Gladys Brandt, 96; Educator Advocated Native Hawaiian Rights

Gladys Kamakakuokalani Ainoa Brandt, 96, a pioneering educator who fought for native Hawaiian rights, died Wednesday in Honolulu of natural causes.

Born in 1906, Brandt was an eyewitness to major events in modern Hawaiian history, including the 1917 funeral of Hawaii’s last reigning monarch, Queen Lili’uokalani.

Brandt’s father was a counterrevolutionary who worked to restore the monarchy of Lili’uokalani in the mid-1890s. He later changed the family name to Ainoa, which means “to eat in freedom.”

A graduate of the University of Hawaii, Brandt embarked on a teaching career in 1927. She became Hawaii’s first female public school principal in 1943 and its first female district superintendent of schools in 1962. In 1963, she became the first native Hawaiian principal of Kamehameha School for Girls, and later oversaw the merging of the girls and boys schools.

She retired in 1971, but remained active in charitable and civic projects, including helping to lead a campaign that exposed the corrupt management practices of the trustees of a $10-billion charitable trust known as the Bishop Estate, which funds the Kamehameha Schools. Her efforts resulted in the ouster of the five trustees, all prominent citizens.

Brandt also played a key role in establishing the Center for Hawaiian Studies at the University of Hawaii, and was a member of the university’s Board of Regents from 1983 to 1989.