(USDA), where he became Chief Botanist and curator of the greatly expanded National Herbarium
.
George Vasey was born in 1822 in Snainton
near Scarborough, England
, the fourth of ten children. His family emigrated to the United States
the next year, and they established in Oriskany, New York
. He left school at 12 to take a job as a store clerk.
He took interest in botany
after borrowing and, since he could not afford the volume, manually copying a book on the subject.
I sit there and say, 'Please don't call me up, I am too shy.' But once I get up there, I take control of myself. Being onstage is magic. There's nothing like it. You feel the energy of everybody who's out there. You feel it all over your body. When the lights hit you, it's all over, I swear it is.
Snakes are very misunderstood. Snakes, I suggest, may be the oldest victims of bad press.
I have begun to see that even my father's harshness was a kind of love. An imperfect love, to be sure, but love nonetheless. He pushed me because he loved me, because he wanted no man to ever look down at his offspring. Now with time, rather than bitterness I feel blessing.… My initial fury has slowly given way to forgiveness.
I put a lot of mannequins in my room in the past, and I still have mannequins in my room, because I used to be very lonely, painfully lonely. You have no idea. I used to walk the streets looking for people to talk to. I'm talking about the height of one's career…. I would walk up to them, strangers, and say, "will you be my friend?" They'd go, "my god, Michael Jackson!" and that's not what I wanted.
The record companies really do conspire against the artists. They steal. They cheat. They do whatever they can, especially the black artists.… Sony's Tommy Mottola is the president of the record division. He is mean. He is a racist, and he's very, very, very devilish.