A zoological garden

Lubbock and the entire West Texas region have never been able to experience the pleasures of regular and frequent visits to a zoological garden. The nearest zoo is in Fort Worth, about three-hundred miles to the East. The nearest zoo West of Lubbock is at Albuquerque, New Mexico. Of sixty-six West Texas c-ounties having a combined population of about 1,188,000 not one has convenient access to a zoological garden. Starting a new zoological garden is a tremendous and difficult task. Previous inquires into establishing a zoo at Lubbock have been made by a local service group but upon learning the cost the project was abandoned. A minimum amount of four million dollars is required to start a new zoo in a new area of about thirty to fifty acres_. 1 Operating budgets, exclusive of animal purchases and new capital structure, exceed four hundred thousand dollars annually for very modest zoos and exceed two million dollars for the larger zoos.2 This thesis is done in the hopes that someday, somehow, Lubbock will have a zoological garden of such size and stature to serve the people of West Texas.