The Last Grizzly — R. Leland Waldrip

The rugged recreational terrain of Yellowstone Park persists as an environment where humans can peacefully co-exist with creatures of the wild … under normal circumstances. But what happens when an uncontrollable event alters the conditions which govern an animal's life? How does this effect the people who happen upon its territory?

U.S. Park Service Ranger Ward Palmer narrates this intense story of a grizzly bear family. The unusual color, character, and behavior of this bear drew Palmer's attention in its youth, but their paths cross again dramatically years later when it terrorizes a group of hikers.

With a unique blend of multiple points of view, R. Leland Waldrip.s The Last Grizzly reveals the perceptions and experiences of the yellow-faced bear and the people who encounter him. Waldrip carries the reader through unexpected affronts and the torment the bear endures while being hunted by hounds; being flown out of the park and away from human contact; suffering attack and injury in the wild; and, upon his return, by the spreading flames of the 1988 Yellowstone fire.

Rich, picturesque natural imagery and the timely issues of conservation and hunting practices are woven into the fabric of this tension filled work as campers, hikers, fishermen, and ranchers fall into life-threatening confrontations with the bear. But when elk hunters unwittingly encounter the anomalous bear in the San Juan Mountains, they spur a dramatic climax of teeth and arrows that raises the question of the tenuous quality of man's role in the balance of nature in their meeting with The Last Grizzly in Colorado.