A crown for a keeper

Dr. Lee Simmons had a perfectly good monkey suit hanging in a closet at home.

But civic duty trumped Simmons’ sense of fashion — brown tones with brown accents. So there he was, Omaha’s longtime zookeeper, standing in cream-colored tights, knickers, embroidered jacket and crown as Omaha’s 113th Ak-Sar-Ben king.

Talk about a wild kingdom.

“It’s a very great honor,’’ Simmons said. “We appreciate it, but there’s not a whole lot of wiggle room with these folks. I’ve got a brown tuxedo I would have far and away preferred to wear.’’

The lanky veterinarian was happy to grin and bear the pomp and circumstance of the Ak-Sar-Ben Coronation Ball at Qwest Center Omaha on Saturday night. The festivities were in recognition of Simmons’ leadership in elevating Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo to among the nation’s best.

Simmons, 71, retired in March after nearly four decades as zoo director. He is chairman of the Omaha Zoo Foundation.

The annual gala sponsored by the Knights of Ak-Sar-Ben civic organization was a far different setting than the wild animal exhibits down the river at the zoo or the dusty grasslands of Africa, where Simmons built a reputation as one of the world’s leading zoo veterinarians and wildlife conservationists.

“Early on in life, I simply managed to stumble onto something that was so much fun, so exciting and so challenging that it made it easy to do a good job,’’ he said. “I stress ‘fun,’ so there’s some excitement every morning when you go to work and never know what you’ll face that day.’’

Animal births, for example.

Simmons recalled the birth of a grizzly bear cub. Just before giving birth, the grizzly mother tore the grate off a floor drain and a newborn cub promptly tumbled 4 or 5 feet down the 3-inch pipe. The 2-pound cub bawled in distress.

“It sounded like a screaming trumpet,’’ Simmons said.

Zookeepers moved the mother to another enclosure and stretched their arms down the drain to fetch the cub. But it was out of reach. So Simmons called his wife, Marie, and asked her to load the family’s shop vacuum into the car and hustle it to the zoo.

Simmons slid the vacuum’s hose down the pipe and turned on the machine. “The moment the tone of the motor changed, we knew we had the little bugger,’’ Simmons said.

Simmons pulled the hose out of the pipe. Stuck by suction on the end of the hose was the uninjured cub.

“Making things work. That’s the excitement, the challenge and the fun. It keeps your juices going.’’

Under Simmons’ leadership, Henry Doorly Zoo evolved from a bleak Midwestern menagerie into a globally acclaimed collection of animals and exhibits seen by more than a million visitors each year. Just about every insect, plant and creature inhabiting the jungles, deserts, savannas, waters and islands at the zoo dwells in a realm Simmons created.

“We want every visitor to have a fun day and enjoy themselves, but our much bigger motive is to expose them to a natural world and animals. We infect people with the conservation virus,” Simmons said. “We’re giving them the message that we need to preserve habitat and wild spaces, at the same time we’re providing, in many instance, the last safe place for these species and animals.’’

Simmons said there is no doubt that zoos will be the last sanctuaries for some species.

“They simply won’t exist in the wild, or there will be so few in the wild that they’re no longer biologically viable,’’ he said.

Henry Doorly Zoo is a leader in the conservation and preservation of wild species. The zoo’s world-class genetics lab has discovered 20 species of lemurs. The reproductive department is one of the top five in the nation. It maintains the world’s largest sperm bank for gorillas and wild cattle.

The nutrition department is strong. The rare-plant reproduction program is the only one of significance in North America. It cares for hundreds of thousands of rare and endangered orchids, including Malagasy orchids.

High school students take classes at the zoo. About 150 college students from around the world live, work and study at the zoo each year. Some are now young habitat conservation leaders in their countries.

Simmons came to Omaha as the zoo veterinarian in 1966. Wire cages and facilities dated to the 1920s. More than 40 years and $160 million in development later, new exhibits help the zoo expand global research and conservation programs.

Simmons said he shared the Ak-Sar-Ben honor with the zoo’s talented staff, a progressive and supportive board of directors, and his wife of 50 years.

“I got lucky to find something that was fun to do. I also got lucky in finding somebody to live with who was extraordinarily tolerant and went along with my nonsense,” he said.

The Simmons household was a nursery and hospital for baby gorillas, orangutans, jaguars and other wildlife years before such facilities were constructed at the zoo. Marie Simmons was a surrogate mother to them all.

“It was a family project,’’ she said. “The mothering instinct comes out. You do whatever is necessary for that baby. Our lives centered around the zoo because of its needs. It’s a partnership.’’

Marie gave more zoo talks around the community than did her husband in some years. Like her husband, she served on the boards of numerous civic organizations.

“Marie actually knows more people by first name in this town than I do,’’ Simmons said.

He said it’s important to give back to the community.

Ak-Sar-Ben previously honored the Simmons family when daughter Heidi was a page and crown bearer to the queen in 1981. Daughter Heather was queen in 1990. Simmons was inducted into the organization’s Court of Honor in 2005.

Simmons said he is optimistic about the future of the city and the zoo.

“Omaha is a unique town,’’ he said. “The future of civic projects is very good. Given its population and economic base, Omaha is more generous and does it better than anywhere else. Omaha has always done above and beyond. Times are tough, but there’s no question we’ll come out bigger and better. The future is very bright.’’

Contact the writer:

444-1127, david.hendee@owh.com

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