He was curious when the rival Vancouver Aquarium succeeded in capturing and keeping a killer whale alive in captivity for the first time.
Aquarium director Murray Newman gave the credit for the first feeding to Allan Williams, a lawyer and chairman of the West Vancouver Parks Commission, with Griffin following him.
"He noticed several live lingcod that aquarium staff had tied to strings," which was their cautious approach to feeding the orca.
"[6] It was evident in the following days, however, that aquarium staff had radically altered their approach to feeding the killer whale.
And on the 14th, assistant curator Vince Penfold "simply held out each of 23 fish as Moby swam by...she opened her mouth and he dropped them in.
"[7] When Murray Newman and Pat McGeer later wrote their scientific paper about Moby Doll, their description of his regular feeding behavior sounded like Griffin's.
Lechkobit called Vancouver Aquarium to make a deal and stipulated a payment of $10,000 in cash.
Reguald "Curly" Marinas designed a cage to tow the orca, named Namu, 450 miles (720 km) in a floating pen to captivity in Seattle.
Griffin and Goldsberry attempted to conceal the deaths by weighting and sinking the bodies, but months later the carcasses washed up.