The Bear on Yesler's Grounds: An Urban Panic

Dr. J. Eugene Jordan’s big black bear, whose home has been in the rear of H. L. Yesler’s residence since a few weeks old, broke loose last evening and for half an hour was monarch of all he surveyed. During his brief period of liberty, he terrified several hundred people and chased four men. About 7 o’clock the big fellow was discovered walking carelessly about Mr. Yesler’s grounds. A dozen men armed with clubs and ropes attempted his capture. The bear contented himself for a time with running in circles and clawing a flower pot. When one member of the capturing party advanced, the bear wheeled around and growled. The man dropped his equipment and sprang for an apple tree, pursued by the bear, which proved an expert climber. The man climbed to the topmost branch, but the branch broke, and he fell to the grass. The bear stood on his hind legs, seized him, and proceeded to hug him very affectionately. The man yelled for help, and his companions beat the animal off. The bear then charged the crowd, which fled. Four men ran into Mr. Yesler’s two-story barn. One man dodged behind a manger; three others took to the upper story, closely followed by the beast. One man sprang from a window twenty-five feet from the ground into a bramble bush; another jumped fifteen feet from a window. The third went up a rope, with the bear growling below, until the animal cooled down and was captured with a lariat. This is the same bear that was intended to make Sarah Bernhardt famous as a huntress on her last visit to Seattle; it was meant to be planted in the woods at Green Lake for her to shoot, but the owner would not sell it.