Perhaps a third of the population was of Japanese ancestry, almost all born here. Herb Bowles had grown up in Japan and his folks were Quaker missionaries there. He spoke fluent Japanese. When the Japanese folks, ladies went to that clinic that he worked within, they preferred him because he… Read More
So essentially, I was urging him to accept them. And we developed a rapport. He was one of the first persons that believed in my integrity that I could do what I said I’d do. I said, yes, that I’ll do this. We’ll get the help of the San Diego… Read More
Will you still take care of them out there at the dairy, if the park department accepts the animals?… Read More
So with those two strong focus, strong directed objectives, I was really persuasive with my building those encouraging others, my biology, I mean the head of the zoology department at the university. The people that I knew that remained here as Navy and here being Hawaii, is full-time Navy officers. Read More
Do I accept them or do we say no and have them shipped back to the mainland?… Read More
And then we’ll get into your time at the zoo. Well, as you’re totally correct. Then in terms of experience, zoo experience being limited to being an assistant reptile keeper, essentially that means cleaning up after a herd of giant tortoises and draining and cleaning alligator pools, and wiping the… Read More
But I was audacious too. See, I just had enough experience as a leader in the war. I think in a large measure, it was due to two things. One is the fact that I knew I had the support of Belle Benchley, director of the San Diego Zoo. And… Read More
What did they see or how did that start?… Read More
So here’s the first question that I have, is how did you actually get into this position of zoo director?… Read More
Because, of course, you had limited experience from the San Diego Zoo. You’d just come out of the- All of a sudden you are bestowed. Read More
Well, now let’s get back to- Let’s get back to- and that is that we now have the second, we’ll call him zoo director, at this newly established Waikiki Bird Park, which was the zoo. And now we got this young whipper stamper, Navy guy who is there. And wants… Read More
And what is truly remarkable, here is this man, probably in his late ’50s, with the much younger Japanese wife, had been paid by the organization of the ladies, had been appointed to that job of superintendent of the Waikiki, newly renamed Waikiki Zoo. The zoo previously had been called… Read More
And he had an incredible, huge, this was in the late ’30s, this was, well, the mid ’30s, ’35. He came back to enormous triumph, had Japanese sacred cranes with a letter from the mayor of Tokyo to the mayor of Honolulu. “These cranes are granted to you with the… Read More
And he gave a talk that the ladies had arranged for him at the brand new, what’s now the Academy of Arts, and he, again, extolled the merits of the future bird park for Hawaii. And he said, these animals are, he specifically pointed out. They’re not only much more… Read More
The bird park was built. The bird park, and all of Catalina, and all of the nation was suffering of severe depression. Lewis was a builder, he’d built 400 aviaries, 400 aviaries and Catalina, plus an enormous, huge, what would be considered like a walkthrough, but it wasn’t a walkthrough,… Read More
This is a marvelous, Honolulu is an ideal place for a bird park. It’s a natural with your tropical plant climate, the lush vegetation, future tourist, booming tourist attraction. It’s absolutely a natural attraction. That’s an ideal location, you should have one. And the ladies agreed with him wholeheartedly. He… Read More
He was a Brit married to a Japanese lady from Japan, and his name, he never liked to use his real first name, his name was Edwin. He liked E.H., his last name was Lewis. E.H. Lewis had developed with the money of a man named Wrigley, who manufactured, the… Read More
And he employed this fellow, E.H. Lewis who had been a gamekeeper according to the accounts, and I’m suspicious of those accounts, that his lineage was supposed to have been a long line of British professional gamekeepers, to build, in 1928, The Catalina Bird Park. So Mr. Lewis went back… Read More
And four days later, the inevitable, he was walking her, and she did what every elephant person has learned or will learn, for the reasons that the newspapers indicated were inexplicable, unexpected, she hit him with her trunk when he was leading her. She then kneeled on him, impaled him… Read More
The man that owned the Colorado Springs of the Broadmore Hotel and Colorado Springs had a winter home in Hawaii, man named Spencer Penrose. Spencer Penrose was persuaded to take a grizzly bear back on a Matson passenger vessel. The only time I’ve ever heard that we’ve ever been able… Read More