| 1 | The origin story |
Grizzly Adams was born in Medway, Massachusetts on October 22nd 1812, to the original Adams family (not the TV one!) that included the 2nd US president John Adams and the 6th US president John Quincy Adams. Surprisingly, his real name wasn’t Grizzly, but John Boyden Adams. He grew up in a rural household as the 2nd of 7 siblings, and by the age of 21, his talent for handling animals was already shining through. Young John was employed as the caretaker for a troupe of travelling animals, including large exotic mammals imported from Africa.
One day, however, John was savaged by a royal Indian Bengal tiger. He almost died and was confined to his bed for months, which temporarily pushed him into the safer career route of shoe cobbler, which he had apprenticed in as a teenager. The young grizzly Adams lived a quiet life in Boston for a while, marrying a young woman called Cylene Drury on April 12th 1836, and having 3 children with her.
But in 1849, Adams reached a crossroads, although he didn’t realise it yet. With the Californian gold rush in full swing, Adams imported $8000 worth of footwear to New York City, to sell to the thousands of excited miners who were constantly passing through. $8000 was a giant sum of money in those days, but tragedy struck when the entire shoe stock was burnt up in the infamous St Louis Wharf fire, at the halfway house port in Missouri. Shortly afterwards, John’s father Eleazer committed suicide, possibly because he had invested in young John’s scheme.
Despondent, young (ish) John turned his eye westwards himself. He promised his wife that he would send money home regularly, and bade her and his children farewell. He would join the Californian gold rush himself. He would become Grizzly Adams.
| 2 | Grizzly’s Californian dream |
Adams’ first mistake was to take the harsh southern route to California, passing through the deserts of New Mexico and Arizona. He almost succumbed to fatal illnesses twice before arriving in the rich golden landscape of California in late 1849.
Money-making schemes started flowing through Grizzly’s head instantly, and before 1850 dawned, he was squatting on an 800 acre plot of land near Stockton, which he quickly stocked with cattle. He invested in a plan to dam the Tuolumne River in order the mine the riverbed below for gold, staked several mining claims near Sonora, and operated a saloon and cavern near Woods’ Creek.
Grizzly certainly didn’t lose points for effort, but his luck was dire, as a sudden deluge of rain in the mountains washed away the half-completed dam. He was informed one day that his cattle had been stolen, and worse, the real landowners cottoned on to the fact that he was squatting there. Grizzly was whacked with a lawsuit in 1851 for not sharing his water with fellow miners, and despite facing bankruptcy, Adams continued on a wild property-buying spree. Unfortunately, the land he offered to the bank as collateral turned out to have been mortgaged already.
In 1852, Adams blew up in court, ranting against the injustice of the legal system against the common man trying to make a living. He stormed out, and when his ranch near French Creek was confiscated by creditors late in 1852, Adams headed for the mountains.
| 3 | Into the mountains |
Grizzly had nothing to show for his Californian project except for two oxen, a wagon, a Colt revolver, several rifles and bowie knives, clothes, blankets and some cooking utensils. He put these items on a creaky old wooden ox cart and headed northwards into the Sierra Nevada. Adams was sick of people and civilisation. He trekked for 200 long miles, stopping on the outskirts of Yosemite valley. For the next two years, he would live life as a mountain man.
Grizzly immediately felt at home in the wilderness: “I seemed to be a part of the vast landscape, a kind of demigod in the glorious and magnificent creation“. Befriending a group of Miwok Indians, Adams constructed a shelter and base near modern Pinecrest. Adams was now 40 years old, with long grey hair and a snowy white beard, but he was arguably entering the peak of his career. Over the next 30 months, Adams soon became an expert not only in killing and hiding animals, but also in crafting harnesses, pack-saddles, buckskin clothing, and snowshoes. He sold these goods to passing immigrants from the east, along with fellow hunters and nearby settlements. It was in this mountain retreat that Adams first became fascinated with the Californian grizzly, which was far larger and mightier than the black bears back east.
Gradually, Grizzly Adams began to be hired as hunting guide. He always set out from his Sierra Nevada base, but his explorations took him as far as the Canadian border, Mojave desert, and Salt Lake City. By 1854, there was barely a square meter of California that hadn’t felt his footstep. Slowly, the legend of Grizzly Adams grew. He was often told of secret mountain trails by the wise local Indians, who he treated with respect, unlike other mountain men who gave themselves the title of “Indian killer”.
| 4 | The heart of bear country |
In Spring 1854, Grizzly Adams was guiding a Sonoran merchant named Solon through the recently explored Yosemite valley, which the Indians knew as Ahwahnee (deep-grassy place). Picking their way through gnarly Native trails, the two spent three days hunting and skinning game, until one day, Adams sniffed out a grizzly bear den “by the headwaters of the Merced river”.
He watched the den patiently for three days, and when a gigantic mother grizzly wandered out absentmindedly, he heard the clear yapping of cubs behind her. Training a bear cub had long been a secret desire of Grizzly Adams, and using the bush as a camouflage to scuttle forward, he aimed carefully and fired 6 revolver shots into the grizzly mother’s chest.
She toppled over backwards, and was panting and moaning when Adams delivered the finishing blow with a slash to the throat. Adams entered the den and retrieved the cubs, but he had a problem – their eyes were still glued shut. Clearly, they were still feeding on their mother’s milk, and a mixture of sugar, flour, and water he offered them was ignored.
Despite her protestations, Adams took his gun and shot all but one of his greyhound’s cubs, to make room for bear cubs at the dinner table. Solon named his cub General Jackson, while Adams named his cub Ben Franklin. This bear would became Grizzly Adams’ faithful sidekick over the years ahead.
| 5 | The bear shows begin |
Another of Grizzly’s famous catches was a gigantic 1500 pound bear named Samson. This was believed to have been a record at the time, except for unverified boasts from local townspeople of slaying 1800, 2000, or even 2500 pound-ers.
By now, Adams’ collection of animals was growing, with badgers, wolves, elk and antelope also joining his Noah-like flock. Even in his mountain isolation, he had received word of the roaring success of animal fighting shows down in Los Angeles. And so, Adams and some Native pals moved his collection to Hooperville near Maripova, a town with a wooden pen which was perfect for chaining animals to. He even hired a band and a bartender, and the Mariposa Chronicle helped him out on March 10th 1854, stating that “‘Wild Yankee’ is making the ‘most extensive preparations’ for the entertainment of his friends next Sunday at Hooperville“”.
The show debuted on March 12th, starting with a large grizzly named Tom Thumb who fought three smaller grizzlies, and continuing with Jenny Lind the grizzly, who fought off a 6-strong wolf pack. The bears were also encouraged to wrestle and perform tricks, and the best performing animal received a prize.
The show was a roaring success, as was a second Hooverville show on March 26th, and a third best-selling show just west of Mariposa in early April. This was Grizzly Adams’ first taste of his later showbiz success, but he wasn’t ready to give up the mountain man life quite yet.
| 6 | Grizzly Adams meets Lady Washington |
Legend states that during winter 1853, Grizzly Adams’ brother William tracked him down to his mountainous Sierra Nevada cabin. Adams was astonished at the figure in the doorway, and the two embraced, but William was now a wealthy gold prospector. He implored his brother to come home, but Grizzly refused to return to his wife emptyhanded. Instead, William proposed a 50/50 business deal, where Adams would capture animals for circuses on the east coast, and William wound finance the ships to set sail from Oregon.
The only problem is that according to records, Adams didn’t have a brother called William, but nevertheless, when Grizzly Adams wrapped up his first bear shows in April 1854, he departed for Portland right away. He had recruited a hunter called William Sykes, and within 2 weeks, the party had reached the wilderness of Oregon, guided along secret trails by two of Adams’ Native friends. Adams spotted several large grizzly bear tracks, and before long, he had dispatched a gigantic mother grizzly with one bullet to her chest and another to her brain. It took forever to lasso the two cubs and tie them to a tree, and one cub only calmed down when Adams beat her with a cudgel.
Then he changed tactics: “I patted her shaggy coat; and she gradually assumed a milder aspect“. He named this cub Lady Washington, and the two would grow to be best friends. She would cuddle up to Adams to keep him warm over freezing nights, carry loads on her back, pull a sled, and even let Adams ride on her back.
When Adams finally reached Portland, Oregon, he loaded his animal posse onto the boats as agreed, but kept the bears most precious to him, including Ben Franklin and Lady Washington.
| 7 | Bear brawl – a paw to the head |
Throughout 1854 and 1855, Grizzly Adams continued to live the mountain man’s life, but by summer 1856, he was officially a resident of 143 Clay Street.
Hardy though he was, Adams had suffered a growing list of mishaps which forced him to shift focus towards bear shows for his income. In 1855, he was travelling with his faithful 1 year old cub Ben Franklin, when a ferocious she-bear suddenly charged, with her 3 cubs watching on in the background. The bear swatted the rifle out of Adams’ hands in the blink of an eye, knocking him to the floor and sinking its teeth into his head. Adams was saved only by his quick thinking in climbing a nearby tree. White with fear, Adams watched from the branches as the she-bear bit Ben Franklin’s head, destroyed one of his eyes, and shook him around like a rag doll. “It was a terrible sight to see this monster combat“, said a report by the San Francisco Bulletin.
The she-bear was spooked enough to flee with her cubs, but in a separate attack in the Sierra Nevada, Adams suffered severe wounds to his scalp, which left a coin-sized hole in his skull just about the forehead.
This attack would lead to his demise, but nevertheless, Adams still had great days ahead of him in summer 1856. After retrieving his animals from Howards’ ranch near Stockton, where he had stored them for a while, Grizzly Adams made a grand entrance to San Francisco, parading his bears and pet lion through the streets while amazed onlookers watched on. Who was this mountain man who had appeared from nowhere? Were bears friendlier than people had once believed? These were the days before Wikipedia, and nobody knew.
| 8 | Grizzly Adams strolls into town |
Grizzly Adams then proceeded to open the “Mountaineer’s Museum” on Clay Street, San Francisco. This museum was a world first, boasting 10 bears, a mountain lion, several eagles, and several elks, not to mention pelicans, eagles and a slithery Californian condor. Adams nailed up a huge wooden sign and weekend visitors started to flock instantly, paying 25 cents for admission. Adams’ beloved Lady Washington and Ben Franklin wore heavy leather collars connected to 5 foot chains in the basement, themselves connected to unbreakable bolts in the floor.
Adams would personally guide the locals around the museum, and demonstrate all his mountain man skills by climbing onto Ben Franklin’s back. Visitors would wow as the chained bear struggled to stand up and throw him off, standing on its hind legs and swatting with its paws in the dusty basement. The museum also housed three excitable cubs which Adams would feed bowls of corn meal and milk as amused spectators watched on.
During this period, Adams would still return to the Sierra Nevada mountains periodically to befriend new animals – he had a reputation to keep up, after all. Adams’ bears were now so perfectly trained that they would sit calmly on the street while Adams dined in a restaurant.
By 1857, the museum had caught the attention of newspaper writer Theodore H. Hittell, who later interviewed Adams in great detail and released The Adventures of James Capen Adams in 1860. Thanks to the newspaper’s glowing reports, Adams had enough cash pouring in by summer 1857 to move the bears from the cramped basement to a much larger building, where he renamed his attraction the Pacific Museum.
| 9 | Grizzly’s booming circus empire |
Grizzly Adams was now a bona fide celebrity, rubbing shoulders with figures such as future civil war general William Herman and exotic dancer Lola Montez, who kept a pet grizzly bear herself. He was even famous back in New York – some consider Grizzly Adams to have been the first coast-to-coast US celebrity, a concept which seems laughably quaint today.
His activities were ever varied. Sometimes, the bear menagerie would pop up as sideshows in circuses, like Lee’s circus in 1856, while on other days they performed in San Francisco’s most prestigious theatres. Bear-bull fights were a common weekend treat in 1850s California. Families would watch from makeshift wooden stands as a bull with its horns sawed off charged a giant bear in an arena, and met its demise as a crushing paw blow broke its back. Other times, the bull would escape the area, and many of the bear combatants were caught by Grizzly Adams. It was common for San Franciscans to see Adams walk his two beloved bears down the boulevard in the evenings like a pair of pet dogs.
For some reason, John was now going by the name of his brother James Capen Adams, but his current nickname was “Wild Yankee”, which gradually morphed into the familiar Grizzly Adams of today.
Sadly, tragedy struck late in 1858, when Adams’ beloved Ben Franklin passed away, either from the injuries of 1855 or a poor adaption to city life. Adams was despondent, and in the Evening Bulletin, Franklin was given a tearful obituary worthy of a king, titled “Death of a distinguished Californian native”.
By 1859, history had started to repeat itself. The bear museum required massive operational overheads, including animal feed and wages for helpers, and ultimately, the bank was forced to confiscate the building, with Adams just whishing his menageries away in time.
| 10 | The end (or so it seemed) |
Adams also knew that his time on Earth was short. His scalp wound from 1855 had been ripped open again during a wrestling bout with his least controllable bear, General Fremont. The brain tissue was left exposed so that “its workings were plainly visible” – pulsations of the brain could be seen after every heartbeat.
Adams’ main priority was now leaving enough money for his beloved wife back in Boston to survive on. In 1859, Adams sold his properties in California, and loaded his remaining animals and bears onto an eastward-bound ship. The voyage took three long months, and after reaching New York, Grizzly joined forces with legendary circus owner PT Barnum, to display his California Menagerie. But disaster struck again, when a monkey he was training bit into his still-raw scalp wound.
Half-dead already, Adams sold his beloved bears to Barnum for a tidy profit. Still, the legendary mountain man begged the astonished Barnum to be allowed to perform for another 10 weeks for a $500 bonus. Adams let his wife accompany him on this final tour, and on the final day, Adams could barely stand up on stage.
Nevertheless, like the tough old mountain man he was, he completed the contract. He returned to the family home in Massachusetts, and even then, Grizzly refused to be confined to his bed. He took the horse and cart to town one day, when suddenly, a bump in the road split the wound in his scalp open once again, sending a fountain of blood splatting into the celling. He was carried into a nearby drugstore, and on October 25th 1860, Grizzly Adams finally died. His family and friend PT Barnum were deeply grieved, but nevertheless, after 11 long years of grizzliness, Adams died a success. He had finally succeeded in his long mission to scrape together a comfortable sum of money for his wife.
Starting in 1976, Adams rose from the dead, starring in the popular TV series The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams, where he was played by Dan Haggerty. His beloved Ben Franklin also got in on the resurrection act – he was played by Bozo the bear (1961-1999).
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