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Robert Herndon Davison runs the roller‐coaster at the Cincinnati Zoo

Earl Remembers Work and Free Time

“My dad came up here. [Cincinnati] I don’t know what he did when he first came here, but one time he had a job
with the Cincinnati Zoo Gardens. One of his main jobs was running the roller coaster. We used to go to the zoo
pretty often and ride the rides when he worked there. Aunt Lou and Aunt Grace worked there for a little while too.

They used to take care of the animals and the grounds I guess. Back when we was a kid they used to have the Food
and Home Show at the Zoo Gardens and they used to have big loaves of bread 3 or 4 feet long. All the advertisers
used to hand out food.

On my dad’s days off we would go to the parks. Like Eden Park and I can remember as we was kids we would tumble

down the hills and at Eden Park they had the Presidents Grove with trees and little things like tomb stones with certain
presidents names, when he took office, when he was born and died, and things like that and we would go around and
read those. It seemed like we always went out on a Sunday evening for a picnic to a park or something. Just had a

good time running and playing. We didn’t have no yards to play in like people do now. We lived in town.
My dad always worked hard. He also did a lot of odd jobs when he didn’t have a steady job. He’d work for people.

He’d help them raise a garden, do roofing, clean out gutters, shovel coal and things like that. Whatever you could do
to pick up an extra dollar he did it.” Earl Davison, from a recorded interview in 2003