Here's a couple of minutes about The 90-Second Naturalist features by Thane Maynard, which started 35 years ago on Aug. 27, 1987.
Produced by Cincinnati Public Radio, the feature airs at 7:30 a.m. and 6 p.m. on classical music station WGUC-FM (90.9), and at 9 p.m. on news and information WVXU-FM (91.7), plus on stations across North America through the Public Radio Exchange (PRX).
THE INSPIRATION: Credit Harvard behavioral ecologist E.O. Wilson for inspiring Maynard, the longtime director of the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, to venture into radio. Maynard attended a lecture in spring of 1987 when Wilson spoke of the need to educate the public on the importance of protecting nature and biodiversity through newspaper stories, comic strips, television and radio programs.
"I sat in the back of the packed auditorium and thought, 'Well, I'm never going to be a great scientist, but I can help tell this story,' " Maynard once told me.
DON'T QUIT YOUR DAY JOB: Credit sportscaster Bob Costas with sage advice early on.
"I came up with a sample cassette tape with a handful of stories and shopped it around," Maynard said. "I sent it to my friend Bob Costas from NBC Sports. He was positive, saying stations would pick it up, but I had to do one thing — keep my day job! — because no one would pay for a brief radio feature like this," he said.
"Truer words were never spoken."
SEE YOU LATER: How did Maynard, a Florida native, get to know Costas, the multiple Emmy Award winner born in Queens, N.Y.?
"Bob Costas’ wife was my wife’s college roommate at Rollins College in my hometown of Winter Park, Fla. I have taken their family on safari in the Serengeti and visited them along the way over the years. Bob was nice to have me bring animals to one of his Later with Bob Costas shows back in the '80s and '90s."
MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME: Although the 90-Second Naturalist has been a staple for decades on WGUC-FM, the show started across the river at Northern Kentucky University's now silenced WNKU-FM.
"I have always loved acoustic music, so I pitched the show to Mick McLean, the general manager of WNKU at the time, and he liked the idea. And The 90-Second Naturalist began airing on August 27, 1987," he said.
"My first producer, Sheila Rue, helped tighten up my stories so they weren't just rambling nature tales. And the show was syndicated and uplinked to satellite to public stations around the country and globally on Armed Forces Radio starting in January 1989."
After program director Rue left the station, Stacy Owen produced the segment in the early 1990s until Brenda Pennell arrived in Cincinnati to manage WGUC-FM. She lured Maynard's 90-Second Naturalist from WNKU-FM.
"WGUC has a vastly bigger reach than WNKU did, and of course, the station is just a couple of miles from the zoo, so I made the switch and never looked back," Maynard said.
"Given the feedback I have long received about the show, I think it is a good fit for the audience at WGUC," he said. After Cincinnati Public Radio acquired WVXU-FM from Xavier University in 2005, Maynard's feature was added to the station, too. Cincinnati Public Radio's Rick Andress produces the segments today.
ANIMAL HOUSE: There's another reason WGUC was the perfect fit for his show, Maynard explained. It turns out that the animals are listening, too.
"There is a connection between animals and classical music. We'd have radios playing in many of the behind-the-scenes animal areas and have found that WGUC is more soothing for animals than classic rock, particularly with all the commercial radio advertisements."
SECOND THOUGHTS: Folks at the Cincinnati Zoo say Maynard has broadcast "more than 9,000 episodes of The 90-Second Naturalist … on topics such as "Turkeys & T-Rex," "Gender Bender Bugs," "Owl Cell Phones," "Fruit Eating Carnivores," and even "Whale Snot!" (Archives are posted on WVXU’s website here.)
“Conservation is not just about saving pythons, penguins and pandas,” said Maynard in the zoo's media release for his 35th anniversary. “Our mission at the Zoo is to inspire visitors with wildlife, and I’ve always had a similar goal for The 90-Second Naturalist program. Protecting the environment protects people, and people will protect things they know and care about. If a fun fact about an insect sticks in a listener’s head, it might just save it from getting squashed!”
GOT A MINUTE?: Maynard, who marks his 45th anniversary at the Cincinnati Zoo this year, has been seen on NBC's Today show, ABC's Good Morning America, the CBS Morning show and many other TV programs. Chad Yelton, Zoo vice president, says Maynard speaks in sound bites.
“We joke that if you give Thane a minute, he’ll give you 90 seconds,” said Yelton in the Zoo's media release. “He’s been writing and recording 90-second-long stories packed with interesting, and often obscure, information about animals and plants for the past 35 years, and hasn’t come close to running out of things to say.”
THAT ANIMAL GUY: At last count, The 90-Second Naturalist airs on 127 stations, including 18 in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho via Yellowstone Public Radio, he says.
"Billings, Montana, is one of those smaller college towns where when I order at a coffee shop the barista says something like, 'Hey, aren’t you that animal guy on the radio?' The same thing happened recently in Wilkes-Barre, Penn., where the show has aired since 1989 on WVIA-FM."
BITE SIZE: It's been a fun ride in Cincinnati for Maynard, who earned a bachelor's degree in environmental studies from Rollins College, and a master's degree from the University of Michigan School of Natural Resources. He's also written more than a dozen books.
"I have had a great deal of fun doing The 90-Second Naturalist over the years. I have had terrific producers at Cincinnati Public Radio, all of whom have brought patience and perseverance to help keep the show going. From the legendary Bruce Ellis, to Tim Lanter, Andy Ellis and our current long-time producer Rick Andress — those are the guys who keep The 90-Second Naturalist on the air.
"The goal of the show is to share bite size tidbits about wildlife and conservation with the general public. That mirrors the work we do up the hill at the Cincinnati Zoo, so it's a good fit, all around."
John Kiesewetter's reporting is independent. Cincinnati Public Radio only edits his stories for style and grammar.
