A zoo veterinarian has a very defined function, and that is the care of the animal collection to provide for their animal health. It doesn’t take into consideration all of the different ramifications that for instance, the educational, the research, some of the other aspects, unless you get into a… Read More
And it was just an interesting challenge. So in 1970, I went from Columbus to Brownsville, Texas to work with Warren Thomas. I worked with him for four years and in April of 1974, he left and subsequently then went on to Los Angeles Zoo. And then I became the… Read More
So what was your relationship with Warren Thomas?… Read More
Warren, I did not know when I was at Columbus. He had already moved on and was in Omaha at that time. Warren went on to do a consulting job for the people in Brownsville, Texas for the Earl C. Sams Foundation who were going to build the zoo, which… Read More
And did you work with Warren Thomas or have association with Warren?… Read More
Warren Thomas was one of three people that were quite active in Columbus. When Warren went to veterinary school there as well, 10 years before I did. And Warren and Lou Desabato and Don Davis were all at the Columbus Zoo at the same time working as keepers and then… Read More
Jim Savoy was always an upbeat, happy go-lucky guy. He demanded a lot out of his employees, but he didn’t micromanage. And he let you do your do your thing. He was pretty good at getting along with people at city hall, because at that time Columbus was a municipally… Read More
So he would not fare too well in this day and age with the zoo exhibits, but he was the state of the art back then quite good. The aquatics curator was Arthur Hagatus. And Arthur was another artist. It seems like they had a lot of artists there, but… Read More
What kind of director was Jim Savoy?… Read More
Who were they?… Read More
The bird curator was actually Terry Strauser, who went on then to work at Disney as he was quite a talented artist. And he went to work in the animation team at Disney, in Florida, designing and building exhibits. He actually also designed the lion tiger exhibit at Miami Metro… Read More
Now, when you started at the zoo as veterinarian, aside from this fabulous mammal curator, what other curators did you work with?… Read More
I got the position because I went and applied for it. They hired summer help. And so I was hired on and when they found out that I was in Veterinary School, they immediately put me into the Animal Care Department. And I worked actually with the great apes at… Read More
And so I could be in the back and I had about three hours of very busy work in the morning and in about an hour break before lunch, where I didn’t have any responsibilities and I could study. And then in the afternoon I had maybe two hours of… Read More
What was your position when you first started and how’d you get this position?… Read More
And so they worked out a deal where I went into the Department of Preventive Medicine at the Veterinary School as a master’s candidate and taught the seniors part-time exotic animal medicine course and was the full-time veterinarian at the Columbus Zoo. And then at the same time, few months… Read More
But when did you start thinking about zoo medicine?… Read More
I’d been outta school about two years, out of veterinary school, about two years and Jim Savoy, who was the director at the Columbus Zoo at the time, asked me if I was ready to come back into the zoo work because I had worked in the zoo for two… Read More
Did you know Jack Nicholas?… Read More
Oh, very well. Yeah. In fact, he offered to teach me how to play golf. And I told him, I wasn’t interested. (laughs) You must be one of the rare people who did that. Now you’re in the private practice, you’re in the muddy field, delivering calves. Read More