But despite as I say, even presence on our board of one of McCutcheon’s sons, that didn’t make a bloody bit of difference in those relations, but you should know, again, that we reached out to, indeed we brought aboard our board of trustees Bill Curtis. That required a board… Read More
It was certainly more than what we did have. We did a sponsor early on, in the Robert Bean days in an educational series before Marlon Perkins that, I think it was a 12 or 13-part series on early television here in Chicagoland. But quite frankly, it was conducted by… Read More
What kind of presence did you want Brookfield to have in the media?… Read More
(George chuckles) In terms of what kind of presence I would like to have had for Brookfield in the media?… Read More
Well, we actually sponsored a young woman Melody Serena on the platypus studies and she worked with the Zoological Board of Victoria and with the governmental agencies and, so to speak, assuring us that the platypus was okay in terms of the river systems and all of that in that… Read More
So the Australia program, I think, is a signal accomplishment of the society. And at the time, there were very few outside interest. New York sort of deferred to us in terms of our efforts there, which are not large, were not on continent-wide scale, but set examples. And as… Read More
So with your presence in Australia, did you consider, from the zoological point of view, bringing koalas or even potentially a platypus to Brookfield Zoo?… Read More
Animals that couldn’t survive because of dogs and cats and whatnot on the mainland itself. So in that case, an auto mechanic became the expert on rehabilitating a natural little island in the Murray River sufficient to support these small marsupial mammals. I mean, he was the expert. And so… Read More
You could not keep these papers in the library. (George chuckles) They were snatched away as soon as you put something in the slot. And these people included the town drunkard guy who was illegally cutting mallee and several others of that sort. They became absolutely marvelous stewards of the… Read More
This is the Commonwealth Government of Australia. One of our staff lobbied them and did some work on their biosphere reserve management, et cetera. And she effectively persuaded them along with members of the community to come up with the money. And the Chicago Zoological Society actually purchased the station… Read More
And as a result, they abolished the leases and the Murray-Sunset National Park was declared, one million hectares. And we assisted in terms of their early monitoring of the both the fauna and the recovery of the vegetation. We assisted with, again, volunteers as well as staff assistance. But then… Read More
No, no, in terms of Brookfield’s presence in Australia, that officially ended in 2006. But if you don’t mind, I’ll tell you what effects our presence has had there. And it’s involved, not just staff, and visiting staff from Brookfield, but also volunteers, also trustees. And we have had a… Read More
And one of the doctoral study was actually done on the cryptogams on the soil that recovered. These are fungi and other lichens that with the very slight rain that they have in such a place, very slightest rain, they dumped the nitrogen into the soil. With the sheep around,… Read More
Is Brookfield still have presence in Australia?… Read More
In terms of the population genetics developments in zoos and the, especially the development of population viability analysis in regard to the species survival plans that zoos, combining both their animal collection holdings and their knowhow, it seems to me that that has been extremely important. And one of the… Read More
And if you continued in the vein that zoos were on before and before the real restrictions on the movement of animals imposed by governmental and other factors and other forces, it seems to me that you’ve got to pay attention on this front. And so Bob and company, and… Read More
(George chuckles) Well, if they’re professionals, it should be one of the invaluable assets of a respectable institution. And we recognized that very early on and tried to build up the holdings. New York, of course, is absolutely superb in that regard, but many other institutions of note, in terms… Read More
Can you tell me more about that and how it has helped zoos?… Read More
Speaking of libraries, how important would you say a zoo library is to the professional staff?… Read More
To what extent was your wife Mary’s involvement instrumental in your research and other programs at the zoo?… Read More