It will be a clear celebration of life with mixed emotions as family members and the First United Methodist Church today, Friday, March 7, 2025 gather to remember the life and times of the late Charles Steiner, a renowned Swiss Taxidermist who died on September 4, 2024 and was buried after an eventful funeral rite attended by family members, friends and other sympathizers.
The occasion, which is expected to be attended by top government officials, professional colleagues, students, friends and other Liberians and foreigners, is billed to take place at the First United Methodist Church, Ashmun Street, the sanctuary he worshipped for many years since his arrival in the country in 1962.
Speaking to the Hot Pepper in an exclusive interview on the memorial service, Annie P. Jolo-Steiner, the widow of the deceased, said the family has decided to follow tradition as a way of climaxing the funeral rite by setting aside “this special day in the life of the family to remember our patriarch who meant everything to us and left us in pain and sorrow at the time we needed him most”.
Steiner, who was married to the deceased for 50 years, said since the demise of her husband, she continues to receive messages of condolence and goodwill from his professional colleagues, friends and partners around the world, expressing their deep sorrow and offering prayers to the family in their trying times.
“That shows how Charles was to people; he was respected, well connected and very helpful to people who came in contact with him. He was kind, friendly and a dedicated Christian who lived an exemplary life worth emulation. Everyone who knew my husband spoke good about him and, at such a ripe age, we want to thank God for his life and time. His legacy he left behind will forever be remembered,” Steiner told the Hot Pepper reporter in a calm tune.
According to a brief biographical note obtained from the family, Professor Steiner was born unto Charles Steiner Sr and Linda Steiner, both deceased, in Bern, Switzerland on August 15, 1941, and began his early education in 1948 and completed in 1952. He then immediately enrolled for his high school education, which he completed in 1958. He matriculated to the University of Zurich in 1958 and graduated with a degree in Taxidermy, a rather uncommon discipline that would later on shape his career, especially working outside of his country and leaving a lasting impression on his host country.
Young Steiner, upon graduation, briefly did an internship with the National History Museum, from where he came into contact with the University of Liberia in 1962. He worked with the university at the Department of Biology until 1990, a period of 28 years, when the brutal Liberian civil war took a devastating turn and forced him to flee the country with his family.
While in the employ of the nation’s premier institution of higher learning, Professor Steiner undertook several tasks, including but not limited to collecting mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fishes, insects and preparing them for scientific collections with all the available data, collecting, preparing and mounting (stuffing) animals for scientific classroom demonstrations as well as for exhibition in a Museum for education and public viewing, tanning furs and preparing skulls and skeletons for demonstration in Biology classes with the largest skeletons being those of elephant skull, skeletons of cow and whale. On the request of the University of Liberia, he sold a number of stuffed birds and mammals as well as skeletons to schools and colleges in Liberia, constructing and operating aquaria for the Biology Department, rearing orphaned animals, doing artistic works, assisting in planning and operating the Science Fair, which was a great success.
He was born unto the union of Charles Steiner Sr and Linda Steiner in Bern, Switzerland on August 15, 1941 and did his elementary education between 1948 to 1952 from which he showed early exceptional brilliance. He then enrolled for his high school education in 1952 and graduated in 1958. As a man driven by the unusual passion of a profession, he chose Taxidermy to study at the University of Zurich when his contemporaries took to the usual disciplines such as medicine, engineering, accountancy, law, economics, banking and Finance and graduated in flying colors in 1962. Taxidermy is a specialized and a rare profession which involves great interest in nature, animals and birds.
His love for nature took Professor Steiner to several places in Liberia, especially in forest and climbing mountains and ranges including Mount Wologisi, Gedeh Mountain, among others. His work made a profound impact on Liberia’s wildlife landscape and marketed the potential of Liberia’s conservation to the external world. Steiner told reporters that it was on one of the several visits in the interior of the country that Professor Steiner met her in Sennehwen, Gbarzon District, Grand Gedeh County. They got married in 1974.
While at the University, Professor Steiner authored several articles which were published in learned journals with so much recognition and honors. Besides taking care of animals, birds, mammals, reptiles, etc at the university, he developed interest in raising some of them at his private home when neighbors and other Liberians started bringing animals to raise.
This extra dedication to the love of nature led Professor Steiner to open the Monrovia Zoo and Animal Orphanage with his wife, starting from their private abode on the Old Road, Sinkor. The couple in anticipation of an expansion in their collection of animals, decided to move to a larger space, thus necessitating the relocation to Lakpazee, Airfield, Sinkor on the bank of Mesurado River.
The Monrovia Zoo and Animal Orphanage was one of the most important leisure facilities in Monrovia popular with the young and the old alike but got destroyed during the civil war and could not be rehabilitated due to several challenges.
After staying away for 19 years due to the Liberian civil war that made him to flee the country and which also led to the destruction of the Monrovia Zoo and Animal Orphanage, Professor Steiner returned to Liberia and decided to resume work at the University of Liberia to re-open the Taxidermy Laboratory to collect and preserve zoological specimen, skeletons and embedding them for classrooms and laboratory works for scientific collections as well as for exhibition in a public Natural History Museum which would support Nature Conservation.
It is important to stress here that unarguably throughout his tenure at the University of Liberia, Professor Steiner was the only Taxidermist in West Africa, as no other institution in the subregion ever had any of his kind. He formerly served as Vice President of the Wildlife Society of Liberia and Founding member of the Sapo National Park.
In 1963, he became a co-founder of the Natural History Association of Liberia. The history of wildlife in Liberia will not be complete without the mention of Professor Steiner. It has been revealed that he contributed to most of the collections that former President William V. S. Tubman kept in his private zoo and farms.
As a mark of recognition for his immense contribution to the national development of Liberia, Professor Charles was conferred with a national honor as Grand Commander, Star of Africa (GCSA) by former President George Manneh Weah in 2019 at a ceremony well attended by senior government officials, members of the Diplomatic corps, business leaders, friends and relatives.
He was a devoted Christian, who for many years also served as an usher at the First United Methodist Church, having attended his first service in November1962 upon arrival in the country. He was a committed member of the Men Unit in the church and was so honored as Father of Year 2019/2020.
He left to mourn his loving and dedicated widow, Annie Jolo Steiner, his daughter, Ophelia P. Steiner Hanz, several foster children, relatives and friends. His adopted son, Levi Steiner, predeceased.