and what a great day that was for me. I really enjoyed it. I finally did something right. I picked the right age animals from the right dealer and brought… Read More
What was your criteria?… Read More
They sell cattle that way and why not their exotic animals as well?… Read More
You mentioned white rhino. You said, well, there’s a lot of white rhino, but white rhino weren’t all that prevalent years ago. Read More
Did the San Antonio Zoo have white rhino births?… Read More