Over the course of 40 years working with big cats, I’ve come to believe that the most powerful influence we can have as trainers and caregivers is not through dominance or spectacle, but through consistency, intuition, and love. My late husband Mike and I founded our rescue in 1990, and while the world we stepped into was largely built by men, it was the female qualities I brought—patience, maternal instinct, and watchful observation—that often unlocked the deepest connections with the animals. Especially with tigers, my heart’s greatest kinship.
One of the most humbling and formative moments in my journey was being invited to observe Gunther Gebel-Williams during a training session. Watching him work with tiger cubs in the arena was like seeing an artist sketch with light. His movements were quiet, sure, and deeply respectful. His focus was not on performance, but on preparing the animals emotionally and physically, so that when they stepped into the spotlight, they felt secure.
That day, I also watched him guide four horses in a seamless, shifting formation on lunge lines—four, then two, then one—without a single tangle. It was magic made mundane through mastery. Later, as I stood backstage during the circus performance, I saw llamas, camels, dogs, and horses all waiting patiently, knowing exactly what was expected. The elephants, without cue, bowed down to change their costumes—a gesture not of obedience, but of willing partnership. It was clear: these animals felt joy in what they did. And it reminded me that training, at its best, is a conversation—not a command.
I felt a similar kinship with Roy Horn, even before we ever met. He and Siegfried hired one of my students for their Las Vegas show—a groundbreaking moment, as she was one of the first women to be part of their animal care team. Over time, they hired more than a dozen of our graduates. I always took that as a quiet affirmation that our program was doing something right—that our blend of compassion and rigor prepared people not just to work with animals, but to honor them.
Roy and I even used the same leash ropes and collar chains, despite never having spoken about it. For years, I sat in the front row of their show, gifted by Roy himself. Each time, the tiger at the end of the runway would flip his tail into my lap. I never touched him—just smiled. It was a moment built on mutual trust. Roy trusted his tiger. The tiger trusted Roy. And, remarkably, they both trusted me to respect the moment.
But everything changed the day Roy was injured.
I remember it vividly. I was bottle-feeding and unclipping a lead from an adolescent white tiger—a moment so familiar to me I could have done it in my sleep. And yet, for the first time, I felt a shift. A pause. A fear I hadn’t known before.
Until that day, I hadn’t feared for my personal safety. I had been caught up in the magic. But when my idol, my “brother from another mother,” was brought down in front of a live audience, and his life was forever changed, something inside me woke up. It wasn’t the tiger’s fault. It never is. It was human error. Keeper error.
From that moment forward, my perspective shifted. I became stricter with the students. More insistent on protocols. The work had always been dangerous, but now it was personal. The magic didn’t vanish, but it matured. It became tethered to a responsibility deeper than awe.
In a world where women rarely had a place in the history books, my mentors were almost exclusively men. But they didn’t just teach me technique—they revealed, through their work, the art of partnership. Now, with Lisa and Randy helping carry the torch, and our vocational school continuing to grow, I hope I’m passing along not just skills, but stories—stories of humility, reverence, and the quiet courage to listen to what an animal’s eyes are telling you.
Because one day, those eyes might be telling you something that changes everything.