Man-Eating Black Bears: Volume 1 - Eastern North America - Paperback

by Ted Gorsline (Author)

Man-eating black bears, volume 1, is a classic in bear literature, in that it is the first book to ever gather together, hundreds of stories about man-eating black bear attacks on human beings. Its one of three consecutive volumes, totalling about 1,000 pages, that in total documents between 400 and 500 man-eaters in minute detail. It explains why the popular term "predatory black bear" is junk science. Such animals really are man-eaters.Volume 1 concerns itself with man-eaters from east of the Mississipi River and east of the Ontario/Manitoba border dating back as far as the Jesuit Relations of 1672.There have been many man-eating black bears in states such as Pennsylvania, New York, Michigan, and in the Canadian provinces of Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick that are long forgotten. Black bears have eaten people in the city of Detroit. The book rebootsmany old stories and collates them with a great many new incidents. There have been a minimum of 10 man-eating black bears in North America in the past three years. Man-eating black bears develop peculiar traits that differ from most other types of man-eating wild animals such as lions, tigers and leopards.They are just about always healthy and well fed and they often eat their human victims alive. They can do this because they have strong arm muscles and short hooked claws, designed for tree climbing, that enables them to hold their victims so firmly that they cannot escape. They have no need to kill their their prey quickly. They are eaters not killers. The pioneers called this forgotten trait the "bear hug" and it really does exist although it just a firm grip and does not kill of itself. Black bears enjoy eating human flesh and blood as much as any other food and will often eat it in preference to more readily available foods such as fish and hamburger.Volume one also documents rabid black bears, with the furious form of the disease, that have been roaming the woodlands of eastern North America since 1970. It also lists missing people that the author is convinced have been taken from lonely forest trails by bears. It discusses the link between man-eating black bears, human remains and the mythical Wendigo.Man-eating black bears volume 1 is very well illustrated with many photos including pictures of the Lone Creek man-eater, The Lake Abitibi man-eater, The Madoc rabid bear, and possibly the Lake Opeongo man-eater.The author also discusses the background of the individuals that helped him to ground his man-eater studies. For example, he accompanied the wildlife biologist George Kolenosky on his bear studies. Kolenosky was the lead investigator for the Lone Creek Man-eater, the Lake Opeongo man-eater and the Lake Abitibi man-eater. George also helped to shoot the Lake Abitibi man-eater. Mr. Gorsline was at lone Creek in Algonquin Park hours after the Lone Creek man-eater, hunted down, killed and ate three young men. He photographed the the search for the missing boys and the men who hunted the bear down. These very detailed photographs appear for the first time ever in volume 1.

Author Biography

Ted Gorsline, a native of Stratford, Ontario, Canada, is a former vaquero who worked for Stanley E. Brock at Dadanawa Ranch in what was then British Guiana but is now Guyana in South America. Mr. Brock was writing books about wild animals and managing Dadanawa, which at 3,000 square miles, was the largest open range cattle ranch in the western hempishere. Mr. Gorsline looked after Brock's captive wild animals including jaguars, puma and tapir. Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom star Jim Fowler heard about Brock's menagerie and brought Warren Garst, Wild Kingdom's director of photography, to Dadanawa to meet Stan Brock. Garst hired Stan Brock to be a Wild Kingdom star because of his great skill at roping from a running horse. He also hired Mr. Gorsline as an animal handler. Stan Brock now runs a foundation called Remote Area Medical. He has provided more free medical to the poor people of the world than Mother Teresa. Wild Kingdom, which was the most popular so-called wildlife TV show of all time, was largely faked, using captive animals from place like the St. Louis Zoo so they needed animal handlers to work with the animals off camera. The W.K. work led Mr. Gorsline to work for a man named Dick Robinson, who did the animal handling for feature films such as Robert Redford's "The Legend of Jeremiah Johnson." Mr. Gorsline got to know captive bears first hand. He then went to the University of Guelph and studied wildlife biology. He became a freelance writer and columnist for the Toronto Sun for eleven years. He was at Lone Creek in Algonquin Park when a bear killed and ate three boys. He then ran a bear hunting operation in Ontario getting to know the difference between wild bears and captive movie bears. He then worked at the Nazinga Game Ranch in Burkina Faso for two years, doing such things as culling buffalo and tagging elephants. He then founded Kilombero North Safaris in Tanzania in the heart of the very worst man-eating lion country in Africa. He hunted man-eating lions and crocs. Against this backdrop Mr. Gorsline decided to write the first book ever about man-eating black bears and why they have become increasingly common.