He had trucks, he had a knowledgeable staff, and so we ordered an elephant from Louis. The elephant, as I recall, was $4,000, the same price as the giraffe from San Diego Zoo. And we came over, and I was still only 25, just 26, I guess. And it was a trial by fire. It was a crucible situation for me, primarily because it was Honolulu’s first giraffe. But the most important thing that made it stressful was the fact that the giraffe had grown. We were greatly delayed in building the giraffe enclosure, even though it was a simple enclosure, concrete, with the 12-foot chain link fence, was the fact that there was a long shipping stripe. the ILWU extended its range from the plantations to the peers, and Harry Bridges was very active at that time in the union organization, and his lieutenants in the ILWU Union in Honolulu had a strike that, to them, was hugely critical.
