Seeing Isabella Bird come to life through the acting of Professor Jackie Pualani Johnson was an enriching experience for Nederland Middle-Senior High School’s (NMSHS) sixth graders.

Professor Emerita Johnson was born and raised in Hawaii. She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Colorado, Boulder. While in Colorado in the 1970s she was part of The Colorado Caravan theatre group. This group had been in Nederland in the 1970s, performing and leading workshops. Later, Johnson served as a drama professor and chair of the Performing Arts Department at the University of Hawaii, Hilo, for 38 years.

Now Johnson was at NMSHS to perform her one-woman show presenting Isabella Bird and to lead a short workshop with the students afterwards.

A living history event like this can give insight and bring relevance to a person from the past. Johnson loves this kind of performance because “you become that person and tell their story, so it does not get lost.” She said that she likes this kind of acting because of the intimacy it allows with the audience. She has been doing this work about Bird for some years now.

Who is Isabella Bird, and why would Johnson want to dedicate years of her life acting out her story?

Bird was born in Yorkshire, England, in 1831, during the Victorian Era. Women were expected to be modest and refined, and not to fill a man’s role in any way. Bird saw things differently.

Because of her frail health, it was recommended that she travel, and travel she did. Bird visited Canada, Australia, Hawaii, Colorado, Japan, Tibet, Vietnam, Turkey, and more. She traveled alone when it was seen as inappropriate for a woman to do so. She was bold, she had opinions, she was an explorer and a great writer, all of which women were not expected to do in Victorian Britain.

Johnson picks up Bird’s story in 1872, when she is traveling from Liverpool to Australia and then to the Hawaiian Islands, which were known then as the Sandwich Islands. Using Bird’s words, Johnson eloquently described the Hawaiian waters: “The sea was like liquid sapphire.”

Johnson held the audience in her hand with this Englishwoman’s description of the Kingdom of Hawaii in the late 1870s. Bird did not sit around observing Hawaii and its people - she engaged in it. She ate poi with two fingers. She was a keen observer of the flowers and plants of the Islands. Bird went bullock hunting, even riding astride, which was unheard of for an Englishwoman of the period.

Being the adventurer that she was, Bird even traveled to a volcano. She got so close that her boots and gloves melted. She did not shy away from the rainstorms and the discomfort that nature can bring.

Bird also wrote about the softer side of culture. She described the stunning landscapes of Hawaii and the “music of the Hawaiian tongue.”

The movements of Johnson’s hands and body, the inflection in her voice, and the delivery of Bird’s words provided a convincing and beautiful portrayal of a woman of profound courage. In an era where women were not to travel alone, never to travel to foreign countries unaccompanied, never to ride a horse astride, and not to become a famous adventure writer, Isabella Bird defied the status quo.

Johnson is keeping Bird’s history alive by telling her story and giving us a picture of the past. The audience is keeping her story alive by listening to the narrative of this courageous woman and being inspired by her.