We were near death. No museum professional wanted to join us. We needed to have somebody who was a true manager to right the ship and get us on a good path. We hired Ken Burton, who was retiring from the RCMP. We had him for six months free, which is not bad. He turned the ship around, because he managed the place well and he had a strong focus on people.
That's my background as an employment lawyer: do the human resources side well. That wasn't good before. He did that well and he got the budget in line, but then he hit a roadblock, because the museum professionals got a bit uptight about it. They were snotty about it, saying, “You don't have a degree.” Well, Ken had the passion and the skills. He recreated the voyage of the St. Roch. In 2000, he left Vancouver in an RCMP ship, turned right, and came back.