Volume 1, No. 17. September 21, 2001
'We don't have the heart to
continue'
The celebratory mood had vanished.
In its place, the delegates at the American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA)
milled about the foyers, lounges and rooms of the Adams Mark Hotel in St. Louis,
Missouri, sharing disbelief, anguish and uncertainty arising from the events
that had occurred that morning when hijacked U.S. airliners crashed into the
World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. Within
minutes of the conference's activities being suspended, however, the activity
turned to a hubbub of cooperation and caring.
The convention still had a day of meetings, the closing banquet, and a week's
worth of specialized symposia on the schedule. However, with concerns among
attendees for family members and now-disrupted travel plans, on top of the general
state of shock that had settled over the whole country, AZA officials decided
to cancel the remaining activities.
"This is a time of shock and extreme sorrow," Charlie Hoessle, director of the
St. Louis Zoo, told the assemblage in a specially called business meeting. "There
is no right or wrong decision. We don't feel we have the heart to continue with
our normal meetings and sessions." Recognizing the need to care for the now-stranded
delegates, that evening's banquet went forward as a non-celebratory dinner.
Care was the operative word for the rest of the day. The blue-shirted volunteers
and staff of the St. Louis Zoo serving as hospitality hosts—400 in all—were
now crisis managers, contacting coach companies, coordinating car pools, finding
lodging, setting up grief counseling and locating Red Cross centers so delegates
could donate blood. In the ballroom serving as the main meeting hall, the two
giant screens that would normally show speakers at the podium ran CNN's broadcast
of the day's unfolding events. That evening, those screens were used to show
President George W. Bush's speech to the nation.
Though the conference was irrevocably disrupted, its purpose became magnified.
Amusement industry colleagues worked together for moral support and physical
accommodation, and the host zoo took whatever steps necessary to make its guests
comfortable. When at the banquet outgoing AZA president Ted Beattie, president
and CEO of the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, Illinois, introduced Hoessle, the
St. Louis Zoo director received a spontaneous and prolonged standing ovation.
"I'm sure that outpouring of appreciation was directed not at me but to all
the dedicated workers of the St. Louis Zoo," he told the audience. He was right;
Hoessle and his staff had accomplished what that morning had seemed impossible:
while September 11, 2001, would be remembered by all the AZA participants for
the events in New York City and Washington, the experiences and accomplishments
of the annual conference preceding that date would be fondly remembered, too.
(Photo of Robert Ramin of the African Wildlife Foundation and Jo Ann Keirsey of the Oklahoma Zoo board a yellow school bus at the AZA Conference. Photo by Eric Minton)
Properly
schooled
The scene caused drivers of cars to do a double-take. A long line of yellow
school buses headed for the St. Louis Zoo, carrying not children but some 1,600
AZA delegates, the youngest of whom last rode such a vehicle probably 10 years
ago. The host zoo's choice of using school buses instead of tour coaches was
in part thematic, an attempt to remind the zoo executives, keepers, curators,
managers and marketers of the excitement of taking a school field trip to the
local zoo.
The choice also saved $7,500. In announcing the mode of transportation during
the conference's opening session, Hoessle granted that the school buses would
have small seats and no air conditioning. "We wanted you to know that though
we aren't using big, comfortable, air conditioned coaches, we aren't cheap,"
he said, and he pulled out a $7,500 check made out to AZA's Conservation Endowment
Fund (CEF). In addition to donating the money saved by using school buses, the
St. Louis Zoo also gave AZA members a 10 percent discount at its gift shops
and turned those savings over to the fund, too. Along with the annual auction
and donations gathered at the annual CEF reception, the fund received $109,000
during the St. Louis meeting.
(Photo of former St. Louis Zoo employees celebrating their homecoming with a group photo. Photo by Eric Minton)
Returning
favors
For several AZA members the trip to the St. Louis Zoo was something of a homecoming.
Twenty-nine delegates who started their zoo careers there gathered at the R.
Marlin Perkins Plaza to pose for a group photo. The gathering ranged from Kym
Folkemer (children's zoo keeper 1988-91), who now is a keeper at SeaWorld's
Discovery Cove in Orlando, Florida, to Bill Conway, recently retired president
and general director of the Wildlife Conservation Society headquartered at the
Bronx Zoo in New York. Conway started at St. Louis as a volunteer in 1945, became
bird curator in 1951 and moved on in 1956.
"Marlin Perkins always encouraged keepers to learn and do papers," Hoessle said.
"We had always opted to be a training zoo. We thought we were training them
for leadership positions in our zoo, but our senior staff didn't turn over."
"Starting here was one of the better foundations you can get in the zoo business,"
said Bruce Reed, now director of the Birmingham Zoo in Alabama. He worked at
St. Louis from 1971 to 1993, when he was recruited by Walt Disney World for
Animal Kingdom. "Charlie taught us the tradition of mentoring people for leadership.
I see that as my responsibility at Birmingham." Starting with Tim Snyder, his
assistant director at Birmingham, whom Reed recently hired away from the St.
Louis Zoo.
Team competition
At the opening session, John Chapo's job as chair of the AZA's honors and awards
committee was to read off first the nominees, then the winners of the various
annual AZA awards. The International Conservation Award nomination for the Betampona
Ruffed Lemur Release and Conservation Program listed the work of 35 different
institutions, all duly mentioned by Chapo. Upon announcing that project winning
Significant Achievement Honors, Chapo started repeating the list of participating
institutions, eliciting a groan from the assemblage. It was physical discomfort
they felt in the overly air-conditioned room as the meeting moved into the latter
half of its second hour that led to the groans, and Chapo obligingly cut it
short. Still, the importance of the list was no less appreciated by this crowd.
Since 1993, AZA had bestowed 12 such conservation awards upon a total of 25
institutions. "In one fell swoop we doubled that number," Chapo said. "It was
the largest collaborative submission ever." Chapo thought the submission, let
alone its being honored, indicated a trend of cooperation among zoos that has
flourished in the past 10 years. "Historically, zoos are like any institution:
'I'm good by myself.' Zoos have been collaborating much more in the last decade.
It shows we're all in this together, working hard to save wildlife and habitats."
Award winners at the AZA conference
follow:
International Conservation top honors to the Cleveland, Ohio, Metroparks Zoo
for conserving High Andes habitat in Venezuela; significant achievement to John
G. Shedd Aquarium in Chicago for Project Seahorse and to the Betampona Ruffed
Lemur Release and Conservation Program by the following 35 institutions: Baltimore
Zoo in Maryland; Blank Park Zoo in Des Moines, Iowa; Brookfield Zoo in Chicago,
Illinois; Caribbean Gardens in Naples, Florida; Charles Paddock Zoo in Atascadero,
California; Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden in Ohio; Cleveland Metroparks
Zoo in Ohio; Columbus Zoo and Aquarium in Ohio; Dallas Zoo in Texas; Denver
Zoo in Colorado; Detroit Zoological Institute in Michigan; Fort Worth Zoo in
Texas; Happy Hollow Zoo in San Jose, California;
Knoxville Zoo in Tennessee; Los Angeles Zoo in California; Louisville Zoo in
Kentucky; Micke Grove Zoo in Lodi, California; Oklahoma City Zoo in Oklahoma;
Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo in Nebraska; Philadelphia Zoo in Pennsylvania; Point
Defiance Zoo and Aquarium in Tacoma, Washington; Racine Zoo in Wisconsin; Roger
Williams Park Zoo in Providence, Rhode Island; Sacramento Zoo in California;
St. Louis Zoo in Missouri; San Antonio Zoological Society in Texas; San Diego
Zoo in California; San Francisco Zoo in California; Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita,
Kansas; Seneca Park Zoo in Rochester, New York; Tulsa Zoo and Living Museum
in Oklahoma; Utah's Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City; the Wildlife Conservation Society
of New York City; Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, Washington; and Zoo Atlanta
in Georgia.
North American Conservation top honors to the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Zoo
for its diamondback terrapin program;
Exhibit Awards top honors to Shedd Aquarium for Amazon Rising and to
Minnesota Zoo in Apple Valley for The Wells Fargo Family Farm; significant
achievement to Binder Park Zoo in Battle Creek, Michigan for Wild Africa
and Alexandria, Louisiana, Zoological Park for Louisiana Habitat Exhibit;
Education Award top honors to the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York
City for SPARKS (Supporting Parents in Advocacy, Reform and Knowledge in Science);
significant achievement to Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, Washington, for "Wild
Wise."
Edward H. Bean Award top honors to the Indianapolis, Indiana, Zoo for its African
elephant breeding program, and to the Cincinnati, Ohio, Zoo for its Peruvian
fire stick long-term propagation project.