The Last Grizzly

On the morning of July 5th in the year 1846 United States Army Captain
John C. Fremont rose to his feet and briefly addressed the group of
nearly two hundred heavily armed Californians who stood before him.
Keeping his remarks brief, for everyone present knew who he was and
why they had been assembled, Fremont then proposed to the men that
they enlist in the United States Army under his command, and that he,
in turn, would do his best by them if they would unquestioningly
accept his authority, unceasingly fight with honor, and always respect
the chastity of women. To a man they all shouted their agreement.

And just what, you ask yourself, just what does respecting the
chastity of women in California over a century and a half ago have to
do with the California Grizzly Bear?

Your patience, please.

At the time which Fremont spoke to these men – 1846 – California had
an estimated population of roughly ten thousand Grizzly Bears. For
centuries they had reigned unchallenged at the top of the local food
chain and were feared by all other animals in the state, including
humans. Weighing in on an average of between twelve hundred to
eighteen hundred pounds, these goliaths would reach over eight feet in
height when standing on their hind legs. The musculature in the
shoulders of their forelegs was such that a single swipe of a front
paw could easily provide them with a fresh meal, or permanently
dissuade a charging mountain lion, or effortlessly break a man’s back.
Their claws could thoroughly rake the flesh from any animal and their
jaws were powerful enough to bite through bone. Despite their size
they could move quickly. Fearing nothing they had spread throughout
the entire state, and not only the snowy mountains of the Sierra
Nevada but also the farmlands of the central valley and the warm
climates of southern California were home to them as well. The weapons
carried by men of the early eighteen hundreds had the capacity to kill
these behemoths, but until about the year 1849 when the repeating
rifle was developed these more primitive firearms carried by
Californians were of the single shot variety. So, when meeting a
Grizzly Bear, it was usually a case of kill it with the first shot or
feel those claws and teeth a few seconds later. The Bad News for the
hunter was that they were often shaking so badly that they missed
hitting that vital spot on the bear with that first shot. The Good
News for them was that
the bear would then be so thorough when its turn came there would be
no evidence left that their last act as a living person was to pee in
their pants.

Throughout the early eighteen hundreds, when the Grizzly still reigned
supreme, California was under the rule of Spain. In the 1840’s, as
more and more Americanos poured into the territory, there was
increasing unrest and opposition to Spanish rule. In June of 1846
those tensions boiled over into an armed confrontation between some
unruly Yankees and Spanish soldiers at Sonoma. The Yankees declared
the formation of the California Republic and adopted as their symbol a
flag with a Grizzly Bear on it. The Bear Flag Revolt had begun. The
fighting Californians took their name from the new flag and became
known as Los Osos – the Bears, although it was also rumored that the
grizzled, unkempt, and unwashed appearance of the Americans was in
fact the real source of the nickname. But whatever, the rebels
embraced it proudly. A few weeks later, on July fifth, the United
States got officially involved in the dispute by ordering the above
mentioned interference of Captain Fremont and his induction of the
Bears into his army. And just a few days after that, on July 9th,
United States Navy Lieutenant Joseph Revere raised the American flag
at both Sonoma as well as at Sutter’s Fort, claiming California for
the United States, and the brief life of Los Osos and the California
Republic came to an abrupt end.

The year 1849 was a turning point for the Grizzly in California,
although no one realized it at the time. That year began the huge
influx of gold-seekers, and each year from then on the human
population of California grew by many thousands. These men came for
wealth, and although very few of them actually found it they weren’t
about to let anything – even an eight foot, two thousand pound Grizzly
– stand in their way of getting it. At about this same time the new
repeating rifle made its way into California, and the combination of
these two factors spelled the end for the dominance of the California
Grizzly. From 1850 on they showed a steady decline. 1850 was also the
year when California became part of the United States, and the new
state fittingly adopted the Bear Flag under which Los Osos had fought
during the brief tenure of the California Republic.

But the real Grizzlies were seen less and less. In fact they were seen
so infrequently that an encounter with one often made it into the
newspapers. In 1866, for instance, a huge Grizzly was killed on the
ranch of James Lovett. It had been using his cattle for an easy
buffet, so a bounty was placed on its head and hunters tracked it down
and shot it. It was so large that they couldn’t lift it onto a wagon,
so they dragged its body back to the ranch. When it was weighed
(history does not, unfortunately, record exactly how they managed to
take that measurement) it was found to weigh 2,200 pounds, and
newspapers ran stories proclaiming that the largest Grizzly in
California had just been killed. Then in 1873 another rancher by the
name of John Lang in Los Angeles County shot and killed a Grizzly
which weighed in at 2,320 pounds.

Grizzlies were often frequently captured for a popular “sport” of the
times – the Bull & Bear Fight, in which a longhorn steer and a Grizzly
were placed in an arena to fight to the death while crowds of men
cheered, booed, and, of course, placed wagers. It’s said that this
event gave birth to the terms ‘bull’ and ‘bear’ for the stock market –
a Bull Market being an up market because a bull hooked his horns
upward in attack, while a Bear Market became a downward moving market
because a bear swung his paws downward at the bull. Perhaps, but it’s
difficult to imagine the terminology from a bloody California sport
spreading three thousand miles east to take root on Wall Street.

One of the more popular encounters of that time with a Grizzly had to
do with the famous ‘Spanish Dancer’, Miss Lola Montez. Montez was a
world famous personality, and not just for being an exotic dancer. Her
series of affairs with European royalty, writers, and artists had made
headlines in the United States. In 1846, the same year in which the
Bear Flag Revolution was taking place in California, Lola Montez was
introduced to King Ludwig the First of Bavaria. Upon the introduction
the King asked Lola, while both were standing and conversing in the
midst of the assembled royal guests, if the very attractive female
assets barely contained within her evening gown were in fact actually
as large and impressive as they seemed. As the crowd fell silent at
the King’s question and the hushed ensemble awaited her reply, Lola
smiled coyly, then slowly yet proudly removed her clothing so that the
king could see the answer for himself. The king was impressed both by
her frankness as well as by what he now plainly saw and he rewarded
her by making her a countess and granting her a sizable annuity. And
then he made her his mistress as well. With exploits such as this
preceding her visit to California Lola was rightfully famous. So when
she performed her exotic dance in San Francisco it was done to
consistently sold-out theaters, and when she married a newspaperman
and settled down in the California town of Grass Valley she was a
local celebrity. At some point her new husband and friends told her
all about the California Grizzly and Lola decided that she wanted one.
So a young bear was captured for her and she adopted it. Now she was
an eccentric local celebrity.

The Grizzly Bear and Lola got along famously and the bear was a
fixture at the frequent social gatherings held at Lola’s home. The
Grizzly quickly became a favorite member of the population of Grass
Valley. Unfortunately the same could not be said for Lola’s new
husband, and one day the bear bit him. Angered at his wound, and
perhaps angered as well at this rival for Lola’s affections, the
husband went back inside the house, got his gun, and killed Lola’s pet
bear. Lola divorced him and in 1855 left Grass Valley to resume her
career, performing her scandalous Spider Dance to packed houses and
morally outraged reviews around the world. Her former home fell into
disrepair and was condemned. She never returned to visit the town
again, or to visit the final resting place of her beloved bear.

But the encounters with Grizzlies grew fewer and farther between. In
1902 President Teddy Roosevelt, an avid outdoorsman, brought notoriety
to all bears when he went on a hunting expedition and, in a famous
moment of sympathy, refused to shoot a bear because it was too young.
Although this tale is often told as being set in California and
involving a Grizzly, it actually took place in Mississippi and
involved a black bear. Nevertheless the national publicity it evoked
brought a more sympathetic attitude to the plight of bears all around
the country, including the Grizzly in California, which by now was
seldom seen. The newspapers got hold of the story of “Teddy’s Bear”,
and thus was born a stuffed toy; a warm fuzzy bear with which children
still, a century later, snuggle to sleep at night.

The last California Grizzly Bear was shot and killed in 1923 by a man
named Jessie Agnew.  He had a ranch in the area of what is now Horse
Corral and Big Meadow. Mr. Agnew was awakened in the middle of the
night by the screams of his frightened horses, so he grabbed his rifle
and ran out to the corral to see what the trouble was. There he saw a
Grizzly chasing his horses around the corral, so he raised the rifle
to his shoulder and fired. Jessie Agnew did not know at the time that
he was killing the last Grizzly Bear in the State of California – he
was just protecting his stock. But when that bullet left the rifle the
last Grizzly died, and died ignominiously, for by then the reign of
the Grizzlies was long over and they had been largely forgotten. As is
Jessie Agnew now forgotten, and although he still rests in his grave
near Zumwalt Meadow in Cedar Grove not one man in a million would ever
guess that the last of a species died at his hands; the Last Grizzly.

In 1924 there was a report of a Grizzly sighting in the Sierra Madre
Mountains of Santa Barbara County, but when hunters tried to follow up
on it the bear, if it existed, could not be found, and the report
remained unconfirmed. Also in 1924 members of a crew working in the
Cedar Grove area reported seeing a mother Grizzly and her cub. Again
the sighting remained unrepeated and unconfirmed and the California
Grizzly was declared to be extinct, leaving behind for its legacy only
some stock market terminology, a blurry picture on a state flag, and a
cuddly stuffed toy; a sad – even depressing – legacy for so formidable
a creature.

In the year 1953 an obscure piece of legislation slowly made its way
through the California legislature, and it had to do with that
aforementioned blurry picture on the state flag. Among other items
contained within this not-notable piece of legislation were guidelines
as to exactly how California should depict the bear which was the most
striking part of the state flag. The bear had actually been on the
flag for over a century, but the art work was irritating to many who
claimed that the animal thereon pictured looked more like a wild boar
or even a hunchbacked pig. So in 1953 some unnamed bureaucrat’s
assistant was assigned the task of spending days, perhaps even weeks,
referencing texts on bear anatomy and consulting with zoologists in
order to accurately put into words exactly what a California Grizzly
Bear should look like, and then composing the language which mandated
that the bear depicted on the state flag be altered accordingly. A few
months later the California legislature passed this bill and it was
signed into law by then Governor Earl Warren in June of 1953. Shortly
thereafter all California flags were changed so as to accurately
represent the California Grizzly Bear. Yet by 1953 this bear on the
state flag, accurate or not, had already been the last Grizzly Bear in
California for thirty years.

So – what did protecting the chastity of women in 1846 have to do with
the Last Grizzly?
Nothing at all. The flower of California womanhood remained unsullied
throughout the Bear Flag Revolt and the years following.

Except, perhaps, for that of Lola Montez.
                                                       -----------------------
Thanks to Ranger Frank Helling, longtime naturalist in Kings Canyon
National Park, for helping with the few details that are known about
Jessie Agnew, the man who shot the Last Grizzly.