"Inspiration of the pet cemetery business... is a little story that probably leads me back many years." "I was born in the state of North Dakota... county of Barnes, city of Valley City." "I was there for several years." "Being born in 1930, then the World War II started... in 1941, when I went to the farm." "On the farm, I had my own pet collie... which worked with me and was beside me." "No matter what I did and where I'd go, my pet collie was with me." "One afternoon, we came back from hauling bundles..." ""thrashing," the old word's going." "And an old Model A came up the road, struck my collie and killed him." "I never did catch him." "But I grabbed my collie... and held him in my arms until he died." "And I pulled one little acre of land right behind the house..." "I'd say a quarter of a mile away." "It overlooked the prairie to the north... which was really a beautiful..." "It had a lakeside at the back." "I picked that as the cemetery for my own collie." "Right across the street from where I lived in Los Altos... was the most beautiful piece of land... as far as I was concerned, in the whole valley." "And, boy, I knew what to do with it:" "Make that into a pet cemetery." "I thought, "Well, this is going to be my project of life."" "I found the land, I found the need." "Something the old-timers used to tell me years ago:" ""To be successful in this world and life, find a need and fill it."" "And, boy, I found a need and I wanted to fulfill this more than anything." "More than anything I did my whole life, I wanted to fulfill this dream." "And there is where we started our work." "Planning, development, and getting the people interested." "Working with..." "I worked with Carnation Pet Food Company..." "Safeway Stores, Lucky Stores." "Several." "I remember talking with Dicky Euwe... of Dick's Supermarkets... and asking him if I could come and work in his pet food section... and just hand out my cards and talk to the people... about having a pet cemetery." "I went to grooming shops, I went to veterinarians." "And the interest I got was just phenomenal." "It was just great." "So then I had to get some more interested people... in the idea of it, because we needed the financing." "Floyd is a heartwarming individual who likes to do a lot for everybody." "And he came into the office one day, and him and I got to talking." "His real name, I think, is Floyd, but we always called him Mac." "And Mac, very surprisingly, said to me that... something he had always wanted to do was put a pet cemetery together." "So I said, " Mac, that's amazing..." ""because we've just been thinking about the same thing ourselves..." ""and maybe we can put it together under one group."" "So he said, "Wonderful."" "So I was made aware of this property... that is in Los Altos on Foothill and Highway 280." "We felt that it would make a great place for a pet cemetery... because it had tremendous visual ability... and thousands of cars that went past 280." "And the property leaned in other directions as well." "It was a marvelous location for a restaurant or a motel." "Various and sundry things." "We found that people by the name of Dunton owned the property... and we approached them and asked them what they thought." "There was a meeting held at Mr. McClure's house... which I attended." "I was a little late, but during the meeting..." "Mr. Dunton had expressed his wishes, desires, and needs... to Mr. McClure, and emphasizing very strongly:" ""Mac, you have nothing to worry about." ""I'm a minister of this particular church." ""You can trust me." "I'm a minister." ""We will have a pet cemetery." "It will be a success." ""You and I, we'll put it together." ""We'll do it." "We'll have it." "Just you and I."" "It was sort of a kismet idea." "So we went to work on the pet cemetery." "The ugly crisis... which we used as our basis... and this was nothing against the SPCA of Santa Clara County... or the Animal Control Officer of Santa Clara County." "But the idea that we needed the concept... for the people that loved their pets, and needed a place for them." "Not the garbage pit, not the garbage can... and a place to bulldoze them into the ground... because we have more love and desire for Mother Nature's little pets." "God only gave us these pets... to be our fellowship, desire, and will." "And what have we got to give them in return?" "Not to be put into a garbage pail or a dump ground... but our last goodbye for the things they gave us." "Rendering is an old industry." "It dates back to the time of the Egyptians." "They can trace it back this far, rendering." "In the Bible, way back in the Old Testament... the guy cut off the sheepskin and put it over him... and put the lamb fat on him to keep him warm." "It could be the oldest industry in the world." "It could be." "It's possible." "When the public got concerned about recycling... that's when the rendering industry started to blossom out, so to speak." "And say, " Hey, we've been recycling for 500 years here." ""Take a look at us." "We are recycling." ""We're doing what everybody wants us to do."" "And that's when we started to come forward." "Before that, nobody talked about the rendering industry." "That's why it was the invisible industry." "Nobody ever mentioned it." "On the quiet side, what those guys do out there is... they boil all this stuff in pots." "Stinks." "What is a rendering company?" "My mind pretty near exploded with the thought and the memories... of a very bad nightmare." "A dream of hell." "And it took me back to this rendering company in North Dakota... where all the little pets at that time, when they died, were..." "A truck would come out... and a big old driver would come and grab your pet... and throw him in the back end of this old truck... and take him to what I called "the boiler chambers."" "It's controversial." "In other words... we stay low-key." "We don't want people to know we're bringing in animals... and reprocessing animal byproducts." "Some people get nauseated by the thought." "They get nauseated by it, you know that?" "I've had people ask me..." "I've been at a dinner party, been sitting down at a dinner table." "And somebody will say, "What do you do?"" "And I say, "Hey, I'm in the tallow business."" "And somebody will say:" ""Don't bring that up right now." "Wait until after when we all break up."" "In other words, " We don't want to talk about what you do, Mike." ""It makes us sick." Why, I don't know." "But it does." "People say that all the time." "We called it back home "a glue factory." They don't waste nothing." "They take the meat and strip it." "They take the bones... and boil them, cook them, and make some kind of meal out of them." "And they don't waste nothing, not even the toenails on the animal or anything." "And the smell that came from it." "I walked in there one day as a child, and saw all these animals laying there." "Being a 4-H man and an animal lover..." "I just thought:" ""Boy, being in hell, here I am." "I'm sitting on the floors of hell now."" "Mike furnished the car, the station wagon." "And Mac furnished some furniture, his time, and his promotion skills." "And Joe, also furniture and some labor." "We both dug the first few graves." "And I made some of the caskets... and Joe would also go around and pick them up." "He'd go around and pick up the pets to be prepared." "Burying the pets was a very difficult task." "Mr. McClure was physically handicapped." "He couldn't in no way do any physical labor whatsoever." "My having full-time employment... was mostly done in the evening." "A gentleman came to my door." "And the gentleman was a huge man." "I'd say about 6'2"." "Large." "He's more the Hercules type." "He asked me, " Are you Floyd McClure?" And I said, " Yes, sir."" "He said, "Do you have the pet cemetery across the street?"" "My house was right across the street from the cemetery." "I said, "Yes, sir."" "And he started crying." "I asked him, "What's wrong?" He said, "Last night my dog died."" "He says, "I want to bury him this morning."" "And his family was home, and they were going to go to church." "But he had him completely wrapped." "Like a mummy, pretty near." "I would then get the pet out of his car... lay him out in the driveway, and proceed to clean him up... brush him out, make him as presentable as possible." "We had all kinds of animals." "I mean, every type of animal." "We had snakes, rats, monkeys, chickens... hamsters, mice." "Seen a few." "Rodents of all types." "And we had, of course, dogs." "Cats were our main pets." "But it doesn't make any difference what type of animal." "You love it." "And you want to give it a proper burial." "That's your business." "You bury that pet because you love it." "You could have... the idea that all animals should be buried." "But if you live over here, or 5 or 10 miles away... and you have a horse, and that horse dies on a Saturday... and it's 102 degrees, and you can't get anybody to bury it... you're going to get a hold of the rendering company real fast." "Because you want that horse out of there, like, now." "See?" "I remember one young lad there that..." "He had a pet lamb." "And his lamb died, and right away, his dad picked up the phone." "This is a 4-H animal... that he had taken from birth, and he just loved this animal." "And right away, his father had grabbed the phone..." "And back in North Dakota, very few people had phones." "But at this particular farm, they had a phone." "He called the rendering service outside of Valley City... and asked them to come and pick up the animal." "I've had people call who have an animal... and they want us to bury it." "We don't bury animals, and they're crying." "People are very emotional." "That's why it's a controversial thing." "That's why I don't like to break away and get into the individual thing." "You take a guy who loses his pet horse." "I mean, to some people, you know... it's like losing their son or their daughter." "I mean it." "That's no kidding." "They're really chilled up bad." "It's heavy." "You know, you get some real moaners on the phone, and they're crying." "This young lad, he was so upset... he went out and jumped on his pony and rode clear over to our place... and told me that his pet had died... and wanted to know if he could bury his pet with my collie out there." "I said, "Sure."" "So we hooked up a team of horses... and we headed out to his place to beat the rendering truck." "And we did." "We got there and got the pet on the wagon... and got him back over to the farm." "I guess we beat the rendering truck by about two hours or something." "We had a little altar set up in the office with some artificial flowers." "And Mr. McClure would light the candles... and be ready to receive... the mourning owners of the pets." "The mother was uptown shopping... and the kids were home." "I'm not talking about small children." "I'm talking about kids that are teenage children." "And the mother gave them specific chores to do." "One was, the girl was to wash and dry the clothes." "One was to wash... and the other was to take the clothes and put it in the dryer." "So anyway, the job was done." "The girl threw the clothes in the dryer and slammed the dryer door shut... and walked back to the kitchen." "As I understand this now... she heard some meowing and frightened screams of the cat." "They were looking for the cat and couldn't find the cat." "All of a sudden... they heard it in the dryer." "They opened the dryer door up, and the cat was in the dryer." "The little cat suffered a broken neck." "I guess they called out the fire department and tried to revive the cat." "But the cat did pass on." "The love... that people have for their pets is really tremendous." "It's something that is very difficult to explain." "On several occasions, I've seen it myself... where we were burying a pet... the whole cemetery would be at the grave site... the children... the mother, and the father would really break down... and actually cry." "The little services that we give out there at the cemetery... we bring out pretty much that:" ""Here before us lies little Toby." ""Little Toby was put on this Earth for two reasons:" "To love and be loved." ""And today, we're standing here saying goodbye to little Toby..." ""who was the Smiths' beloved little friend." ""Now, we're going to give you back, little Toby, to Mother Nature."" "We had a gal here." "I had a gal hired here." "Now, this will show you what you're up against." "She never went in the plant, she never left this office." "You don't see anything of this plant." "These trucks." "You don't see too much, right?" "And she didn't see anything." "But she left." "She quit working here... because it bothered her mind." "The mere fact of what we did bothered her mind." "And she never saw a damn thing or smelled anything." "One thing that really bothered me a lot... that really got into my heart... was knowing, not only that animals... are being treated in such a violent way after death... in this rendering company... by being torn apart... and every scrap of their body being used in one way or another." "But the smell and stuff was so terrific... we'd even sit down in the evening time to our meal... and the only thing that hit your nostrils... wasn't that good piece of meat you were about to eat... or the vegetable... or the nice dessert that's put on your table." "But you first had to grab the wine glass and take a whiff of that." "Get the smell of the rendering company out of your nostrils." "You know John Ascuaga's Nugget up there?" "They lost one of those elephants once." "Didn't know what the hell to do with it." "We got it." "And somebody made the statement:" ""Hey, that thing went to the rendering company."" "We had so many phone calls... and we actually had to deny that we had that animal." "We told them we took it out to a pet cemetery and buried it." "Because people just didn't want to get..." "People got chilled up." "What happened to that animal?" "What happened to that elephant?" "Where's the elephant?" "Every once in a while, they'll lose a giraffe at the zoo... or they'll lose Big Bertha, or Joe Bear or whatever his name is." "And I mean, people say, "Hey, what's going on here?"" "We better bury this and get a plot and everything." "So we have a standing deal with the zoo." "They don't tell them where the animal went." "Because they don't want to be in the burying business." "When I came here, and seen this ugly crisis... these gas chambers that they got built down here... and these pets half-dead going into the dump grounds... and the bulldozer going over the top of them... and leaving them half alive in the garbage dumps... brought me back to that, and I thought, "We're going to beat this."" "And this is part of the inspiration... of getting our little pets... out of these places and into a cemetery." "Something that we could be proud of saying:" ""My little pet has done his chore here." ""That God has sent him to us to do a chore:" "Love and be loved..." ""and serve his master." And, boy, these little pets have done that." "And not let them go into the bases of the living hell." "Like I said before, "Death is for the living and not for the dead."" "Sing, baby." "Come on." "I want my mama." "Oh, so sleepy." "Attaboy." "I want my mama." "Are you sleepy?" "We'll sing loud." "How can I say how you miss them." "And how you wake at night and feel around for her... hoping that's she's all right, and then she's not even there." "It's heartbreaking." "And then you remember that she's gone." "You get to thinking where she is." "You know where she is and you're happy where she is." "The next day you go out and take flowers, maybe meditate a little bit... and think of how often maybe you cried into her fur." "People like people because they like one another." "And people don't trust one another thoroughly... like an animal and a human being." "I can know you very well." "But when I turn my back, I don't know you." "Not truly." "But my little dog..." "I can turn my back on my little dog... and I know he's back there." "He's my little friend." "He's not gonna jump on me or bite me or anything like that." "But human beings cannot be this way." "We didn't get an agreement, which is our fault, in writing." "And it just kept getting involved and more involved." "And since there was no final agreement, then we started... to differ on ideas, and get into a few arguments." "A pet cemetery business is not a fast-buck scheme." "It's not a suede-shoe game." "It's a good, solid business enterprise." "And in order to have this concept... it has to be in your heart and not in your billfold." "And these are the type of people I wanted in business with me... in the pet cemetery concept." "The reason, unfortunately, why we didn't continue on... with the entire development of the pet cemetery was... we couldn't actually work it out with our investors... that we could project exactly what the income would be for it." "Because we had no way of projecting the amount of people... that would want to put their pets into a cemetery... even though we felt that there was a great need for it." "So after several weeks and several months, we decided... it would be better to turn it back to the original owners... which was Mr. Dunton and his family." "I was told... that Duntons trying to get themselves involved in some sort of gold venture... or exporting of dead animals from the United States to Mexico... for some university in Mexico... to do some exploration type of work on the animals." "Mr. Robert Dunton had convinced Mrs. Ken Dunton... to have her child born in Mexico, so he would be a Mexican citizen." "And under those pretences... he could have a business in Mexico and control it." "Mr. Dunton came back into town... and he decided at that time that..." "Well, maybe, this is just a great thing." "I can't speak for this man's mind." "But the only thing I thought at the time was the way they decided..." "I should open one grave site, put several pets into one grave, close it." "To me, that only spelled one thing:" ""Let's get all the bucks we can out of this."" "Mac called me and says:" ""Well, we can't come to a final agreement, and I got put out today."" "He says:" ""The attorney's advice would be to get all those pets over on the legal side..." ""and vamoose."" "So that's what we did." "Mrs. Billingsley came out to the cemetery... and said that they had moved the stone on her animal." "And I said, " How are they gonna to get the animal out of the grave..." ""the casket out, if they don't move the stone?"" "And she said she didn't want her animal moved." "She said, "You talk as if I didn't care about my animals."" "And I said, "Well, that's the way it appears to me."" "I asked her if she'd signed a release, and she said she had." "Then she said she hadn't." "So I don't know." "I can't swear to that." "But I made up my mind I wasn't going to fool with her." "She went down and talked to Mr. Robert Dunton... and I sat in the car waiting for his son." "I was supposed to sign the release to let my dog go." "And then I saw both of them look in my direction and start laughing... like it was just a big joke." "She isn't going to cause me any trouble... because I'm not going to pay any attention to her." "She just wanted to be noticed." "She just wanted to be Miss Big." "And here we have all of these other poor people that really needed help... and she was just trying to be Miss Big... and she didn't pay half as much as the rest of us did." "I don't know whether she really liked her animals or loved them... or whether she was just trying to show off, make a big impression." "This was my idea... because anybody that would come whizzing up in a Cadillac... with all of her furs on, to a cemetery... and you know when they're digging animals, there's gonna be an odor... didn't have much upstairs." "Because, I'll tell you, that was not the place to wear fur." "I think that something should be done so that it shall never happen again." "I think it was a horrible thing for us in this generation to have it happen." "And in a state like California... to have something like that, I think it's inhumane." "I think Mac really wanted a pet cemetery... and I think he probably had a great love for animals." "Unfortunately, it's not that easy." "You can't just go out and start something like that, build a chapel... and pay $50,000 an acre for land... and pay taxes, interest on the balance... for 25 cents." "Impossible." "And the Duntons were not interested... in that beautiful Garden of Eden that Mac had in his mind." "Because I really think he had it in his mind." "So as a total... before it finally wound up and went to the final lawsuit..." "I myself lost around $30,000." "I'm not sure how much Joe has lost." "It's in that neighborhood." "I suppose after you lose this kind of money... you just keep working at it until you're a success at something." "The only thing that I'm guilty of is compassion." "And that's all." "If you want to put... to what I was charged with... in the courts... the only thing they can charge me with is compassion." "Because I put my heart over the dollar sign." "It wasn't the dollar I was after." "It was to take care of my customers... and my dedication to what I believed in." "Then, because of the way I proved my point... by using my heart... into fulfilling my obligation... then I was condemned." "Then they write letters... telling everybody I'm no longer part of it... which broke me... not only financially... a burden upon myself and everyone else..." "I was not only broke... but broken-heart." "I was raised on a farm... where we had chickens, pigs, cows, sheep, and everything." "But down here I've been lost." "Now they're taking them all away from here up to the..." "What's the name of that place that's up above here a little ways?" "That town?" "Commences with "B."" "It's Blue Hill Cemetery, I think the name of it is." "Not too far, I guess about maybe 20 miles from here." "A little town there, a little place." "You know where it's at." "But I was really surprised... when I heard they were getting rid of the cemetery over here." "They're putting buildings or something over there." "I know people have been very good to me, you know." "Well, they see my condition, I guess, and felt sorry for me." "But it's real my condition is." "It's not put on, that's for sure." "Boy, if I could only walk, if I could only get out... drive my car..." "I'd get another car." "Yeah." "My son, if he was only better to me." "After I bought him that car..." "He's got a nice car." "I bought it myself just a short time ago." "I don't know." "These kids... the more you do for them..." "He's my grandson, but I raised him from 2 years old." "And my husband always told me... he says, "Mama, someday you're going to be sorry."" "That was a car?" "Oh, boy." "He said, "Someday you're going to be sorry."" "You see how it happens, things?" "I don't see him very often." "And he just got the car." "I didn't pay for all of it." "I gave him $400." "Pretty good." "His boss knows it." "He's not working for that outfit now." "He's changed." "He's gone back on his old job, hauling sand." "No, not hauling sand." "He's working in the office." "That's right." "He took over the office job." "His boss told me that on the phone." "But, you know, he should help me more." "He's all I got." "He's the one who brought me up here." "And then put me here by myself among strangers." "It's terrible, if you stop and think of it." "I've been without so much when I first came up here." "Half of my trouble is from him not being home with me." "Didn't cost him nothing to stay here." "Every time he needed money, he'd always come:" ""Mom, can I have this?" "Can I have that?"" "But he never pays it back." ""Too good, too easy." That's what everybody tells me." "I quit now." "I quit." "Now he's got the office job, I'm going after him." "I'm going after him good, too." "If I have to... do it in a different way." "He's going to pay that money." "He's got the office job now." "He makes good money anyway." "And he has no kids." "He's not married." ""Never get married," he says." "He was married once." "They're divorced." "Well, she tried to take him for the kid, but she didn't." "They went to court." "It was somebody else's kid." "She was nothing but a tramp." "I told him that." "He wouldn't listen." "I said, "I know what she is." "Richard, please, listen to me."" "No, he wouldn't listen." "He knew it all." "He knew everything." "Big shot." "But he soon found out." "Now that's all over with." "I've been through so much, I don't know how I'm staying alive." "Really, for my age..." "If you're young, it's different." "But I've always said, "I'm never going to grow old."" "I've always had that." "And people that I tell how old I am, they don't believe me." "Because people my age, as a I rule, don't get around like I do." "Skippy's been dead quite awhile, two or three years." "I don't want to think about it." "Everybody liked that dog around here." "You know, you miss your pets just like you do any of the family." "And I don't know what happened to this last little kitty who was here." "Now all the cats have gone." "There's no cats around, no animals, no nothing." "I miss that little black kitten so much." "It was wonderful." "And all of a sudden, boom." "No animals around." "Somebody in the neighborhood or something is doing away with them." "The thought of trying to bury 400 pets... was pretty hard to accept at the outset." "However, we felt that we had an obligation to pet owners... because if we were not to take on this endeavor... it would leave many pet owners with a sour taste... and could set our industry back for a long time." "We are often asked:" ""Why is your business apparently successful where others have failed?"" "The only answer that I can give is a very obvious one and that is:" "We have tried to follow sound business practices... where it's quite obvious that other pet cemeteries... that have now failed, did not." "This cemetery will be in business... 50, 60, 70, or 100 years from now." "Certainly beyond the lifetime of anybody... who ever buried a pet here." "I think this is all that concerns people that have buried their pets here." "When we decided... to turn the property into a pet cemetery... and we discussed a name... we just all agreed that we couldn't come up with a better one... than Bubbling Well Pet Memorial Park, which has a lovely sound." "The connotation is something living, bubbling." "A well with lovely, refreshing spring water." "And it has a meaning of life... and purity... and all of the good things that we all like to think about." "Most people don't know it, but we're in the middle of a pet explosion... throughout not only the United States, but throughout the world." "And this has been brought about... from the new pattern that has emerged in the last 10-15 years... in the family life." "I would say that the pill is largely more responsible... for the pet explosion than any other single factor." "This is quite a surprise... to a lot of people that don't understand the business... and haven't done any background work." "But it's very simple." "The old style was for the husband to earn the living... and the mother stayed at home." "Today, we have a different pattern." "Today, husband and wife both work." "And they want to prepare themselves... with a home and some of the things they would like to have... before they start a family." "Well, this is just fine from a planning standpoint." "But nature can't be put aside." "When the young mother comes home, she has to have something to fondle." "Something to mother, something to love." "She'll have a pet." "The rest of it, in the normal pattern... would be that the grandparents... would have children." "Grandchildren... to take care of, to fondle, and to help to rear." "This would satisfy their need for love and giving of love and receiving." "But when this has been set aside for five, six, seven, or eight years... what do they do?" "They get a pet." "Now we're talking about both sides of the family." "We are not talking about just one." "Now we have a three-way explosion." "Well, we're here... to put Caesar in the ground today." "I know this is something that you've not looked forward to... but I would just be interested to know... how you picked Bubbling Well." "And just tell us a little about Caesar... so we can have as much personal feeling about this as you do... because we're going to be Caesar's caretakers... and take care of his plot from now on." "And although we can't know... personal details about all the pets of all who come to Bubbling Well... we have a great feeling for pets... and we certainly want to include Caesar in our pet family." "Cal, here's a little picture of Caesar." "If you see that, you can understand... why we wanted him buried in a good place like Bubbling Wells here." "You know, I feel like I know him." " Is that right?" " That face and that smile." "He was quite some dog." "And what was his pedigree again?" "He was a mixture of Australian sheep and terrier." " And terrier?" " Yeah." "You can see with all that hair he had." "Did he have a coat." " And look at that face." " Isn't he beautiful?" "I've never seen that kind of a mix." "And we get many different combinations." "One thing that we get and we see... is it's the combinations, it's the crossbreed that produce seemingly..." " the best pet." " Right." "The purebreds are fine... and a lot of people enjoy their relationship... as much as others." "But it seems that when we get a mix... somehow it seems to bring out the best in all the breeds." " And they make a better pet." " Right." "I don't know." "This is most unusual." "Most unusual." "I just can say I've never seen anything like that." " He always had hair over his eyes." " That's from the sheep in him." "He never had any trouble looking out?" " No, he found his way around good." " He got around." " I'm glad you showed that to me." " He always got around me pretty nice." "I bet he did." "Our oldest son, who was in the insurance business... back in Salt Lake City... decided that insurance business pressures were getting to him... and he made a trip back home... just to look around the Bay Area to see what might be available." "His mother, as devious as she is... got him on the hill and really sold him a bill of goods." "And the next thing we knew... he had decided to bring his little family back to Napa." "Every young guy has an aspiration... to pursue a very aggressive sales field." "About the only thing I could think about was insurance." "I started off as a salesman, worked my way up to a sales manager." "But throughout the whole thing..." "I wasn't cognizant of it... but I was actually using my strength and my youth to the height." "I was burning out." "I could not exceed 150 pounds... no matter how much I ate..." "There was so much mental work there." "I had, ultimately, no free time." "So I resigned my position." "Of course, gave them plenty of warning." "And decided to come back to California." "I have to say to myself, what does it mean to me?" "What does this mean to me?" "What is it going to mean to me?" "I recognize this and..." "A couple of things when I was instructing motivation... back in Salt Lake City... is that, you know... if we don't stop and ask ourselves a question once in a while... to probe our subconscious or to probe our conscious..." "I used to teach it." "It's a plain, simple formula." "We reduced everything to a formula, memorized it... and therefore we were able to repeat it constantly." "I used to call it the R2/A2 Formula." "Recognize, relate, assimilate, and put into action." "Like I could be driving down the freeway and see a 450 SL... and I can say, "Hey, I like that." What does that mean to me?" "What would I have to do to get it?" "How can I do it?" "And then go to work for it." "And strive for it." "It kind of makes life easy." "I think that's why a lot of people don't..." "They get frustrated." "They have emotional problems... because they don't know how to cope with their mind." "There are three things that I've got to do... that anybody has to do if they want to be successful." "To have the desire, the "want to."" "Why do you go to work in the morning?" "Gee, why am I here?" "Because you want to." "But that's obvious." "And then, the next very important ingredient... is something that a lot of people and businesses fail to delve into." "It's the activity-knowledge." "It would be the equation... to a mathematical problem." "It would be equal... to the chemist's ability to emulsify chemicals." "You know, properly, the valences." "But the knowledge of it, the whole scope, everything in detail." "And then the third element would be the know-how or the experience." "I have the inspiration to action." "I don't have the activity-knowledge... but I'm getting the know-how before the activity-knowledge." "In fact, I'm getting more know-how than activity-knowledge." "But they can be correlated together." "They can be overlapped." "Our youngest son, graduated from Chico... with a degree in Business Administration." "He thought that this entitled him... to an executive position out in the world somewhere." "After many interviews he found that it wasn't that easy." "So he agreed to come home... and, with a lot of reluctance, to try this out... to see how he and his lovely father would get along." "College is an interesting experience... and I was kind of taken with it my first few years." "I would study eight or nine hours a night." "I really caught up on the idea of doing a lot of studying." "But towards the end of my college days..." "I ended up partying more than I did actually studying." "You know, I learned a lot." "I took many classes... say, in Mathematics, Business Administration..." "Marketing, and things like that." "You're given things to learn... however, you don't retain the knowledge that you learn." "It's the idea that you're applying your brain, you're exercising it." "That's the part where the education comes in, I think." "Something also that happened, it happens to everybody, I suppose." "I fell in love up in Chico." "I think the important thing in falling in love... before you fall in love, you should have..." "True love, I think, is experiencing many different types of loves... and learning exactly what you want out of a relationship." "I spent about two and a half years with a woman." "I fell in and out of love and I learned a lot of things." ""Nothing lasts forever"... was something that hit home." "I think a broken heart is something that everybody should experience." "Because it makes you appreciate... any future experiences that you have." "You've felt the hurt... so you can enjoy the positive aspects of love." "I finished all those experiences... and I came back here to the park... and my father offered to take me on... to teach me the business." "I knew we had many houses up here... and I would have no problem having a place to live." "And I lived down in the chicken coop down in the little house for a while." "Then I got this place... which is a pretty nice place for just one person." "The House on the Hill is what we call it." "And so, I moved up here." "I still haven't completely moved up here." "I still have a lot of my stuff down in the chicken coop." "My dad initiated this whole program..." "I would say, approximately six years ago." "So therefore he has the greater amount of knowledge." "He has the public relations with the veterinary doctors." "He knows them not only by name... but also by their secretaries' and also their wives' names." "He has a vast amount of knowledge." "My brother Danny has been working in the park for about three years." "He has quite some knowledge of procedures and public relations." "Therefore my father is the focal point." "He trained my brother, he gave him the knowledge." "He taught him this route that I'm responsible for now." "I find it quite hard right now... to go out on my daily task here at the park... without consulting my brother or my father." "One thing in the insurance business that I always did, that got me ahead... is I was able to memorize quite well with hardly any effort." "I have to literally memorize the streets and localities of veterinary clinics." "These clinics are literally... speckled all over that southern peninsula area." "I have to get on the freeway and go to this one... and come back on to this one and pick up from where I left." "I have to memorize the routes, know exactly where they are." "What road to take to get to it... to get back on to the right road, to get to the next one." "Naturally, there's an element of fear that I have." "With our Permalloy markers... we have several different formats that the people can choose from." "You can see some of the different formats right here." "In some situations when the people don't have actual photographs... they can sketch a picture... right on to the alloy steel." "Probably the most popular type of marker... that we have in the Permalloy... is what we call a vertical-type picture." "The reason being, in a vertical type picture... they can place the photograph in a position... so they are getting maximum amount of surface coverage... with maximum amount of wordage usage." "I have to keep telling myself... there's going to be more parts to this." "There's going to have to be an advance selling program." "I'd like to be selling in Los Angeles... and getting the cemeteries there and starting another one in LA." "Maybe Seattle, a larger city where there are a lot of animals." "With our private burials we have two systems of marking." "The first is what we call a grid system." "The way it works is we have a rectangle... with letters and then numbers." "In a vertical position we put numbers... and the numbers go from 1 to 17, and then we have the alphabet." "It's a cross situation where an animal... say, Bonnie... would be 9-W." "What that would mean is that the people would go to Row 9... then they'd go to "W"... and where those two points crossed... you would have the location." "This opportunity doesn't mean a damn thing to you... unless you're willing to work hard... to study, to be a student... and to apply your experience, and to do better constantly." "So I think that's what my father's done for many years." "And I know, I've seen his successes." "He's read the same textbooks I have." "Danny is basically doing the same thing." "And this is what I have to do." "I have to learn to put this knowledge into reality." ""The basic tenet of our church..." ""the Bubbling Well Church of Universal Love..." ""incorporated in January of 1977 is..." ""the Church has as its tenets..." ""a belief in a supreme being who does not differentiate..." ""in bestowing his benevolence on all species of life..." ""whether of this earth or any form of life hereafter."" "The thought occurred to me... that any god, any supreme being... that was indeed compassionate and concerned about people... would surely be concerned about any living creature." "God is supposed to know when the sparrow falls... when the lilies of the field bloom." "So surely, at the gates of heaven... an all-compassionate god... or an all-compassionate supreme being is surely not going to say:" ""Well, you're walking in on two legs, you can go in." ""You're walking in on four legs, we can't take you."" "I don't believe this will happen." "Now people come up and there is a common bond." "At the church, we don't have formal services." "We're not trying to save any souls or collect money or anything like that." "It's sort of a church of love." "We do not have to go too far afield to make this conversion... because we have our own chapel... we have stained-glass windows, we even have a bell." "We're usually talking in terms of death and talking in terms of hereafter." "Well, this is the very essence of any other religion." "So if in the hereafter there are no pets, I think..." "I don't think any of us that love our pets would really... feel, maybe..." "I can't say we wouldn't want to go, but..." "I really believe that they'll all be there in spirit with all of us." "The pet owners that we have talked to... have embraced the idea... and it has had a very dramatic effect on a lot of them." "It's brought them assurance, it makes sense." "And it's not..." "It's very hard to refute it, as a matter of fact... because it makes sense." "You don't have to depend on a lot of... mystical type of thinking." "It just makes sense." "And people at this time are looking for assurance." "They don't want pie in the sky, they don't want fairytales." "Trooper was the type of dog that didn't have other dogs to relate to." "He lived with adult human beings." "And having the inability... to communicate like human beings do through conversation... he did it with his mannerisms, his eyes, and reception." "One of the things that you noticed with him... was when we were sitting in a room, he would position himself... and as each one of us spoke... the tone of their voices would direct his attention to that person." "And during the course of the conversation... if the conversation was pleasant, he would react to that... or if it was sharp, he would react to that." "And he also had a sense as to what the subject of the conversation was." "In particular, at Christmas time... the discussion about gifts to various members of the family." "And there were certain things that we knew he would like... as to doggy bones and little chewy things that he had." "We didn't conceive that he would be aware of our conversation... but we were relating to him, because as I say... there was no one else he could talk and relate to except ourselves." "Christmas morning, in fact, this was just before his death... we all came down to open our presents... they were all laid out in various sections around the Christmas tree." "And we would hand each one of us a gift... particularly, my mother-in-law, her being the elder of the family... we'd bring her presents." "He lined himself up and couldn't wait... and he went right to the direction of where his packages were... and started unwrapping them, right in there... they were not laid out in the open." "And he unwrapped his presents just like sharing with all of us there." "It's amazing that there are so many different aspects of this." "It's not just, you know, an opening in the ground... somebody prefers a casket or not... and the ground is put back into the opening." "No." "Sometimes the people like to come up, witness the actual burial of the animal." "Sometimes they don't." "We pick out a date that's convenient for them and they come up." "As far as preparation, a hole has to be dug, prepared." "We have to make sure that the hole is going to fit the size of the casket." "You don't want to make it too large because you'll waste space." "And you don't want to make it too small or you can't get it in there." "Mentally, I don't worry about putting an animal down into an opening... because if I don't do it, somebody else will have to do it." "It's just mind over matter." "You have to prepare yourself for it." "We pick up animals that are 150 pounds, greyhounds." "They're very heavy." "We have to bring them in to our bodies... to be able to hoist them into the truck." "It's mind over matter once again." "Sometimes they come in, when we get them... their hair is matted... and they're very moist from being in a freezer where they're kept." "So they have to be combed and dried out a bit." "It isn't the most pleasant thing in the world." "But it's not that bad, really." "After a while it becomes something that doesn't really bother you at all." "But I don't know what happens down there." "I really don't." "The moisture, the contraction, the expansion of the ground... of course, the insects and so on and so forth." "There's another world down there, you know." "He'd go down on his front knees, and I knew something drastic..." "He'd just black out." "Just fall over and black out, just for a few seconds." " Then he'd get back up again." " Ready to go." "We took him down to the vets." "We had test after test." "They couldn't find nothing." "One day we took him back to the same vet... because that vet, he's darn good, we liked him a lot." "He called us up, said, "I've found out what's wrong with York."" " "He has heartworms."" " Heartworms." "I'm telling you, if I never tell anybody anything else again... please watch your dogs for heartworm." "It's carried by mosquitoes... just like your malaria." "And you don't know." "We used to think we were free from it here." "But we're not." "It was a Southern disease." "But here in California, it's very prevalent." "I ask myself, " What does this mean to me?" ""What does this park, this opportunity mean to me?"" "Well, it means a lot." "It means that I'll be able to... have something to work for for many years to come." "It will provide the things that I will need... the long line of the other things, events." "Phil has moved into the business." "He's slowly learning it." "He's learning the route right now and he'll be taking that over." "But at the same time, he's learning about the private burials... he's learning about handling the people... because there's definitely things you have to know... to be able to talk to the people about their pets." "You have to see by example, you have to learn by example." "We're working together." "We have our ups and downs." "He's a bit older than I am." "It provides some hardships because I'm the one telling him what to do... and he doesn't always like that." "He resents it at times." "My father is in charge of the park." "He's El Presidento, you know." "He's Number One." "Danny, by virtue of seniority and knowledge is Number Two." "I guess I would be the third person." "My father now is trying to work out of the business... because he's getting on in years, and he wants to do a little traveling... before he passes on." "So he's letting up and he's letting me take over... the handling of the people and he's staying in the background." "Although, I don't think he'll ever stay completely in the background... because he's a fairly dominant person." "Then he came out of it, and he was perfectly normal... and racing through Golden Gate Park along the ocean beach." "And then just as suddenly, we took him over for a checkup... to recheck the prior prognosis." "They thought he was all right." "He came home on a Wednesday." "And I can recall he was so relieved to get out of that veterinarian office... having been in there all day." "He had a habit to me." "I always got a kiss on the knee area." "I recall that as probably the last time I remember him doing that." "And then, just as suddenly as the kiss... he seemed to go right down, and we kept phoning the vets... and they said not to worry... that they didn't like to eat when they were under medication... but to bring him in on Monday." "But, before that happened, we ran him to the Animal Emergency Hospital... and to Dr. Benjamin there." "It was too late." "He was gone by then." "He just passed away on the Sunday after it." "But the main thing is for people who have dogs... and they don't breed them... the most intelligent thing I would recommend would be... when the dog is, I suppose the same for cats... about two or three years old... that is the time to make a decision to have them..." "Neutered." "You keep that idea of building this place up, of fixing it up... and eventually it will be something that nothing else can compare with." "That idea keeps the whole thing together." "That concept is what keeps us together, I think." "My dad used to tell me when I was a young kid..." "I'd look at a job that had to be done, and he'd say, "Nothing's impossible."" "That stuck in my craw." "I couldn't believe it. "Nothing's impossible."" "I learned when I got in the insurance business... that everything is possible." "It's just you have to look at it with the right frame of mind." "And that's important, your mind." "There's a tendency to sit on your laurels... and be somewhat complacent... about small advances and small accomplishments." "Or even sometimes large accomplishments... have a tendency to put you at ease." "However, this is a trap." "Because we are not content... with just having an ordinary... nice, or good pet cemetery." "Ours is going to be the finest." "We're not going to stop until ours is the finest in the country." "There'll be no finer when we're through." "When I'd hire a guy..." "I'd bring him into my office." "And I had specifically designed my office so I could display... the maximum trophies on walls and stuff." "I bring this guy in, who had probably been making $9,000 a year or less." "I'd bring him into this office with nice furniture." "He'd see these trophies, and, you know..." "They were taken away." "It's kind of like flaunting it, I guess." "To hire him all I did was tell stories about what each trophy meant to me... what it could mean to him... and if he would like to increase his income and his future." "The names of our gardens were created... by words that seemed to depict... the qualities of pets, like our Garden of Companionship." "A pet is a companion." "The Garden of Devotion." "Almost all pets are devoted to their masters." "The Garden of the Gentle Giants, again, is descriptive." "Kitty Kurve, the Reserve Garden set aside... and reserved for smaller pets." "The Garden of Memory... is set aside... because it will bring happy memories in the future, we hope." "We had a Valentine's Day party for all the wives." "I think there was about six of us." "I told the guys to come over." "We were going to have a cake and celebrate Valentine's Day." "So we got a big cake and all the wives came." "I had this motivational meeting planned." "You know, they didn't know exactly what was going on." "And I had all these signs on the wall." "I had made up a chart, a commitment chart." "Anyway, we had the cake and we had the girls talk... and we read the material... the motivational material for prizes and trophies... to be won the subsequent week." "We got the girls motivated." "And the girls got the guys motivated." "We created the Garden of Honor." "And in this garden we will bury... a Seeing Eye dog or a police dog killed in the line of duty... at no cost... if it's killed in the line of duty." "And for anybody else who wants to share this garden... then we created a price... which amounts to more than any other garden that we have." "I think that I'm motivated all the time... because I have so many experiences... of motivation." "I understand it quite well." "One thing that this gentleman... to my left always said, and it sticks in my brain all the time is that:" ""The emotions are not always subject to reason..." ""but they are always subject to action."" "We all have periods of inertia where we don't want to get up and do things." "So I have to tell myself psychologically:" ""It's going to be a great day, I'll have a great day today."" "And I repeat it over and over." "And actually do the thing with that in mind." "I've been trying to teach it to my brother." "As a matter of fact, couple of months ago, I wrote him a letter." "I tried to write him a very motivational letter." "Because at the time he was very inspirationally dissatisfied." "I don't go out very much... so what I do to pass the time... aside from watching television, of course... is I would sit down and put these tracks down on tape... and just play guitar." "It's something that gives me a lot of personal satisfaction." "With any type of a musical instrument, you're never going to be bored." "So much of the time, people say, "What am I going to do?" ""There's nothing to do." They're always continually complaining." "But with a musical instrument, you can sit down... and you can provide your own entertainment." "Even my kids." "I try to abstain from the word "not"... and "can't," and "no," and stuff like that, which are very negative words." "And try to instill, rather than physical punishment... but just saying..." "My youngest girl is two and a half years old... and it's very hard for her to understand the language, rationalize it." "I sit her down when she's done something wrong and I say:" ""Good girls don't do this." ""Good girls do things that make us happy."" "We created our little lakes... because we feel this gives an atmosphere of tranquility... and helps to break up the rows of little headstones... which can be very monotonous and not too appealing." "In former years, I would write three or four songs a week... and I've got a little notebook... where I've got about probably 50 songs." "You always have the dream in the back of your mind... that someday these songs will be published and you'll be famous." "But as you get older, you start realizing... that maybe those are just what they were, dreams." "Nothing more." "Dreams are nice to have." "Something to look forward to." "It gives you more satisfaction." "Something you can think about." "Our mind is like a computer." "You know, if our mind read... or extracted a data-line from it... if you put in positive, you would get out positive." "If you put in negative, you'd get out negative." "So you have to understand that." "Our mind is..." "We can go into a negative part... and into a positive part... and if you want to get more involved, there's an in-between:" "Where people never get really negative and people never really get positive... what they call "gray area."" "But the mind reacts to suggestion." "And suggestion is merely... an external force or an external thing... that you perceive through your senses." "You know, like your smell, your sight, your feeling." "You could even be smelling a big vat of spaghetti... you know, and it suggests to you that you're hungry." "So therefore, our strongest power... that we have is in suggestion." "In the power of prayer." "That's the strongest power that we have." "Success is like a journey." "And when you finally achieve success in your given field... the journey's over." "You have to look for something else to motivate you." "There was a famous doctor who was one of the first to climb Mt." "Everest." "Right at the end he looked up at the mountain..." "The first time he tried it, he failed." "And as he was coming down from the mountain, he looked at it... and said, "I'll climb Mt." "Everest."" "He says, "Mountains don't grow, but men always will."" "There's a principle of law that with every benefit there's a burden." "And the responsibility that you have with a dog..." "It's not just an inanimate object." "In our life today, we do focus a lot of our attention... on material things such as automobiles, clothes... trips, and things of that sort." "And even objects, paintings... and other kinds of things at home that you cherish." "Well, an animal, I think, much more so, you cherish... because he does respond to you." "He doesn't talk like a human being... but he is much more than just an inanimate object." "Therefore, the responsibility that a person has to the animal... you sense that when you have them." "Because their love and affection comes to you." "And that love and affection, over a period of years... becomes a part of your life." "And you can't discard them... to such a degree like you can a wrapper around some food... and say, "Well, it's finished and it disappeared."" "When a dog dies suddenly like Trooper died... the moment of decision came." ""What do we do with him?"" "I could only think of Trooper's face... and he'd say, "Where are you going to put me?"" "There's something to life... that even when you discard something of an inanimate nature... you dispose of it with some kind of reverence." "I've got a stereo system aside from a recording system." "It's a Pioneer SX-1010." "It's 100 watts per channel, which is very powerful." "On some occasions... say late afternoon, when there's nobody at the park..." "I'll take my speakers and I'll put them outside... and turn it up." "You can hear it." "It goes through the whole valley." "You can hear it from miles away." "I think we'll all be together again." "I think we're going to live pretty much like we do here." "I want to be able to find my pets." "I don't want them dug up and scattered all over creation." "I want them right where I know where they are... where it's like in humming fields like they've had in this life." "I believe that we'll all be reunited." "I really do." "I believe that from the bottom of my heart." "She's got me believing that now, I never believed in it before." "But I still do." "'Cause after all, there's your dog." "Your dog's dead." "But where's the thing that made it move?" "It had to be something, didn't it?" "There's your spirit." "There it is." "I might be dead, but I'm not moving." "And you can't put that back in them." "But I can take the body where it will be with it and lay it to rest." "It's a beautiful thing." "It can rest there or be right around there." "It'll stay close." "It'll stay where he is, and I'll find it again." "I really will." "They'll be with us." "I hope she's right." "I think I'm right." "In fact, I almost know I'm right." " You'd bet on it, huh?" " I'd bet a lot on it." "My assurance to the pet owners... is that they will be reunited with their pet... at some time in the future." "Maybe under different circumstances and in a different form... as remote as this might be and as hard as it is for them to visualize... it still gives them a degree of hope."