Zoo father, nene protector honored

HAWI — Paul Breese wrote the book on the Honolulu Zoo.

Literally.

For this energetic 93-year-old Hawi resident — father of the zoo in its current form — authoring the history with the help of his wife Jean was only the latest in a series of things that just needed to get done.

Like operating landing craft in five different World War II campaigns, including Iwo Jima and Leyte Gulf. And becoming the zoo’s first director in 1947, figuring out how to bring numerous animal shipments across the Pacific Ocean, overseeing and participating in the zoo’s rapid expansion into a notable facility. And helping save the nene goose from extinction.

“I was a hustler back then,” Breese recalled.

Though his role is sometimes shrouded by the more publicized contribution of Herbert Shipman, Breese was instrumental in bringing viability back to the few remaining birds of that species as the nene teetered on the brink of extinction following World War II.

Shipman kept the only known flock of the birds in existence, and donated the two pairs of geese that would start the captive breeding program which has allowed nearly 3,000 of the birds to thrive today. But it was Breese who worked on Shipman to convince him to donate the birds. To hear Breese tell it, he made sure credit for the program siphoned steadily Shipman’s way while he himself oversaw a team that built two primitive aviaries out of ohia logs and wooden boxes that had been used to hold artillery shells.

The first captive nene breeding program had begun at Pohakuloa Training Area and would struggle before it triumphed.

Such history doesn’t stay buried for long. In February, Breese was recognized as the latest Big Island addition to the state’s Living Treasures of Hawaii, selected each year by the Honpa Hongwanji Mission of Hawaii. He didn’t know it at the time, but he’d been nominated for the honor by the current zoo director and his staff.

The Living Treasures Award recognizes individuals who have strove and excelled in a particular field, enriching society with shared knowledge and their own continuous growth. Five Hawaii residents were honored at the 41st Living Treasures of Hawaii Recognition Luncheon on Feb. 13 on Oahu.

Many of the efforts that led to his nomination are laid out in the book: “The Honolulu Zoo, Waikiki’s Wildlife Treasure 1915-2015.”

“Our book was a real labor of love,” Breese said. “Our friends and our kids said, ‘You’re retired and what needs to get done is a written history of the zoo because there is no history in one place.’”

Backed by his experience in the Navy and work at the San Diego Zoo where he had the resounding endorsement of that facility’s — and the nation’s — first female zoo director, Breese arrived in Honolulu to find an Indian elephant, two adult chimpazees, deer, a bactrian camel, goats, monkeys, 12 tortoises and “a marvelous bunch of Asiatic birds.”

The zoo needed a lot of work. It had fallen on hard times during the Great Depression, and in 1933 a rampaging elephant had killed its keeper there, casting a pall over the place that wasn’t easy to shake.

But Breese was the man for the job.

Before he simply burned out two decades later and went into early retirement, Breese and his crews worked long, hard days building enclosures, water systems, “fences to keep the dogs out.” They planted monkeypod trees and banyans. They brought in seal lions, elephants, giraffes and bighorn sheep and became the first zoo to hatch Galapagos tortoises, transforming a barren portion of Kapiolani Park and an Army baseyard into a wonderland.

‘We worked fast and furious,” Breese said. “It was a thrilling time.”

Breese remembers his most challenging shipment back in 1949 — an oversized giraffe that should have shipped much sooner but was delayed by a dock strike. When the animal finally arrived, the strike had made materials scarce, so there was nothing to use for building its enclosure.

Breese adapted and overcame.

“One of the traits that Paul has had over his career was networking and bringing people together that wouldn’t otherwise talk,” Jean Breese said in an interview at the couple’s kitchen table.

That quality would help Breese overcome five discouraging years trying to figure out how to bolster the faltering ranks of the nene geese back in the 1950s.

“We were desperate,” he recalled. “We knew we had the one treasure. But most of the eggs didn’t hatch. If they did, the babies wouldn’t mature right. I think in three years we raised three birds and many more went down the tubes.”

Gradually, Breese and his team acquired wild birds which they introduced into the flock to increase genetic diversity. They learned from mistakes, and survival rates began to improve. Some of the birds then went to captive breeding programs in Britain, and the recovery of the species began in earnest.

Breese went on to lobby the state Legislature to declare the nene the official state bird. The rest, as they say, is history.

At his home on the Big Island’s northern tip this past week, Breese paused his flow of words to watch a gold dust day gecko make its way across his floor. He has a few more of the geckos in a back room. The reptiles are his pets, and they gather when he has something sweet to eat to share.

Paul Breese isn’t done yet.

His book, 364-pages of history, news clips, photos and illustration, is available at www.honoluluzoobooks.com