Record Unit 9616

Interview 1: May 27, 2003

Interview of Stanley H. Weitzman by Susan L. Jewett, David G. Smith, and Inci Altug Bowman covers his youth, education, marriage to Marilyn Jean Sohner, and career at the Division of Fishes, National Museum of Natural History.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 2: May 29, 2003

Interview of Stanley H. Weitzman by Susan L. Jewett, David G. Smith, and Inci Altug Bowman continues his discussion of his career at the Division of Fishes, NMNH, and contributions of his wife, Marilyn J. S. Weitzman.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 3: June 3, 2003

Interview of Marilyn Jean Sohner Weitzman by Susan L. Jewett, David G. Smith, and Inci Altug Bowman discusses her youth, education, marriage to Stanley H. Weitzman, early career in landscape architecture and transition to working on fishes at the NMNH, especially pencilfish.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 4: July 26, 2003

Interview of Victor G. Springer by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman discusses his family history, youth, education, career at the NMNH and role in professional societies.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 01:51:28 hours.

Interview 5: February 10, 2004

Interview of Bruce B. Collette by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman, covers his childhood in Panama, Florida and Long Island, New York; interest in collecting small animals, influence of Long Island Science Congress, high school projects, and going to Cornell University as an undergraduate, meeting Sara, his future wife, and work on darters and tunas; his major professor Ed Raney, teaching assistantship and fellow graduate students at Cornell; interest in herpetology and then ichthyology; marriage to Sara, honeymoon in Higgins Lake, Michigan, as he attends the first American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists meeting; accepting position at the National Systematics Laboratory at the Smithsonian in 1960.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 02:11:08 hours.

Interview 6: February 12, 2004

Interview of Bruce B. Collette by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman discusses his sabbatical year in Sydney, Australia; various expeditions in the region, including Great Barrier Reef and Papua New Guinea; return from Australia; his immediate family, Sara and three daughters; account of early field trips and expeditions, beginning in 1952 and continuing through the early 1960s; continues with expeditions, covering a period of thirty years, such as his experiences on the French ship La Rafale, Gulf of Guinea; Anton Bruun, Chile and Peru; USSR-USA cooperative survey, Miami and Bermuda; Oregon II, French Guiana and northern Brazil; Russian vessel Vityaz, Mozambique and Madagascar; Albatross IV and Delaware II, northeastern US, and others.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 02:00:25 hours.

Interview 7: February 18, 2004

Interview of Bruce B. Collette by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman focuses on teaching experiences at Northeastern University, Nahant, Massachusetts; Bermuda Biological Station, Bermuda; and Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) at the College of William and Mary, as well as influence of teaching on his research and publications, in particular textbook, Diversity of Fishes (1997), and the work of his graduate students and summer interns; the book, The Fishes of Bermuda (1999). He then reviews his work as editor of scientific journals, Fishery Bulletin, Copeia, Voprosy Ikhtiologii, and others. Relations between the National Systematics Lab (National Marine Fisheries Service) and the NMNH, including the Fish Division; and the attempt to close down the National Systematics Lab in 1981.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 02:11:27 hours.

Interview 8: February 19, 2004

Interview of Bruce B. Collette by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman he reflects on the advantages of working in a museum (with a major collection of fishes), interaction with colleagues in other fields, and significant research papers, as well as mentors and influential colleagues at Cornell and the Smithsonian; his 50-year long affiliation with the ASIH, various positions he held in the organization; how the ASIH and the field of ichthyology have changed during his long career as a government scientist; ending with his personal interests, the horse farm in Virginia where he lives, and his international beer bottle collection.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 02:36:45 hours.

Interview 9: June 15, 2004

Interview of Susan L. Jewett by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman begins with her early childhood in Albertson, New York; interest in biology, especially in marine life; influence of science teachers and college work at the University of Louisville, Kentucky. Discusses graduate school at Louisville and marriage to Charlie Karnella; getting the job in the Fish Division, Smithsonian Institution, as a technician; recollections of curatorial and support staff, and loan and acquisition procedures in the 1970s and 1980s; outreach activities as a Collection Manager; discovery of a Coelacanth caught in Indonesia, contact with Mark Erdmann, and trip to Indonesia to preserve the fish; trip to South Africa to attend a conference on Coelacanth and interview with Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer; professional involvement in the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists (ASIH), 1945-1980s.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 02:36:45 hours.

Interview 10: June 17, 2004

Interview of Susan L. Jewett by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman continues with field trips to Fundo Masaguaral Nature Reserve in Venezuela; Tambopata Reserve in Peru; coastal rivers of Bahia, and the Amazon in Brazil; and north coast of Cuba; experiences and reactions to a woman field assistant in the late 1970s; interest in dancing, and marriage to Tren Haselton. She then covers the move of the Fish Collection to the Museum Support Center, and the care of the wet specimens in jars; preservatives used, and labeling and shelving specimens. Involvement in various NMNH and Smithsonian committees (e.g. Advisory Committee on implementation of McKinsey & Co., NMNH liaison to McKinsey & Co., Committee to revise GS-1016, Search Committee for NMNH Director, and NMNH Collections Committee.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 11: June 22, 2004

Interview of Susan L. Jewett by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman covers more on the collections in the Fish Division (osteo collection, cleared and stained specimens, fish models), story about the old Keleket X-ray machine; involvement in women’s issues and activities relating to the SI Women’s Council, establishment of the first Day Care Center, and Women in Museums Network, and closes with her retirement and plans for the future.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 1 hour.

Interview 12: October 26, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman begins with his early childhood and family background; first childhood memories, the death of father and burial in Arlington National Cemetery; growing up in Ottawa, Kansas, grandparents, stories of Wild West heard from great uncle; moving to Washington, DC, and memories of living near Catholic University and in Georgetown; attending school in Washington, early interests in nature, part time jobs, getting polio and recovery, and decision to go to George Washington University. He then turns to getting a job (GS-1) at the Fish Division, United States National Museum, while a junior in college; Fish Division staff, working with Giles Mead, his first expedition in the Gulf of Mexico; and decision to go to Stanford University for his Ph.D.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 13: October 28, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman opens with first impressions of Stanford University, graduate students he knew there, Stanley H. “Stan? Weitzman and major professor George S. Myers; assistantship in the Biology Department, and the expedition to the Antarctic; work on crabeater seals, research on tetraodontiform fishes for Ph.D. dissertation and getting a job offer from the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia. He discusses the staff at the Academy, working with Jim Boehlke, research at the Seychelles Islands; a National Science Foundation grant and expedition on Anton Frederick Bruun.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 14: November 2, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman discusses expeditions and cruises organized by the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences and sponsored by the benefactors of the Academy in the Caribbean, as well as collecting in the Bahamas, Haiti, Puerto Rico and Cayman Islands, participating in research in underwater habitat and the Tektite project in Virgin Islands, collaboration with C. Lavett Smith, Bruce B. Collette and Carter Gilbert. He continues with interest in study of garden eels and their habitat; organizing the expedition to Australia that located and retrieved the lost cannons of Captain James Cook; developing interest in the fossil forms of tetraodontiform fishes and making contacts with European paleontologists, Father Jacques Blot and Lorenzo Sarbini.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 15: November 3, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman focuses on his work on Monte Bolca fossils from Verona, Italy; notes that tetraodontiform fishes became one of the few groups that have been studied both in fossil and extant forms; discusses technique of drawing lateral view of fish skeletons, using the method of stipple; then turns to social life at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia and developing alcohol dependency; his departure from Philadelphia for Bimini, Bahamas, to become director of Lerner Marine Laboratory in 1972. Provides recollections of Henry Weed Fowler and his work at the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia; addresses losing position in Bimini and applying for jobs; being appointed Endangered Species Research Coordinator, National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), Washington, DC, and work on sea turtles. He then discusses his move to Miami to head the NMFS Atlantic Bluefin Tuna Program and attends the ICCAT (International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas) meetings in Madrid; as well as completes his book on the osteology, phylogeny and classification of Tetraodontiformes fishes in 1980.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 16: November 9, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman covers his new job with the National Science Foundation as Director of the Biological Research Resources (BRR) Program in 1980, the difference between work environment and attitudes at the NMFS and NSF; his role managing the NSF grants to collections of preserved biological specimens at museums and related institutions as well as germ plasm centers for computerization of loan activities and catalogs, and renovating storage facilities. He also discusses his research on Luvarus imperialis at the Fish Division, National Museum of Natural History (NMNH). He then turns to his appointment as the Associate Director of the NMNH at the Smithsonian in 1985; upon the resignation of Richard Fisk, serving as Acting Director; the administrative structure of the NMNH, meeting the staff, new exhibits and social events, unannounced plans of Secretary Robert Adams for enhancing relations between Smithsonian scientists and the academia. He then turns to founding an AA group, "No Bones About It," at the Smithsonian. He closes with his role as Acting Director of the National Air and Space Museum and reasons for the resignation of the former director Walter J. Boyne.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 17: November 10, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman details the reorganization at NASM in order to create a more favorable work environment; appearing before the Congressional Committee on the Interior and Related Agencies of the Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives, headed by Sidney Richard Yates, who oversaw the budget of the Smithsonian; social events at the NASM and meeting famous pilots like John Hershel Glenn, Jr., Chuck E. Yeager, the pilots of the Voyager (aircraft), later donated to the Smithsonian, and going to the Paris Air Show to take custody of a Concorde aircraft, also a donation to the Smithsonian; appointment of the new NASM director Martin Harwit and the controversy of the Enola Gay exhibit. Highlights his receipt of the Smithsonian Gold Medal for Exceptional Service, 1987, and after returning to the NMNH, becomes Acting Director when NMNH Director Robert “Bob? Hoffmann resigns. Closes with his unsuccessful bid for the directorship of the NMNH, appointment of Frank H. Talbot as Director, and Tyler receives the title of Senior Scientist in 1991.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 18: November 12, 2004

Interview of James C. Tyler by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman recounts more on social events at the NASM, exhibition of Hydro Lab from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration at the NMNH, and the controversy involving the return of the Indian cultural objects and skeletal remains in the possession of the Smithsonian to American Indian communities. He discusses his research at Carrie Bow Cay, Belize, describing the facilities operated by the Smithsonian on this remote island, and work on sailfin blennies. He closes with a review of his work on the tetraodontiform and acanthuroid fishes in fossil and extant forms; his involvement in the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, receiving the Gibbs Award from the ASIH, and future of ichthyology as a scientific field.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 2 hours.

Interview 19: September 11, 2008

Interview of George R. Zug by Joseph C. Mitchell, David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman covers his youth in Pennsylvania, education at Albright College, biology major under mentor Al Schwartz, their field trip to Cuba in 1957, graduated 1960 and married Patricia Ann Brehm; next graduate school with Archie Carr and William J. Reimer at University of Florida Gainesville working on turtles, masters in 1963 and then to University of Michigan for Ph.D., Charles Walker and Arnold Kluge were advisors, dissertation on "Buoyancy, locomotion, morphology of pelvic girdle and hind, and systematic of cryptodiran turtles," graduated 1968, importance of publication, then came to NMNH when curator Doris M. Cochran retired in 1968, working with James A. Peters, research on frog locomotion, 1971-1972 field work in New Guinea; 1977-1983 served as chair of Vertebrate Zoology so focused on administration, collaboration on cane toads with STRI, with A. Stanley Rand, contributions of wife, Pat, press when he commented on reptiles of Loch Ness, relationship with Smithsonian Secretaries, role in Senate of Scientists, and Congressional Nights.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 3 hours.

Interview 20: November 20, 2010

Interview of George R. Zug by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman covers the importance of his work on tropical American cane toads for Australia, where they became invasive; Victor G. Springer facilitated his move to Pacific region field work; collaboration with younger scholars where he study morphology and they study genetics, work on Pacific radiation of reptiles and importance of humans; has not worked on fossil species; c. 1999 Chris Wemmer brought him into work in Myanmar on snakes with Joe Slowinski who was killed by snake there, he focused on frogs.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 1.5 hours.

Interview 21: December 1, 2010

Interview of George R. Zug by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman discusses his work with professional societies, joined the Herpetologist’s League in 1958 to be able to publish, then the Biological Society of Washington, and the Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles and was involved in professionalizing their Journal of Herpetology, also served as turtles editor for American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, discusses differences between the societies; discusses management of the museum and staffing changes over time; closes with observation that caliber of research continues to improve.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 0.5 hours.

Interview 22: October 15, 2020

Interview of Jeffrey T. Williams by David G. Smith and Inci Altug Bowman begins with his youth and education at Florida State University, University of South Alabama, University of Florida, and completed Ph.D. in 1986, Smithsonian predoctoral fellowship in 1980, joined staff in 1983, Collection Manager in 1985; turns to his field work including Rotuma Island, Fiji, 1986; Australia, New South Wales, Tasmania, 1989; Tobago, SE Caribbean Sea, 1990; New Caledonia and Loyalty Islands, South West Pacific, 1991; Tonga Islands, South West Pacific, 1993; Philippines, 1995, in connection with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) workshop; Vanuatu, South West Pacific, covering southern and northern islands, 1996 and 1997; Santa Cruz Islands, Solomon Islands, South West Pacific, 1998, including George Zug of the Herpetology Division; Navassa Island, Caribbean, in connection with "Animal Planet" TV program, 1999; French Polynesian Islands (Rapa, Moorea, Mururoa, etc.), several expeditions between 2002 and 2019; and Philippines, 2011, involving DNA barcoding of commercial fishes, funded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration; assesses his career, noting the role of Victor Springer of the Fish Division as his mentor, who trained him in field work, helped him find funding for collection trips, and supported his research. In addition to the taxonomic description of fish species, photographing the live specimen, getting a live tissue sample, and analyzing the DNA barcoding became standard procedures in collection development during his long career at the Smithsonian.

Recording of Interview: Total Recording Time: 03:14:40 hours.