Joseph Pacheco
Year Inducted: 2002
Parker Ranch | Hawai'i
Joe Pacheco was 15 years old when he started at Parker Ranch, and his first assignment was helping put out the famous Hanaipoe fire -- a brush fire that smoldered across pastures for six months. Back in those days, firebreaks were dug by hand and nearby tree branches were used to beat back the flames.
Over his career at Parker, he trained mules, worked as a rough rider, served as foreman of the breaking pen, became assistant cowboy foreman under Yutaka Kimura and ran the ranch’s Paauhau station.
His granddaughter remembers that Joe’s trademark was a neatly cared-for workplace. The grass around his cowboy house was always nicely trimmed, and once he even tidied up a ranch pond by planting water lilies and filling it with goldfish.
“He was a perfectionist and wanted things to look right,” she says.
But his real skill was his ability with animals and expertise as a trainer. A big man in more ways than one, Joe’s abundance of kindness and gentleness became mutual respect between him and the animals - and people - he knew. And that is how he is remembered today.