When a two-headed calf is stillborn on a farm somewhere in Iowa, a local media outlet may or may not produce a short item, depending on the relative busyness of the news cycle. But at Edward Meyer’s office, it’s all hands on deck. As the VP of Exhibits and Archives for Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, it’s Meyer’s job to bring that two-headed calf home.
So what’s it like being the man who has brought over 20,000 items into the collection over a 40-year career? There aren’t many jobs that require knowledge of the shrunken head market or long phone calls to convince a man who built a replica of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge out of toothpicks to sell his creation. Since he first joined Ripley’s as cartoon editor in 1978, these activities have been just another day’s work at the Orlando-based company.