He Bit the Bear!

Excerpt from: Game Reminiscences of Yesteryears by Walter R. Welch, California Fish and Game.

Palo Alto, March 13, 1931

Dear Friend Walter — During the late sixties a Frenchman by the name of Barbone, while fishing in Pilarcitos Creek, in San Mateo County, came onto a grizzly bear. He turned and tried to make his getaway, but the bear was too quick for him, overtook him and grabbed him by the thigh. Barbone succeeded in breaking the bear’s hold on his thigh, but it grabbed him by the arm, and he grabbed the bear by the nose with his teeth, whereat the bear let go and so did Barbone, and both started in opposite directions. Barbone’s injuries, while serious, were not fatal.

Subsequently this bear began to kill cattle on the Dennison Ranch, located near Half Moon Bay, and was finally killed by my uncle, Patricio Soto, with a gun used to shoot whale, that he had secured from a whaling station then located on San Pedro Point, near Half Moon Bay.

Uncle dug a hole in the side of a hill, baited the bear and when it came, fired one shot at it. The bear was wounded, fell into a gully, crawled into the woods and was never seen or heard of after that…

                        Yours truly,

                        John Lucas Greer.