Oral History Program Sam Zeveloff Interviewed by Marina Kenner 23 June 2021 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Sam Zeveloff Interviewed by Marina Kenner 23 June 2021 Copyright © 2022 by Weber State University, Stewart Library Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description The Weber State University Oral History Project began conducting interviews with key Weber State University faculty, administrators, staff and students, in Fall 2007. The program focuses primarily on obtaining a historical record of the school along with important developments since the school gained university status in 1990. The interviews explore the process of achieving university status, as well as major issues including accreditation, diversity, faculty governance, changes in leadership, curricular developments, etc. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Zeveloff, Sam, an oral history by Marina Kenner, 23 June 2021, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Dr. Sam Zeveloff Circa 2018 Dr. Sam Zeveloff Circa 2018 Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Dr. Sam Zeveloff, conducted on June 23, 2021, in the Stewart Library, by Marina Kenner. In this interview, Sam discusses his life, his experiences, and his time serving as a professor of Zoology at Weber State University. MK: Today is June 23, 2021. It is 1:40 p.m. This is Marina Kenner and I am interviewing Sam Zeveloff, and Alexis Stokes is our film technician. When and where were you born? SZ: I was born in New York City on May 2nd, 1950. I was actually born in the borough of Brooklyn. My parents lived in Queens then. I don't know why, but my mother's obstetrician was affiliated with a hospital in Brooklyn. So, I was born in Brooklyn, even though once I left the hospital, I ended up in Queens. There are five boroughs in New York City: there's the Bronx where the Yankees play; then there's Manhattan, which is really the busiest part. And then there's Staten Island, which you have to go to by bridge or by boat, passing the Statue of Liberty on the way. MK: You talked about growing up in New York. You want to talk a little bit about your early life? SZ: Sure. I think in many ways that I was very fortunate. I had the best of both worlds because we lived in Queens. After living in an apartment in Queens for a few years, my parents moved out to Long Island, which includes New York City on its 1 western side. On Long Island to the east is Nassau County and then Suffolk County; we lived in Nassau County. And it was a very idyllic 1950s childhood with Little League Baseball games, etc. There was a white bus that came down the block and sold pizza from it. Of course, there are food trucks now, but there were food trucks then, too. I had a great childhood. I was the middle child, and had an older sister who sadly passed away last year and a younger brother. So, of course, my parents ignored me since I was the middle child (but not really). It was just really nice. I remember being very impressed by some of the shows back on the television then; it was the early days of TV. I loved watching Davy Crockett with his coonskin cap, which, of course, figured later on in my life. I was an avid baseball fan. My first game was to go see the Brooklyn Dodgers when I was five years old with my dad before they moved to Los Angeles. And that was a great time for New York baseball because the Yankees, the Giants, and the Dodgers were all in New York. After the Dodgers left, I went to Yankees games with my friends. My parents were permissive so I could readily get on a bus and on a train with my little 10 and 11 year old friends. We would go to Yankee Stadium and sit in the bleachers. It wasn't that dangerous back then. And I got to see amazing players all the time, like Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, and Roger Maris. It was truly a great time to be living in New York. When I say I had the best of both worlds, I mean that, I grew up in the suburbs, yet had easy access to city life. My parents moved back to Queens when I was toward the end of the sixth 2 grade. We lived in a very suburban area in a private house. But I could easily take a bus and a train and be in Manhattan within 45 minutes. I think another reason why I loved being in New York then was because I was very interested in music. Of course, that was the time of the British Invasion with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, The Who, and the Kinks, and all of those incredible groups. And a lot of musicians performed in Greenwich Village, like The Byrds and James Taylor. I went to Greenwich Village clubs with my friends when I was 15. Again, my parents had no problem with that. They grew up in the city, too, and they were very comfortable with my use of public transportation. I remember when I saw James Taylor; I think it was the first time he appeared in New York. I was dating this girl and we were 16 or 17. Were at the very back of the line waiting to get in. Everybody knew about him because his first album had come out. A lot of people think “Sweet Baby James” is his first album, but there was an earlier album, “James Taylor” which the Beatles produced. So people had heard about him. There was a long line going into one of these clubs in the village and there were no seats left. So Cindy and I sat on his amplifier behind him and we were vibrating the whole time while watching the concert. Clearly, there were a lot of cool things about growing up in New York. I had a great family, with an older sister, and a younger brother whom I'm still very close with. I went to very good schools; the public schools in the city were terrific. I went to elementary school on Long Island, but went to junior high school and high school in New York. I went to Jamaica High School. The building is still 3 there, although now it’s divided up into a bunch specialty or charter schools within the same building. It had a reputation of being great academically. We had a lot of students who received Westinghouse science scholarships. There were Regents scholarships through which students were able to get money to go to state universities. It was a fantastic high school. There were some famous and infamous graduates. Stephen Jay Gould, who was very influential in my training as a biologist, went to Jamaica High School. I met him at a meeting and we talked about the good old days at Jamaica High. And John Mitchell, who was Nixon's attorney general, went there (he's more of the infamous sort). Sheila Jackson, who is now a congresswoman in Texas, graduated from Jamaica High School. One of my classmates ended up being a saxophonist. He ended up going on tour with the Rolling Stones. Another was the first president of the Rolling Stones U.S. fan club. It was a fun time, with all of the music in New York and heady academics. MK: Sounds like it. Were you encouraged to pursue an education? SZ: Definitely, by my parents. My parents were both children of immigrants and they both felt very strongly about the need for all of us to go to college. I think there was a very strong push for me to go to college, to become a professional. And this is true of people in my extended family which includes teachers, doctors, and lawyers. There was always that very high level of expectation. MK: What started your interest in zoology? 4 SZ: I was always interested in nature. I would regularly go to summer camp. One camp was in far upstate New York, high up in the Adirondacks, not all that far from the Canadian border; it was a beautiful area. I really became much more interested in nature in the summers when I would go away from my suburban home in Queens. Then I went to another sleep-away camp that was still in New York state, fairly close to Albany, near the beautiful Berkshire Mountains in western Massachusetts. Of course, these aren't “real” mountains compared to those here, but nice rolling hills and dense forests. So I became especially interested in nature when I went to sleep-away camp. I was always interested in what was going on in my backyard. We once had squirrels nesting on our property right behind the basketball backboard that my father had built over the garage. And every time the ball hit the backboard, you would hear the babies cry. I was interested in what was going on. I became particularly interested in the formal aspects of biology when I was an undergraduate student. I started out as an art major at the State University of New York at Binghamton which is now called Binghamton University. There was one professor there who was very well known internationally. His name was John Christian, and he took me under his wing. I did research with him back in the very early 1970s. I think that was unusual back then. As both of you probably know, there's a big push now for undergraduate research. And obviously we have a tremendous program here at Weber State. But back then it wasn't that typical. That had a very profound effect on me. I was able to do research with him on 5 rodent population biology and endocrinology when I was in my very early 20s. That was my formal introduction to biological research. I was interested in biology in high school, too, as I indicated. I was one of these nerdy biology lab monitors who would take out the stuff in bottles from the prep room to the biology teachers. So I was interested, but didn't really know much about what was involved in biological research until I was in college. That was a very profound experience for me. I stayed in touch with Dr. Christian until he passed away. He sent me his entire set of journals going back at least seventy-five years right before he passed away. All of that was really meaningful to me. MK: That's cool. Did you say what your professor's name was? SZ: His name was John J. Christian. He did a lot of very important work on the effects of population density on reproductive biology. He looked at this both in the lab and in the field, and I helped him on some of this research. He also did some interesting work on patterns of human demography, which is basically population dynamics. He was one of the first people to show that under very high population densities in rodents and in some other mammals, that there were effects on an individual’s hormones. For example, with a lot of stress, males were more inclined to fight with each other at high population densities. He also found that at particularly high population densities both male and female reproduction would be inhibited. There are probably stress-related factors that get in the way of their functioning effectively as reproductive animals. One 6 can see on a graph that population growth rate may start out slowly, then increase rapidly before tapering off a high densities. A lot of people know about this, the "s" shaped population growth curve. Why does it taper off? The standard explanation is that resources become limited and so individuals have less to subsist on. If these individuals have less food and so forth, and mortality is greater, they're not going to have such high population growth rates or reproductive capability. Christian also looked at the hormonal aspects of this decline in population growth rates and showed that some of it is stress induced. He was instrumental in looking at this at the National Institutes of Health and at Johns Hopkins University. Then he came to Binghamton University and I got to work with him. It was a really fantastic experience. MK: That's cool. What are some of the challenges you faced while obtaining your degree? SZ: I had different challenges, with my master's degree as well as my doctoral degree in zoology. I actually have two masters. One of them is a master’s in science education, which I received while still living in New York City after college. Do you mean my undergrad degree or my grad degrees? MK: Any of them. All of them, any that you would like to share. SZ: As students there are often challenges, whether they're personal or related to what you're studying. And sometimes there's an overlap between the two. I think that what happened with my undergraduate degree is actually a kind of a pattern. I mentioned that I started out as an art major, but I became much more interested 7 in biology. When I switched degrees, I was able to cobble together an interdisciplinary degree, kind of like what you might have here as a BIS degree. Instead of finishing out as a biology major, I ended up creating a Science and Mathematics Major. I did that because it would have taken so much time for me to get all the biology requirements done. I met with somebody in the administration office and said, “Look, I have all of these art and art history credits and I have to still take biology, physics, and chemistry classes. What kind of degree can we create so I don't have to spend an extra year here?” That was one challenge I faced, but obviously it wasn't insurmountable. Then with my master's degree in zoology, I initially started out working with one fellow who was a laboratory biologist. Yet I knew after being there for a short while that I really wanted to do field work instead. It was not a big deal. He didn't care really; I think he was thinking of retiring soon. So I ended up working with a different individual as my thesis adviser. And I'm still in touch with him; he's a truly wonderful guy and he's very prominent in the field of wildlife biology. When I did my raccoon field work with him, I just had a terrific experience. We've published a couple of articles together. I loved living in North Carolina for my master’s degree in wildlife biology at North Carolina State University. It was a fantastic place to be. But I'm supposed to talk about challenges. For my doctoral degree, I actually had a fairly similar experience, but it was far worse. I went to the University of Wyoming to study the population ecology of Canada geese. My job every day was to float down the Snake River in the Jackson Hole area and look for goose nests and count how many Canada 8 geese were being added to the population. This involved many visits throughout the spring and summer. I had a really great gig. I got paid to get in a rubber raft with a guy from Montana State who was studying eagles. We'd get up every morning and take the raft onto the river. I would also climb haystacks in the valley because sometimes the geese nest on top of them. And I’d get attacked by them. If you like wildlife, Yellowstone and Jackson of course are unbelievably great for the lower 48 states. However, my advisor was very difficult. He had this idea that I should collect eggs from the nests and have them analyzed for lead residue. At that time, there was a lot of concern about lead in ecosystems. You might remember that hunters were advised not to use lead shot, because it could poison the animals. So his idea, which I thought didn't make a whole lot of sense, was that there could be lead in gasoline that would make its way down the hillsides and somehow the geese would ingest it, and this would interfere with their reproduction. The whole thing was kind of far-fetched to me. It seemed like a long stretch for that lead to get down to the geese and for it to matter to them. We were looking at data from the 1960s and determining how our data in the late 70s and 80s compared to it. Also there had been a lot of channelization of the river there, which allows the water to go much faster to the irrigation canals and out toward the west, through Idaho and so forth. That high water could wipe out the goose nests. That seemed to me to be a bigger factor for the population than the potential for lead contamination. 9 One day, I was speaking with the head of the Department of Statistics who also had a joint appointment in Zoology and a fairly young theoretical ecologist who was a mathematical wizard. They sat me down and said, “You definitely should not collect any eggs.” Their names were Mark and Lyman. Mark said to me specifically, "If I were you, I wouldn't collect one damn egg." And I said, "Why?" And he said, "Well, look, the population is not that large to begin with. You might have somewhere between 40 to 70 nests. If you start removing the number of eggs it's going to take you to do the lead analysis, you're going to be ruining what you could say about their reproductive prowess; their ability to recruit new individuals to their population. Statistically, you're going to ruin the sample size about what's most meaningful to you.” I became very nervous about this. They were both on my dissertation committee but both were hesitant to talk to my adviser about this because he was a very powerful guy. He was the director of the research station up in Jackson Hole. That was, I think, my first look at how strange politics can be in academia. I went to my advisor; his name was Ken. And I said, “I'm really upset about this. I've heard from other statisticians. They didn't want me to name them, but they told me that it's not a great idea to collect the eggs.” He looked at me in the eye and he said, "There's no way we're not going to collect all of those damn eggs.” He was insisting that I do something for this project that would have ended up with me shooting myself not only in the foot but in the head! I felt like I was going to do all of this research but none of it would be publishable, because of problems with sample size and what one could say 10 about variability within the population. It was going to be just awful from a scientific viewpoint. So I decided to quit. That was obviously a challenge to do. I had already been paid for a year and a half on this project, and it was exciting to be doing this research on the Snake River. I was getting paid at least as much as any doctoral student at the university, which of course, wasn't a lot then. However, I decided to stay there. I had thought about going elsewhere. But the one fellow who was the theoretical ecologist who was on my committee suggested that I could work with him on analyzing what were called patterns of variation in life history traits in mammals; things like mammalian reproductive traits, longevity traits, and mating system traits. I did three fairly huge theoretical analyses to look at these questions, and finished my thesis there. MK: Did you just go from one degree to the next or did you take some time? SZ: I took some time off. When I finished my undergraduate degree, I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to do. After working for a few months at a hardware store in Queens, I decided to become a secondary school biology teacher. While I was both working there and then another year doing student teaching in Manhattan, I finished a master's in science education degree at The City College of New York. Then after doing that, I taught for two years within the New York City public school system. I taught at a junior high school in Queens. After that, I taught biology at a high school in Queens; they were both interesting experiences. The junior high school was in a fairly rough neighborhood and there were two major ethnic groups there. There was a large population of Greek immigrants and there was also a sizable number of Puerto Ricans. They didn’t always get along well. 11 Occasionally I'd come home with blood on my clothing from breaking up fights. The good thing was that there were fantastic Greek bakeries with baklava and all these super rich desserts. My father was in a regular card game on Friday nights and one of his cronies was a Greek guy. When the card game was at our house in Queens—I was still living at home—I would bring home Greek pastries. That was a nice part of that experience; the breaking up of fights, not so much. The next year, I taught at a school named Aviation High School. It was a school where they trained aeronautic mechanics so obviously, most of the students weren't all of that interested in biology. It was a very militaristic school. Back then, it was only males, when public schools could still get away with that. They would have assemblies with the students in uniforms with shiny steel helmets marching into the auditorium for the Pledge of Allegiance and to sing the national anthem. The kids were carrying bayonets. It was a strange environment, but it was a very good school and the kids were super well-behaved. They all wanted to become aeronautic mechanics and work at Kennedy Airport or LaGuardia or Newark Airport. But after doing that for two years, I decided I wanted to go back to school and get a master's in biology or zoology. I know I use these terms like wildlife biology and zoology somewhat interchangeably; it depends on the name of your program and what the degree is. My degrees were always in zoology, but the program, at least for my master’s, was wildlife biology. After this master's degree I was hired as a visiting instructor at NC State. I stayed on there for two years before I went to the University of Wyoming to get my doctorate. Then they 12 wanted to hire me back as a visiting assistant professor at NC State. So I was there for two years before I came to Weber State. I really kept the moving companies in business. Another challenge all along was being far from my family. At first, it seemed like a great adventure just to move to North Carolina, 500 miles from New York City and then to move to Wyoming. I remember my mother would be on the phone and she said, “So when are you coming back to America?” She'd said that as a joke, as if to her, America was New York. [To Marina] Have you ever seen this cartoon on the cover of The New Yorker magazine where they show a typical New Yorker’s view of the United States? It's largely Manhattan and then a smaller part is New Jersey. Then there's briefly the Midwest, and the rest is just basically a pencil line. MK: That's pretty funny. SZ: Of course, a lot of people bought copies of that and framed it and put it on the wall, especially if they were from New York. It's a great magazine. Do you read The New Yorker? MK: I think I've seen articles. SZ: They have great literature. Seinfeld once made fun of The New Yorker cartoons saying that a lot of people don't get them but feel they have to laugh anyway. MK: I could see that. So you were working at a university before Weber, right? And then you came to Weber State? 13 SZ: Right. MK: What brought you to Weber State? SZ: Well, I was looking for a job at a university. This is what you call the Holy Grail: to get a job that's tenure track, where ultimately you don't have to be on soft money and it could turn into a permanent job. The job here appealed to me for a number of reasons. I was always interested in a job with a combination of teaching and research opportunities. If you go to a major university with many PhD programs, there aren't as many opportunities to teach what you want to teach or to teach as much as you would like to teach. So I liked that combination that Weber State offered in teaching and research. I really knew nothing about Weber State but I liked the location. When I was at the University of Wyoming, I once gave a paper in Salt Lake City. I was attracted to the idea of moving back out West after having lived in Wyoming for four years and then moving back to North Carolina for two years. I liked the idea of being back out West and being a wildlife biologist. Obviously, there are tremendous opportunities here for studying wildlife. There are so many of what you call “iconic species” in the West; so many large hooved mammals, and so many different species of middle-sized and small mammals. There's much more species diversity in the mammals out West than you have any place else in North America. I was very attracted to the landscape and to the types of things I could be studying as well. MK: Okay and when did you start at Weber State? 14 SZ: In 1984. MK: What was Weber State like when you first started? SZ: I think there are many ways one could describe it. It had more of a small college feel then than it does now. Of course, there were fewer students. I don't remember what the enrollment was like, but I'm guessing it was possibly something like half of what it is now. The buildings were all much older. But I thought the science building seemed more than adequate and had nice labs. There were very few graduate programs. There might have been two master's programs then. And I think one of them was in logistics, which doesn't even exist anymore. There wasn't even an MBA program, which is such a standard master's here now. So it was virtually entirely undergraduate back then. The focus back then was strongly on teaching. Faculty really didn't have that many research opportunities, particularly with students. There were a few faculty, maybe a couple in my department, two or three, who were doing research that involved students. But that was more of an exception than it was a rule. And it was certainly not expected to the degree that it is now in order for somebody to succeed here and in many departments, especially in the College of Science. The school was also, of course, named Weber State College then. And even though the name changed to university many years ago, I think that in a sense describes the difference because it had more of that small college, entirely undergraduate, feel. When it changed to Weber State University, things were really in transition. And of course, the name change didn't mean that the 15 university changed overnight. But over the years, I think it's evolved into having more of a university feel. And there's the perception that it's a university. Now, of course, there are many graduate programs, and there is more diversity in the university community. The word diversity is, you know, it's a funny word. And of course, it means very different things in biology, for example “species diversity” [insert comma] than it does in our culture. But I think there was a relatively low diversity in the nature of the faculty hires in my department. They only started really hiring from outside of the region with two individuals before I was hired. That was, Gloria Wurst, who I think is part of this series, and Carl Marti, who was an ecologist. I think that they were the only individuals before myself that were the subjects of regular national or international searches for faculty. From them and myself onward, virtually all of the hires have been from outside of the region. Almost all of the Zoology faculty when I was hired had their degrees from Utah State or the U and possibly the Y. Back then, there were even two faculty who were able to have full time tenured jobs in my department without having doctoral degrees. That's still the case in departments that don't require a doctorate as a terminal degree; that’s what's it like in the arts where they can be hired with an MFA. That would never occur now in the College of Science. Some departments were entirely from the local population and some are still very much like that. But it's hardly the case throughout the College of Science now that somebody who is from Utah or Idaho or Arizona would have the “inside track” on a job. 16 So the university was changing a lot back then. I think some of the senior administrators who were from outside the area also felt things really being in the process of changing back then. The expectation for more research wasn't always possible then because we didn't have separate lab spaces to a large extent. Some faculty did have research programs, but they were in the minority. So it was different in many ways. Sure, it was also much different than that 10 years before now as well. It will be interesting to see what it'll be like in 20 years. You'll send me a message! MK: We'll be like, "Dear Sam, this is what's changed." What positions have you held in your career? SZ: I think I've almost always been in education. As I mentioned, I was a visiting instructor and a visiting assistant professor at North Carolina State University. I was a high school and junior high school science teacher. I went up through the ranks here: assistant, associate, to full professor. I was department chair of Zoology for 25 years. So almost the entire time that I was on the faculty, I was the department chair of Zoology. I think that was one of the longest stints of anybody at the university or maybe even in the university's history. I think there may have been other people with about the same length of time as chair or possibly even longer, but I'm sure I'm one of the top five, let's say. I know another person who was in this interview series, Spencer Seager in Chemistry, would always say that if you decided that you wanted to run for chair again, you might fail the intelligence test. So I failed the intelligence test quite a few times. 17 I was also a Visiting Scholar at Cambridge University in England. I was also a Visiting Scholar for the Fulbright program at a university in Vienna called BOKU, which is an abbreviation for the German term that means University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences. I think that's about it. I've had titles in different organizations as well. I was an editor for the Journal of Wildlife Management and I've had some other similar experiences, but nothing else that I was getting paid for as part of my career. MK: Are there any professional organizations that you found out that you really enjoyed being a part of? SZ: Well, certainly Weber State. For many years, I was a member of the American Society of Mammalogists, people who study mammals. I really enjoyed being part of that organization and going to their meetings as well as the international group which the American society is part of. That would be like the International Mammalogical Congress. I attended a few of their meetings; I always liked interacting with other mammalogists and wildlife biologists. At a local level, I really liked being part of the Ogden Nature Center. I was on their board once and I think that they do fantastic work. Let's see if there are any others I can mention. Oh, right, I've been a member of the Small Carnivore Specialist Group of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, which is in Switzerland. I work with other biologists who are interested in small carnivores on their conservation. So that's another professional group that I've enjoyed being a part of. MK: Those are cool groups. 18 SZ: They have big names and they have fun words like carnivore. MK: Going back to the Zoology Department, how has the Zoology Department itself changed? SZ: One of the primary ways that I've alluded to is how they've changed to the group of people for whom doing research with students is regarded as important. It was previously regarded as, let's say, extra work or, work that you might do if you can fit it in. Beginning about in the 1990s or so, there were several of us in the College of Science especially, that made a concerted effort to have more and more… if not all of our faculty engaging students in research. When we began to do faculty searches, we would seek out people who had an interest in doing that. And so in addition to teaching, a fairly sizable group of us decided that this was going to be critical in the hiring of new faculty. We wanted people who were committed to undergraduate research activities. And one of the people whom we hired in my department is John Cavitt, who is the Director of Undergraduate Research here. MK: It rings a bell. SZ: His office is also in this building. He's a member of the Zoology Department. We hired him as an avian ecologist. John does a lot of work along the Great Salt Lake with shorebirds. And he's a fantastic ornithologist. He was one of those people who was very committed early on to involving students in research. He built a tremendous record in that area and has a tremendous profile in that area. In fact, he hosted the National Undergraduate Research Conference at Weber 19 State several years ago. I think he's helped to put Weber State on the map as a place where students feel that they can get research or scholarly experience with their faculty early on. So going back to my own history, remember that when I was at the State University of New York at Binghamton, I thought that was a really crucial part of my training. And I wanted to help to develop that at Weber State. And we did it...What's a good word? Assiduously. In the hiring of faculty, we wanted to make that a very strong part of our program. That's one way in which the department is very different now. At first we were just one of several departments in the College of Science and even in the university that was very strong in that area. It took a while, I think, for some of the other departments to catch on. But that's really now, if you want to use the “vision” word, that's the vision within the College of Science that this is really a part of what we do. So that's one way in which the department has changed profoundly. And I think that's terrific. Another way is our connection with area secondary school teachers. There's a lot of outreach now, and there was some of that back then, but there's much more of it now. Whether it's through the regional science fair or by people interacting both with teachers or people who are trained to become teachers, there's much more of that now. And that's, again, pervasive throughout the College of Science. I mentioned also the bit about diversity of the faculty. I'm sure it extends not only to the diversity of individuals in terms of where they're hired from, but there are many more women both in the department as well as within the College 20 of Science now. We also made that a very strong goal. And, of course, we're encouraged to do that and supported by the university in those hires. I think it's important that female students have female role models who[m] they could not only feel comfortable working with, but they can model themselves after those individuals and feel like a career as an ecologist, or a physician, or a veterinarian, or any one of the other things that you can do as a Zoology graduate is possible. You know that these are career avenues that are much more open to them now. And I think that's another major way. When I came here, Gloria Wurst was the only female in the department. I could go through now and count the number. But it's I think it's fairly equal to the number of males. MK: That's just really cool. SZ: Yeah, you know, I think that's happened also nationally as well. So it's not like we're so terribly unique, but, you know, it's certainly a way in which the department has changed over the years. I think those are the major ways. Oh, I thought of another one. Now, along with undergraduate research opportunities being much more of an expectation, the faculty have much better research spaces and research funding. When I was first hired here, there was almost none of what you would call startup money. Oftentimes at a university, when somebody in the sciences is hired, they'll say okay, you can have X number of dollars to get your lab going or your field studies going with a new microscope if you need one or some kind of an electro-shock device or if that's what you want. You can stun fish and count them in the streams, or a canoe or whatever it is that you feel that you might need. There was very little money for that kind of thing. Of 21 course, we're not anywhere near what somebody might be offered when they go to the University of Utah or another major PhD granting institution, but it's certainly sufficient to get going. We also made that a part of what we wanted to do with the chairs and the other senior faculty leaning on the deans to lean on the provost to say you need to find money for this. Of course, some of it down the road comes from grant support. And that's another way in which things are different. There's not a requirement or even a strong expectation that faculty develop external sources of funding. But there's so much more of that now. And so I think the whole research enterprise, whether it's money for lab facilities, the idea that you're going to do it with students, that's all very different now than what it was like in the 1980s, before you were both born. MK: What resistance or battles did you face as you progressed in your career? SZ: Well, I became chair very early on, even before I had tenure. I was only here for three years when I became department chair and that was scary because I wasn't really sure I wanted to do it because the department was very divided then. There were some of us who felt that we really needed a change. But that was only about half of us. The other half decided that they were happy with the guy who was the current chair. But again, about half of us, including myself and a faculty member who was hired the year after I was, were not all that excited about this fellow continuing on as chair. So everybody who was in the opposition said, “Well, why don't you do it? Why don't you do it?” And all of the senior faculty who were tenured knew better. And they said to my friend Gary, who was hired 22 the year after I was, why don't one of you do it? And Gary said to me, “Well, you're here one year longer, why don't you go for it?” And I thought, you know, it's kind of dangerous because I didn't have tenure. I'd be enraging half of the department, certainly the fellow who was chair. But I decided to go for it and I became chair even though we were split. Then that recommendation went to the dean who supported me, but this dean was on his way out anyway. He was a short timer at that point. And the fellow who was the Vice President at that time for Academic Affairs was the one who appointed me. And the fellow that had been chair was very unhappy with me. We still had the Christmas party at my house that year and his wife made him talk to me. So it was very tense. But then after, let's say, a couple of years, he and I became friends again. He was very nice to me when I was first hired. And so that made it harder for me to go up against him. In fact, he and his wife were wonderful to my wife when I was first hired. The place that we were renting wasn't ready yet, so they had us stay over there, and they had a big family with these amazing breakfasts every morning and it was just lovely. And so I think he felt resentful toward me that after all of this wonderful hospitality, I still ran against him for department chair. I think it was hard for him when I became department chair; he was pretty unhappy for a few years. But then we became very friendly. I think we had a nice relationship for decades before he sadly passed away a few years ago. So that was certainly a challenge. 23 I don't know if they were really any other major challenges. Of course, over the years, being department chair and trying to battle for my department and my colleagues, there were issues that came up, let's say, during faculty hires. Again, half of the department might think that we really had to hire one person and the other half might think we had to hire another person. So those were tough times. And I think for me as a department chair, the hardest times were always when I had to deal with a personnel issue. I think personnel issues for me were often difficult because you're dealing with people's lives and at the same time you have a responsibility to the students and the people you work with in the institution. Those are really the ones that are the most fun to talk about. But I don't know if I can because there might be legal issues, like there were some issues with students that were just crazy. AS: Did the pandemic ever become a hardship for you? SZ: Not for me, really, because I retired four years ago and I'm still teaching one course online. But I have been teaching it online since I retired. I developed it actually as an online course, as a general education course. The pandemic affected my course because when the testing centers closed I couldn't have my students go to the testing center safely anymore, even though they were still open for a little while. I changed the format to open book exams and of course, the students loved that. But I also felt more comfortable doing that as a safety issue. I think it affected me a little bit because some of the students, many more of the students than ever before, would talk to me about all of the other problems 24 that they were having emotionally. So I tried to be as sympathetic as I possibly could, doing whatever I felt I could do for them, knowing how miserable the time this has been for everybody. So, yeah, it has affected me, but not in an enormous way. I stopped being chair a few years before I retired. And I think if somebody said to me I had to teach face-to-face, I would invent some illness. Actually Weber State was, from what I've heard from everybody, very kind in that regard. And in working with chairs, faculty were allowed to do what they felt most comfortable with. Whereas at the U it wasn't that way. You may have heard that the faculty were told: “No, you're going to teach it this way—wear your mask and do it.” So that would be really difficult if you didn't feel comfortable. And of course, people in my age are in the most vulnerable bracket except for people who have chronic ailments of one sort or another. MK: Pre-pandemic, what did a typical semester look like for you? SZ: Well, it varied: both in the period before I became chair, then after I became chair, and then when I wasn't chair any longer. When I wasn't chair, I typically would teach at least two courses per semester. Courses like Animal Behavior at first and one of the introductory courses in Zoology, and have research activity going on with students. I also like to do my own writing, both with and without students, in terms of articles and books. Then once I became chair, which of course, was for many years, I would have a lighter teaching load. I would usually teach one, sometimes two courses. It depended on the semester and what the needs were, and then I spent a fair amount of my time working with faculty and students on advising issues, on 25 issues that they might have as far as their own aggravation, and also supervising a laboratory manager and supervising a secretary. There were lots of things that were involved in that. With the lab manager, that would involve purchasing lab supplies, going over the budget, all of this very exciting stuff. And with the secretary, she might have things to do, like work on exams or doing annual reports, doing Board of Regents reports, doing Northwest Accreditation reports. There's an awful lot of report writing, and it seems that that increased more and more over the years. So a typical day might involve meeting with one student after the next if they had concerns about almost anything, or with faculty, and with my secretary, and lab manager, and in trying to do my own personal professional work. After I stopped being chair, then it was back to the way it was with teaching and research and some committee work being my primary obligations. MK: And what committees were you a part of? SZ: I was... Let's see. I think I even wrote them down. You’ve got to make sure I don't miss any. Okay, I was on the Holocaust Commemoration Committee, I actually started the Holocaust Commemoration at Weber State, and then, of course, that had to become a committee. MK: Because everything does. SZ: Right. So I started that and I was the entire committee at first, and then other people became part of that committee. I was doing that for quite a few years. We 26 won a University Collaboration Award for that years after I stopped being part of it… that's probably why. I was also on the Faculty Senate for many years. As department chair, I almost automatically became involved in curricular issues. You know, I would be the last stop after curricular work would go through the departmental committee. Of course, I was on so many of what are called ranking tenure committees where I would be part of the decision making for people who are going up for tenure or promotion, both at the departmental level and on the College of Science level. And I also served on ranking tenure committees in other colleges: the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, and College of Health Professions. And I was on a committee in Arts and Humanities when they were trying to pick who their distinguished fellows would be. I was the president of Phi Kappa Phi, which is the university's honor society through the Honors Program. Let's see if I missed any really exciting committee assignments. Committee wise, externally, I was also involved with directing symposia at various times with different organizations. A couple of the ones I've listed in my résumé: I developed a symposium at the International Theriological Congress, which is a fancy word for the study of mammals. And I also developed one on wilderness issues for the American Association for the Advancement of Science. And then very early on here, I formed an event with Dr. Mike Vause, who you may know, who is in English, and a fellow who passed away named William McVaugh, who was Chair of Psychology many years ago. The three of us formed 27 the North American Interdisciplinary Wilderness Conference, and we brought in speakers from the humanities as well as the sciences to talk about various aspects of wilderness preservation. We published a book as a result of that with the University of Nevada Press. Then I published another book from this other meeting at the American Association for the Advancement of Science on wilderness with a previous dean Cy Mckell, who was the dean of the College of Science. So I tried to be involved, both at the university level as well as externally. I also mentioned that I was on the board of the Ogden Nature Center. So most of these organizations, as you can tell, have to do with science and education. There's a big surprise. Yeah, I hope I'm not putting you to sleep. MK: No, you are good. What was it like setting up the Holocaust Commemoration event? SZ: Well, I should go back in trying to describe my interest in this by saying that growing up, I never really paid much attention to it. It wasn't really something that was talked about much. I knew my father had freed the survivors in one of the major concentration camps when he was in the Army during World War II. I didn't know of any of my relatives who were left in Europe who died during the Holocaust. But then I subsequently found out when I was an adult that my mother's mother had a couple of sisters whom they never heard from again. Once the war was about halfway through, the assumption and belief was that they were either murdered by the Nazis outright as occurred with many of these massacres in little villages, where these villages were just wiped off the face of the earth, or that they were sent to the camps and died. 28 So I didn't have any real strong connection. Obviously, I knew about the Holocaust, as everybody does, even some congresswoman who has just found out about it. I think one of the lines was that, “Oh, she just like learned about something every third-grader in Washington knows when they visit the Holocaust Museum”. Then, when the Holocaust Museum opened up in Washington, which is part of the big Smithsonian complex, my wife felt that we should become members. So we became members and I was in Washington, D.C. for the seventy-fifth anniversary meetings of the American Society of Mammalogists. I had a free afternoon and I thought I'd go over there and the line was way around the block. But I had my membership card with me. So they let me in and I thought, okay, I'll check this place out. It's a brand new museum. It's gotten these amazing reviews. And to me, it was personally devastating. I was just totally horrified by what I had seen. And of course, I knew a lot about it. But I think one of the things that I remember clearly was this. They had this tower that went up several stories. And when you looked at it, you saw the names of all of these villages which were wiped off the face of the earth. And of course, each of them included anywhere from hundreds to many thousands of people. They were just obliterated from history. And so that, as well as knowing what went on in the camps, was just catastrophic. You know, it's kind of strange, isn't it? Because growing up Jewish in New York, you would think I would have a much greater sensitivity to this, but it really wasn't talked about. I think my dad, especially like a lot of other American GIs 29 who came back home, didn't want to talk about the war at all. And he had been through D-Day. He had been through the Battle of the Bulge, you know, where many soldiers lost their toes and their arms from frostbite. And he—did you ever watch “Band of Brothers”, did you ever see that Spielberg movie? It was with Spielberg and Tom Hanks. That was basically my father's experience. He was in almost all of those battles. And then knowing that he personally helped free members, not members, but victims of the camps, you would think that I would know more about it. But again, it wasn't really talked about. It wasn't really part of my experience growing up. And I think this was true even of Holocaust victims who came back, many who came back to the United States or moved elsewhere, that they just didn't want to talk about it. There was not this encouragement to process everything. And, you know, people didn't know what PTSD was. It was like you were shell shocked when you came home. And, of course, for the victims, many of them just suffered horribly throughout their whole lives. So anyway, after going to that museum, I thought we should really do something at Weber State. Nobody else had. I knew that there had been some Holocaust commemorations or events at other universities and I thought we should do that here. I didn't know how exactly to go about doing it. But I spoke with a History professor who has recently passed away, Dr. Richard Ulibarri. He was a very close friend and worked with Ann Millner, who was President, of course. I've known Ann for many years since way before she became president. Anyway, I went to Richard, who was not only a history professor, but he was the 30 Dean of Continuing Education. And I thought that this could be like the type of event which would be sponsored by this entity that reached out to the community. He had a very flexible budget for these types of activities. So that very first year, we hired a violinist to play music from that era. I think she was part of the Utah Symphony, but I can't recall for sure. And I knew the rabbi from the major congregation in Salt Lake and we got him to be a speaker. I don't think we had a Holocaust survivor speak at that one, but we did in subsequent years. It was a very low key thing that we did to show that Weber State was committed to remembering the atrocities and wanted to inform their students about this as a historical event. Of course, one not to be repeated. We did that, that first year on a fairly low key basis. Then, of course, a committee was formed. Step two, the committee is formed. That was really a very good thing at first. I remember there was a Dean of Education, David Greene who was working with area high schools, maybe Weber High School, certainly Ogden High School, and Ben Lomond, then maybe Bonneville. Together with Weber State students, we started an area march for tolerance that, of course, wasn't just about tolerating different ethnic or religious or racial groups, but about gender tolerance, etcetera. And so there was a march from the university to Ogden High. Then at the next one, there were Holocaust survivors speaking. And there were people in that community who I knew who were Holocaust survivors in Salt Lake. Then we were able to get, over the years, speakers who had great scholarly profiles in that area, who had written books. I remember one year there was a meeting of people who arranged these types of 31 things at different universities, and it was in Tampa, Florida, and I got to hear Elie Wiesel speak. Do you know who he is? He's written many books about his experiences in the camps. And he won the Nobel Peace Prize, or did he win the Nobel Prize for literature? MK: I think he did. I think it was peace. SZ: I think so, too. And I heard him speak at this conference; that was very moving. But then, you know, over the years, let's say several years, three or four years went by, and I felt it was time to turn over the leadership to somebody else. Barry Gomberg, who was the affirmative action attorney at Weber State, who retired about a year ago, took over some of the leadership of that. I don't really know what the status is now. I know they've had dance performances over the years. There was a showing of the documentary film that showed the looting by the Nazis of treasures from private collections, art treasures from private collections, and the great museums in Europe. There was a Hollywood movie about that, too, with George Clooney. MK: I know what you're talking about, but I can't remember. SZ: Something “men”. And that was about that, too. But there was also that great documentary made about it. So films were showed at these events. People came and spoke about other genocides, about the Armenians or the Native Americans. So the purpose really broadened from its original form, which was great. I mean, sadly, there's not a shortage of groups of people that haven't been persecuted. 32 MK: What year did the first commemoration happen, if you happen have that in your notes? SZ: Yeah, I might have that. Then again, I might not. Okay, I don't really know what to say. I know I have it someplace in my files at home but I don't know if I ever put it down on my résumé. MK: And if not, no worries. We can probably find it somewhere. SZ: Well, I think maybe we need to do that. MK: You've mentioned some of the topics that you've written on. Are there any other topics that you want to mention? SZ: Well, I've written mostly about the ecology and management of different mammals. I focused especially on raccoons. I've written a book about the natural history of raccoons, which was published in 2002 by Smithsonian Institution Press. And that was something I'm very happy with. It got great reviews. I gave a presentation on it at the Smithsonian. I also wrote a book about the mammals of this region called Mammals of the Intermountain West. In that case, I was really very lucky to work with Farrell Collett, who was one of the well-known art professors here. Farrell was close to 80 when I worked with him. And I was in my late 30s and we used his illustrations in the book. He both painted and drew with black and white ink many, many illustrations just for this book. You can see them now in Tracy Hall, the science building. Up in the Zoology area are where many of them are. That was great to work with him. 33 I also worked with many students on various species. Together with students, I've published work on mountain goats and on pygmy rabbits, which are the smallest rabbits on Earth and on various other species, including bats and various rodents. I've published articles and have written books on issues pertaining to mammalian ecology. The other field that I have published in, and edited a couple of books on, as I mentioned earlier, is on wilderness Issues in the West and North America in general. What else can I say about that? I'm also very interested in evolutionary biology, and I've published a couple of articles on evolutionary biology, such as the evolution of body size in mammals, and the evolution of mating systems in mammals which stemmed largely from my doctoral dissertation. Recently, one of the articles that I'm happiest with was an invited chapter in a book on the biology and conservation of a group of mammals that are called “musteloids”, which you haven’t heard of unless you're a zoologist. And even if you are a zoologist, you may have never heard of the term musteloids. But it's one of these terms that basically means a superfamily that's composed of members of the weasel family, which are the mustelids, and the raccoon family, the procyonids. And for this book, which was published by Oxford University Press in 2017, I published what I hope will be a very useful, comprehensive article on the management of the raccoon in North America. That's one of my more recent articles. Also...there's this great series which you may have seen in my résumé. It's in a journal called Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. The series is called 34 Frontiers EcoPics [See attached curriculum vitae]. You get to submit some photographs you've taken that can raise issues about puzzling things in ecology. Just recently, together with my colleague John Mull, in the Zoology Department, we've published a little article about the food habits of mouse lemurs. I've also published a few others recently in this series on Blue-Footed Boobies and on Canada Geese. At least I got some good goose pictures, which I was able to turn into an article now about one particular nest that was surrounded by a decaying elk skull. And it may have hidden the eggs better from predators. So, you know, I've worked on a variety of different species, but, virtually always along the lines of some question in biology. MK: The story about the skull is really cool. SZ: Skulls are always cool, especially on Halloween. MK: Yes. What recognition have you received for your accomplishments? SZ: Well, you know, I didn't get a watch when I retired. I know you're supposed to get a watch when you retire. You can leave that in there. MK: He wants his watch. SZ: Who wears a watch anymore? Right, you can look at your phone. I think I've been very lucky to get recognition for different accomplishments. Last year, in 2020, I received an honorary doctor of humanities degree from Weber State and I was very stunned and of course, happy when I received the call from President Mortensen that I was getting an honorary doctoral degree, which is the highest level of recognition from the university. 35 That was a very amazing graduation in the middle of the pandemic, as you might recall. And maybe you were there or you know people who were there. It was held on the on the football field with the graduates spaced out so that nobody could be near each other. I was up on the stage with a couple of the other honorary degree recipients, as well as members of the Board of Regents and so forth. And everybody had masks on. It was surreal. It was a beautiful summer evening, but it was very surreal. And as you may know, there were very few universities in the world that did anything like that. But fortunately, they pulled it off. And I don't think it was a super-spreader event. But that was back in the day when the term "super-spreader event" was very common and scary. It was back, of course, way before the vaccines became available. So that was a wonderful honor. And I'm very grateful to the president and the university for getting that award. A couple of others I think were really meaningful to me. One was I received an award for the outstanding graduate of the wildlife program in the Department of Zoology at North Carolina State University. That was a very strange event when I received that award. It was at this banquet at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds. As soon as the banquet was over, it was a lunchtime, an early afternoon affair, I went to my car. I was in a rental car, and the sky was a really weird color. It was kind of like a greenish purple, not a good sign. And the wind started to howl and it was like raining sideways. And I got on the road. I was going back to my daughter's house. My daughter, who lives in 36 Salt Lake now, was living in Chapel Hill, which is not too far from Raleigh where the state fairgrounds are. As I was driving on the highway from Raleigh to Chapel Hill, the wind was just outrageous. There were things that maybe are not the size of this desk, but definitely half the size of this desk blowing across the highway. And one of those emergency alerts came on the radio, you know. When you hear the radio starting to go [makes squawking sound] very loud, like pull off the road, look for shelter. I never heard this word before; it said “You are in a major tornadic episode”. I'm looking and there's nowhere to pull off there, just a few pine trees, which didn't look like they were very safe. So I just crawled along and cars were stopping in the middle of the highway. It was pretty crazy. It was even more surreal than the graduation. And fortunately, I was okay, but I think eight people were killed in Raleigh that day, in downtown Raleigh, and major trees were toppled everywhere. And there was a lot of destruction. So that was that event. I’ve received different awards at the university. I was very happy when the Holocaust Commemoration Committee received the Outstanding Collaboration Award. I was also very happy to be one of the first recipients, with Dr. Sessions and Dr. Oberg in Microbiology of the Presidential Distinguished Award. So I think I've just been very lucky to be recognized. It always feels good to be recognized. But then when you retire it's like, "Well, there it is." MK: How have you become a mentor to others in your field? 37 SZ: Well, obviously, in working with students, whether it's in teaching them or trying to give them career advice or having them do research with me and in working on projects together, I think you're mentoring them both formally and informally. You're mentoring them formally about how to answer a scientific question, but maybe informally in terms of how to pursue a project and working through obstacles. Certainly, given what I encountered, as I've mentioned, these challenges in getting my degrees, you can give some life advice about how to proceed in a career. And I think the longer you do it, maybe the better your advice can be because you've encountered so many more circumstances, whether it's an application to graduate school or medical school. In Zoology, we've been the primary participant in the College of Science's premedical program. So I've been able to give guidance to people applying to medical professional schools as well as graduate programs or teaching positions. And I think the same is probably true, but obviously in a different way. And being a mentor to faculty, let's say they're having a difficult time and going through the tenure process or promotion process or they find working with a certain student to be very challenging. I think you can always give advice about what's going to work, what they need to be careful about in terms of liability issues so that they don’t end up in the penitentiary. I'll tell you some of these stories some other time when the cameras are off. Some are just outrageous. Those would be the really fun ones to talk about. You know, the ones that incur great legal risk. So I think in working with students and faculty and staff, you could be a mentor. I've had staff… obviously I've 38 mentioned this before, who've had some personal issues or maybe they've gotten themselves in hot water because they didn't approach things in the way that they should have or maybe they've been challenged in working with a particular faculty member. The staff positions at Weber State are very interesting in some of the departments, you know. We know how let's say a secretary may do work for eight people, or 15 people, or a lab manager in the College of Science, or a staff person. Maybe there's someone in archaeology who is helping out Dr. Arkush or one of the other archaeologists with their materials. They might be working with a handful of individuals, but the chair is their supervisor. And so maybe some of them feel that they're being mistreated or that the person is not sensitive to what their time needs are or the way in which they are operating. Otherwise, as you know, as a department chair, you have to be the go-between and you have to mentor the person as to what they can say or shouldn't say, because it can be an intimidating position for somebody who is a lab manager, responding to a dozen different individuals and taking orders from a dozen different individuals and learning how to prioritize. So I think there's some mentoring in that as well when I was chair. MK: What advice would you give to students starting in your field? SZ: I think it depends because there are so many different fields that students can go into starting out in zoology. I mean, the obvious one is that if they're going to succeed in school, they have to be very serious about their studies. And that just goes with the course. Anybody would say that to any student entering college. You need to be serious about your studies. If you want to succeed in a particular 39 field, really interact. But let's say they want to become a wildlife biologist or a zoologist, you certainly should be in a position to tell them about what graduate degrees are available and what they might expect if they go on to a graduate degree, in your field and in different states in the country. Fortunately, now we have such a broadly trained group of individuals in Zoology that we can pretty much tell them, if you go to a graduate program in Michigan or in California or in Texas, you might expect this, that, or the other thing. And we know of individuals who they can train with. I think the most important thing to tell a student going into a field like ecology or wildlife biology is that they have to be persistent, that jobs are so hard to get in some of these fields. That if they don't get the exact job that they're interested in, even when they finish their master's, they need to know that if they're persistent, the odds are great that they will get what they're looking for. But it might involve moving. As I mentioned, a lot of students, especially given what I've observed in Utah, don't want to move. We had a fabulous student within the last couple of years I was here who could have gone anywhere. I think she could have gone to some of the Ivy League schools that have programs in ecology like Yale or the University of Chicago—which is not really Ivy League, but it's excellent in that field. She could have gone there. She just had great credentials and she was brilliant and hardworking. She just wanted to go…not that it's a bad program, but she just wanted to go to Utah State. So I know that's one of you. Are you there? Right. You're at the U? MK: I'm actually at San Jose State University. 40 SZ: Oh yeah. That's good I only insulted one of you. Yes. But, you know, I think people need to be flexible if they're going to get a fulfilling job and a career where there are few jobs. I think the same thing is true for many fields that are very glamorous sounding, but there's not that much available, like in archaeology. And yet you know, the fun one that everybody talks about is, "I want to be a marine biologist." even if they're at a university in Kansas, they want to be a marine biologist. Well, if you're great and you're persistent, chances are you'll find something. But it might involve some flexibility as well as hard work. I think the other large group of people that we have as students coming through our program are those interested in medical professions. And there's a premedical advisor for that who can give very good guidance. But again, I think one thing I would say to anybody, including you two, is that you really just should follow your dreams. And I think, obviously there are practical considerations that come up. But what I've learned and I've observed in the people who are happiest in their careers are that if you do what you're really passionate about, and hopefully you can find something that you're passionate about, you'll succeed because it's so much more meaningful to you. So these are you know, they're aphorisms that you'll hear from almost anybody. Well, what is the thing we used to say in high school? It's like a profound grasp of the obvious. You've heard of that? MK: I've never heard of that before. SZ: But you could say when people say, “What was this talk like with Zeveloff?" You could say, "Well, he was really good at a profound grasp of the obvious." There you go. That's my special thing. Or jumping to conclusions is the other one. 41 MK: Alright. Are there any other memories of Weber State that you want to share or favorite memories? SZ: I just think that I was very lucky to end up at a place that was very well suited to my dual interests in teaching and research. And I think my favorite memories are those involving the colleagues and friends that I've met over the years. I'm still, as you can imagine, friendly with several of my colleagues. Next week, we're supposed to go to a retired department chair of Botany's house for Canada Day; he's originally from Canada. And there's just so many great people here. I think that early on I was lucky, you might have seen it in my résumé right before I became department chair [See attached curriculum vitae]. I was only here for a couple of years when I became the intern for Academic Affairs with the guy who was vice president then. In those very early years here, especially through that position, I got to meet people throughout the university, including, of course, this fellow and his wife and then through, what we call dinner groups, I met people from throughout the community and university. So there are just so many very amazingly talented people at the university. It's been fantastic to interact with them. So I think my greatest memories at Weber State involve becoming friendly with and interacting with so many really fine individuals who are very interesting, who have fantastic talents. You know, some of the people we mentioned, in History, they're like really world class people. I think in the College of Social Sciences, the level of people you have is comparable to that in the best universities in the country. It is just astounding. Part of it, of course, is a reflection 42 of the job market. But, you know, when I've been on those tenure committees, I got to see where these people received their degrees and the books that they published. You know, Susan Matt has been on national and international radio shows with her work on envy and homesickness. There are such great people here that I think my best memories of Weber State are really the human interactions. You can love a building only so much. Some people love them plenty, and those are architects. MK: Is there anything else that you want to talk about before we wrap up here? SZ: I don't think so. Can we redo this whole thing? MK: You want to redo the interview? SZ: No, I'm fine. I'm kidding. No, I think it's great to have been able to be a professor. You get to explore your own interests. You get to work with great people. You feel that you can have a meaningful impact on students’ lives. And I think I'm just very lucky. So, you know, I'm lucky I had a great childhood and I'm lucky to have met you two. MK: Well, thank you. 43 CURRICULUM VITAE SAMUEL I. ZEVELOFF Department of Zoology Weber State University Ogden, Utah 84408-2505 USA EDUCATION University of Wyoming Zoology Ph.D. 1982 Thesis: Patterns in mating systems, body size, and species diversity of mammals North Carolina State University Wildlife Biology M.S. Thesis: Age and weight characters of raccoons in North Carolina 1976 The City College (NY) Science Education M.S.Ed. 1973 S.U.N.Y. at Binghamton Science and Mathematics B.A. 1972 EMPLOYMENT 2017-Present Presidential Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Zoology, Weber State University 2012-17 Presidential Distinguished Professor of Zoology, Weber State University (title since 2006) 1987-2012 Chair and Professor, Department of Zoology, Weber State University 1984-91 Assistant, Associate Professor, Department of Zoology, Weber State University 1982-84 Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Zoology, North Carolina State University 1982 Instructor, Department of Zoology and Physiology, University of Wyoming 1976-78 Instructor, Department of Zoology, North Carolina State University 1972-74 Biology Teacher, New York City public school system ADMINISTRATION Chair – Department of Zoology, Weber State University (1987–2012): Administered personnel and salary decisions. Managed budgets and facilities. Fund-raising. Other Administrative Activities Assisted in establishing an academic exchange with the Universidad Autónoma de Nayarit in Tepic, Mexico (2010). President, Executive Board—North Carolina State University and N.C. chapters of The Wildlife Society. Founded state chapter (1982-84). Science Advisor for eco-regional planning, Wild Utah: The Wildlands Project (2001-04). Small Carnivore Specialist Group; Species Survival Commission of IUCN—The World Conservation Union, Gland, Switzerland (2004-present). Conservation of Land Mammals Committee (American Society of Mammalogists). Editing and Reviewing 1995-97 Associate Editor for Book Reviews—Journal of Wildlife Management. 1981-Present Reviewer: e.g., Journal of Mammalogy, Journal of Wildlife Management, Journal of Zoology (London), Smithsonian Institution Press, National Science Foundation, U.S. Fulbright Program. Meeting Organization 2008 “Innovative Practices in Mammalogy Education” symposium, International Mammalogical Congress, Mendoza, Argentina. 1997 "Evolution of the Procyonidae" symposium, International Theriological Congress, Acapulco, Mexico. 1990 "Arid Lands: Wilderness or Wasteland?" symposium, American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting, New Orleans. 1988-91 North American Interdisciplinary Wilderness Conference. Weber State University, Ogden, Utah. 1984 Guild of Rocky Mountain Population Biologists. Ogden Valley, Utah RESEARCH INTERESTS Mammalian ecology and conservation biology. TEACHING EXPERIENCE 1976-Present Weber State University, North Carolina State University, and University of Wyoming. Courses: e.g., Conservation Biology, Mammalogy, Evolution, and general education, graduate-level courses, and seminars. Weber State University’s Honors Program, e.g., taught "Nature and Art" with art historian, th focusing on science and culture in late 19 century Europe. 1972-74 General Science, Biology: New York City secondary schools. HONORS 2018 H. Aldous Dixon Faculty Award, Alumni Association, Weber State University. 2017 Presidential Award, Crystal Crest Awards, Weber State University. 2014-15 Fulbright Scholar, U.S. State Department. Teaching and research appointment in mammalian conservation at the Institute of Wildlife Biology and Game Management, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna, Austria. 2011 Outstanding Alumnus Award: North Carolina State University Fisheries and Wildlife Alumni Association. 2008 Nye Cortez Professor of the Year, Weber State University Honors Program. 2006 Presidential Distinguished Professor Award, Weber State University—one of three inaugural recipients. 2005 Exemplary Collaboration Award, Weber State University, for initiating institution’s Holocaust Commemoration. 2000 Spencer L. Seager Teaching Award, Weber State University, for outstanding teaching in the College of Science. 1993 John S. Hinckley Fellow Award, Weber State University, for excellence in teaching, scholarship, and service—highest faculty honor at that time. 1991 Visiting Scholar (invited) - Large Animal Research Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, England. GRANTS 2010-11 Utah Division of Wildlife Resources ($11,000): "Population and Habitat Ecology of Pygmy Rabbits in Northeastern Utah." 1994 British Council of the British Embassy ($2,000) to investigate exchange programs with University of Sheffield and University of Aberdeen. 1985 National Science Foundation ($60,000): "Instrumentation for a Behavioral Ecology Laboratory Program." 1979 University of Wyoming—National Park Service Research Center ($10,000): Canada Goose ecology. SOCIETIES American Society of Mammalogists The Linnean Society of London Phi Kappa Phi (Weber State University President - 1996-97) PUBLICATIONS (Peer Reviewed) Books 2002 Raccoons, A Natural History. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C. 200 pages. Comprehensive volume on the raccoon's biology, management, and cultural significance. Described as, "sure to become the standard work on this wide-ranging species." 1992 Wilderness Tapestry: An Eclectic Approach to Preservation. University of Nevada Press, Reno. 306 pages; includes chapter "A multidimensional mandate for wilderness preservation." Senior book editor and chapter author to L.M. Vause and W.H. McVaugh. 1992 Wilderness Issues in the Arid Lands of the Western United States. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque. 145 pages; includes chapter "Arid land wilderness issues." Senior book editor and chapter author to C.M. McKell. 1988 Mammals of the Intermountain West. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City. 365 pages. Reviewers' remarks include "deserves to be owned and read by everyone appreciating mammalian wildlife in the Intermountain West." Articles 2018 The legendary masked bandit. Natural History, October issue “Endpaper”: 48. 2018 A grim spot for a goose nest? Frontiers EcoPics, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 16:353. 2018 The Trickster 'Howling the Original American Anthem' - A Conversation with Dan Flores. Weber: The Contemporary West 34 (2) (Spring/Summer issue): 37-49. 2018 Environmental drivers of raccoon (Procyon lotor L.) occurrences in Austria - established versus newly invaded regions. Archives of Biological Sciences (Serbia). 70(1): 41-53. With T. Duscher (senior author), F-U. Michler, and U. Nopp-Mayr. 2017 On the mortality and management of a ubiquitous musteloid: the common raccoon. Pp. 503-514. In D. Macdonald, L. Harrington, and C. Newman, editors. Biology and Conservation of Musteloids, Oxford University Press, England. Invited chapter. 2016 Unique loss of cheek teeth and subsequent ossification in a mountain goat (Oreamnos americanus). Mammalia 80(4): 441-443. Senior author to C.R. Schulze. 2014 Population and habitat ecology of the pygmy rabbit in northeastern Utah. Western North American Naturalist 74(4): 456-466. With J.M. Schmalz, B Wachocki, M.Wright, and M. Skopec. 2011 A conversation with Ian Tattersall. Weber: The Contemporary West. With H. Cox and S. Geary, senior authors. Fall 2011 issue: 25-37. 2010 A ground-based paintball mark re-sight survey of mountain goats. Proceedings of the Sixteenth Biennial Symposium: Northern Wild Sheep and Goat Conference. Pages 6877. With C. Schulze and R. F. Schulze, senior authors. 2010 The effect of cheatgrass on deer mouse abundance. Ergo (Weber State University Undergraduate Research Journal) 4: 87-97. With L.K. Hall, senior author. 2010 On Wolves, Wildlife, and Weather: A Conversation with Douglas W. Smith. In The Stewardship of Public Lands: A Handbook for Educators. N.S. Cole, ed. American Democracy Project, American Association of State Colleges and Universities, Washington, D.C. (Also in Weber: The Contemporary West.) Senior author to B. Bartosz and K. Gurr. 2003 A review of the taxonomic and conservation statuses of the island raccoons. Small Carnivore Conservation 2: 10-12. 1998 Book Review: "The Handicap Principle" by A. and A. Zahavi. The Auk 115(2): 544-546. 1994 Preserving the Great Basin. Invited Preface for "A Trace of Desert Waters" by S. Houghton. University of Nevada Press, Reno. 1991 Reproductive strategies: r strategy and K strategy. In Magill's Surveys of Science, Life Science: 2339-2345. Salem Press, Pasadena, CA. 1991 The sociobiology of menopause: Implications from parental investment and concealment of ovulation theories. Pp. 353-371 in A.M. Voda and R. Conover (eds.), Proceedings of the Eighth Conference of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research, Scottsdale, AZ. Senior author to R. Conover. 1989 Why do human females conceal their ovulation?: The arguments and a resolution. Pp. 21-38 in R. Holt and R. Conover (eds.), Great Debates and Ethical Issues. Weber State College Press, Ogden, UT. 1988 1987 Body size patterns in North American mammal faunas. Pp. 123-146 in M.S. Boyce (ed.), Evolution of Life Histories of Mammals, Theory and Pattern. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT. Senior author to M.S. Boyce. Human infants redux. Human Evolution 2(5):475-476. Senior author to M.S. Boyce. 1986 Maternal investment in mammals. Nature 321(6069):537. Senior author to M.S. Boyce. 1985 Seasonal weight changes in raccoons (Carnivora: Procyonidae) of North Carolina. Brimleyana 11:63-67. Senior author to P.D. Doerr. 1984 Book Review: "Growing Young" by Ashley Montagu. Journal of Social and Biological Structures 7(2):185-186. 1983 Contamination of roe deer forage in a polluted forest of southern Poland. Environmental Pollution, A, 30:257-276. Junior author to K. Grodzinska and W. Grodzinski. 1983 Island biogeographic considerations for pocosin wildlife conservation. Journal of the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society 99(3):69-77. 1982 Why human neonates are so altricial. The American Naturalist 120(4):537-542. Senior author to M.S. Boyce. 1981 Reproduction of raccoons in North Carolina. Journal of the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society 97(3):194-199. Senior author to P.D. Doerr. 1980 Ponderosa pine bird communities. Pp. 170-197. In R. M. DeGraaf (tech. ed.), Proceedings of the Workshop on the Management of Western Forests and Grasslands for Nongame Birds. U.S.D.A. Forest Service General Technical Report INT-86. Junior author to K. L. Diem. 1980 Parental investment and mating systems in mammals. Evolution 34(5):973-982. Senior author to M.S. Boyce. TECHNICAL REPORTS, POPULAR ARTICLES, RELATED ITEMS 2018 “Wildlife and Landscapes”. Retrospective Photography Exhibit, Stewart Library, Weber State University, and Weber Country Library, UT. 2017 Weber State, home of the Wildcats, not the wild cats. Guest Commentary, Standard Examiner, Ogden UT. September 25, 2017. 2017 In Ogden, idle threats from the UTA. Guest Commentary, Standard Examiner, Ogden UT August 24, 2017. 2015 Unexpected impacts - Wildlife biology from Utah in Vienna impacts on snow leopards in Tajikistan. Fulbright Newsletter, Austrian-American Educational Commission 10:7. 2014 Principal consultant for mammals for National Geographic book "Illustrated Guide to Wildlife." 2014 Photographs of Galapagos sea lion, eastern brown mouse lemur, diademed sifaka, and indri selected for Mammal Image Library, American Society of Mammalogists. 2012 Interview on dormancy for "Science Fridays", Utah Education Network; for series of discussions paired with films to raise awareness about science concepts and careers. 2010-13 Consultant on Canadian and Japanese films on the raccoon. 2009-Present Interviewed and quoted by numerous media sources about raccoons: e.g., Business Insider, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, earthtouchnews.com, msn.com, New York Post, New York Times, Outdoor Life, refinery29.com, and Slate. 2008 Consultant with Humane Society of America on rehabilitation of raccoons in the Florida Keys. 2007 Organized and provided database on bat specimens in Weber State University’s collection to Utah Division of Wildlife Resources for use in Utah Natural Heritage Program. 2003 Participant in National Science Foundation – Research Experiences for Undergraduates award: “The Biology of the Great Salt Lake.” Worked with student from University of Idaho on mesocarnivore abundance and distribution along the Great Salt Lake. 2000 Featured as the "raccoon expert" on www.discovery.com "Creature of the Week" series. 1996 Why species become threatened or endangered: A mammalogist's perspective. American Society of Mammalogists report. 1996 More cougar killings may hurt state wildlife. Another View column, Standard-Examiner newspaper. Sept. 6, 1996: 6a. Revised version also published in Intermountain Fish and Game News. 1995 Wilderness as a harbor of biodiversity. Salt Lake City magazine Nov/Dec:46-47. 1992 The role of research at a metropolitan university. Pp. 72-76 in The Inauguration of a Metropolitan University. Weber State University Press. 1986 Hamsters teach students about parental care. W.S.U. Instructional Development Newsletter. 1983 Islands for wildlife. Colorado Outdoors 32(4):40-43. Senior author to D.G. Krementz. 1978-79 Population study of Canada Geese of Jackson Hole. University of Wyoming-National Park Service Research Center Annual Report. 2:57-61; 3:54-59. REPRESENTATIVE PRESENTATIONS AND MEETINGS 2017 A retrospective perspective. Invited presentation, Department of Zoology, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. 2015 Natural history of common mammalian predators. Invited presentation at Biology and Management of Shorebirds and Colonial Nesting Waterbirds of Utah's Wetlands meeting, Utah Division of Natural Resources, Salt Lake City. September 2015 2015 The molding of inspirational behavior in the shadows of the Wasatch Range. Invited presentation at the Ogden Nature Center, Utah, June 2015. Published as guest commentary in Standard Examiner, Ogden, UT. October 6, 2015. 2015 The raccoon: a natural history and an unnatural future. Invited public lecture at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences (BOKU), Vienna, Austria. 2014 Mortality and diseases of raccoons. Invited presentation at “Wildlife Disease Lecture Event” at Vienna, Austria’s University of Veterinary Medicine. Student chapter of European Wildlife Diseases Association. 2014 Bat community composition in northern Utah. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Project Leaders meeting, Region 6. June, 2014 at Weber State University, Ogden, UT. (With K. Behunin, C. Cothran, and A. Brewerton). Also presented at 10th Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium and Celebration, Spring 2014. Abstract p.48. 2014 Save the Ringtails. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Project Leaders meeting, Region 6. June, 2014 at Weber State University, Ogden, UT. (With J. Arnt). 2014 Greater Yellowstone ecosystem landscape conservation. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Project Leaders meeting, Region 6. June, 2014 at Weber State University, Ogden, UT. (With J. deJong, C. Lansford, K. Poulter, and M. Richards). 2012 Comparative vegetation survey of active-, abandoned-, and non-burrow sites of the th pygmy rabbit in northeastern Utah. 17 Wildland Shrub Symposium: Humans in Changing Landscapes, Las Cruces, NM. (With J. Schmalz, student–senior author, J. Hyde, B. Wachocki, M. Skopec, and M. Wright). 2012 Effects of human development and recreation on nest occupancy and breeding in a population of Flammulated Owls (Otus flammeolus) in Snowbasin, Utah. National Conference on Undergraduate Research, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. (A.L. Earley, student – senior author, and M. Mika). 2011 Habitat ecology of the pygmy rabbit in northeastern Utah. American Society of Mammalogists meeting, Portland, OR. (J. Schmalz,–senior author, B. Wachocki, and M. Wright). 2010 Civic engagement and mammalogy education. Annual Meeting of the American Society of Mammalogists, Laramie, WY. Abstracts: 46. 2010 The Galapagos, A Natural History. Invited presentation: Brigham City Library, UT. 2010 Strengthening conservation efforts through international research and service exchanges Weber State University and Universidad Autónoma de Nayarit – A Linking Communities partnership. Great Salt Lake Issues Forum, Salt Lake City, UT. With M.S. Linford, J.F. Cavitt, and J.P. Ramirez-Silva. 2009 Darwin, Darwinism, and Teaching Science in the 21st Century. Cultural Affairs, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. 2009 Sexual Selection: Two Hundred Years of Darwin. Department of Psychology, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. 2009 Civic engagement exercises for mammalogy term projects. 10th International Mammalogical Congress, Mendoza, Argentina. 2009 Visions of Madagascar. Lectures: Honors Program Banquet and Sigma Xi Chapter, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. 2007 Mesozoic Mammals. Invited Address: Phi Kappa Phi banquet, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. 2006 Participant: Workshop on politics and management of natural resources, Yellowstone National Park. Course offered by American Association of State Colleges and Universities’ American Democracy Project to develop civic engagement activities in universities. 2005 The Feasibility of River Otter Reintroduction Into Northern Utah (U.S.A.) Drainages. International Mammalogical Congress 9, Sapporo Japan. Abstracts of presentations: 114. Co-author with W. West (undergraduate student) and A. Kozlowski. 2003 Raccoons, A Natural History. Invited lectures: National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C.; Friends of the Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. 1998 Geographic Body Size Variation in North American Shrews. Invited presentation, EuroAmerican Mammal Congress, Santiago de Compostela, Spain. Abstracts:144. 1997 Significant Issues in the Evolution of the Procyonidae. Seventh International Theriological Congress, Acapulco, Mexico. Abstracts of Papers and Posters, Seventh ITC: 395. 1994 Utah Wilderness and the Conservation of Mammalian Biodiversity. American Society of Mammalogists meeting, Washington, D.C. 1992 Chair, Conservation Biology session: American Society of Mammalogists meeting; Salt Lake City, Utah. 1989 Climatic effects on mammalian predator-prey ratios. Invited presentation, Fifth International Theriological Congress, Rome, Italy. Abstracts of Papers and Posters, Fifth ITC:857. 1985 Late winter feeding habits of mule deer in northern Utah. Encyclia, the Journal of the Utah Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 62: 233. Senior author to C. Bruch. 1985 Body size patterns in North American mammal faunas. Invited presentation, Fourth International Theriological Congress, Edmonton, Canada. Abstracts of Papers and Posters, Fourth ITC:0684. Senior author to M.S. Boyce. 1982-91 Environmental variability and the structure of North American mammal faunas. Invited seminars: e.g., University of Nevada, Reno; Oxford Brookes University, England. 1984-87 Parental investment and mating systems in mammals. Invited seminars: University of North Carolina at Wilmington; Bowdoin College; Northern Illinois University; Utah State University. STUDENT RESEARCH AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT ACTIVITIES: RECENT EXAMPLES 2015 Collaboration with secondary school teachers on eMammal, international citizen science image sharing project administered by North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, Raleigh, NC. 2013-Present Development of Save the Ringtails: a student-based philanthropy organization. Group committed to conservation of species in the raccoon family Procyonidae. Generated >$2,500 for partnering conservation organizations (www.savetheringtails.org) Bat community composition in northern Utah. Support from Utah Division of Wildlife Resources. 2013 2012 Collaboration with Weber State University Department of Visual Arts to raise awareness and support for elephant conservation. Sale of student art posters raised >$900 for Save the Elephants. http://www.weber.edu/wsuimages/drsamzeveloff/ElephantProjectPosters.pdf 2012 Partnership with Weber State University Department of Visual Arts to raise awareness and support for rhinoceros conservation. Art auction raised >$700 for International Rhino Foundation. 2010-Present Population ecology of pygmy rabbits in northeastern Utah. Resulted in presentation at national meeting. Support from Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, U.S. Bureau of Land Management. 2007-08 Population analysis of mountain goats. Resulted in peer-reviewed publication and presentation at international meeting. Support from Utah Division of Wildlife Resources. 2006 The effect of energy development on Sage Grouse in the western United States. Presentation: Third Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium & Celebration, Weber State University, Ogden, UT:42. With Rebekkah Downard. 2004 Divergence within the raccoon family Procyonidae using mitochondrial DNA sequences. Poster presentation. First Undergraduate Research Symposium & Celebration, Weber State University, Ogden, UT: 39. With M. Nebeker and J.B. Clark. 6