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MANN:    I think that's lovely

HENSON:  Now Dr. Wetmore would have been interested in that because his field was birds.

MANN:    Yes.

HENSON:  He was an ornithologist. Do you know if Dr. Mann went directly himself to the PWA? How did he actually get that, do you know?

MANN:    He got it through Mrs. [Mary Vaux] Walcott, and Mrs. [Anna W.] Ickes. Mrs. Walcott and Mrs. Ickes were great friends, and [Harold L.] Ickes was Secretary of the Interior, and he had the money. That's how the zoo got that.

HENSON:  Because none of the other Smithsonian bureaus got quite as much done during that time as the zoo did. 

MANN:    Yes, the zoo did very well. Then of course the war came along and there was no more money for anything.

HENSON:  And there was quite a period of time there where nothing else was built at all.

MANN:    Nothing was going on. The last few years it really has made wonderful strides.

HENSON:  Yes, I guess it runs in cycles like that with the building.

MANN:    Dr. [Theodore H.] Reed is doing a magnificent job.