The Summer of 63 & Bear Hunting

I was fortunate and got a summer job at our local paper mill in Munising, MI during the summer of 1963. My best friend Joe Hase was similarly employed. Late in the summer Joe and I decided we would enjoy trying our hand at hunting bear. Black bear season opened in the late summer and we had a few weeks we could hunt before going back to school.

I consulted my girlfriend's father who was quite an outdoors man and any advice he could provide would be valuable. He told me of some areas bears might browse and told me that bears like apples in the fall of the year. Baiting an area with apples might induce a bear to frequent our bait. Joe and I traveled the countryside finding wild apples and chose an area north of the Carmody Road. Each evening before work we would take some apples and head to our bait site and check it out. Sure enough after a while a bear did start feeding on the apples because we could see bear scat and evidence of disturbance in the pile of apples.

When bear season opened we had dreams of bagging a big one. Now, what the hell we would've done with one is another question. My Mother and Dad ate fish but wild game was not a fare at our table. I wouldn't know how to dress a bear. Joe's situation was a little better off, his family did some hunting and perhaps they might take some bear meat, but I'm sure my mother would not have. Those thoughts did not surface in our consciousness.

The problem Joe and I had was we were working mostly the midnight shift and the only time we could really hunt the area was evening hours. We did not get off work until 7:00 AM and it was really too late by the time we got to the bait sight. Bears tend to be nocturnal and work interrupted our ability to bear at the bait during prime time opportunity. Nonetheless we would carry our guns in our cars, and dutifully head out to the bait area to check it out.

Joe got caught up in spending time with his girlfriend and soon was missing some of the excursions. This led to the incidence I want to relate. One evening before work I had driven out to the baited area, parked and prepared to hunt the area. I had a Winchester Model 94 Lever action 30/30. The gun would hold about six or eight rounds and was a sturdy gun that felt good in my hands.

As I walked the small two rut dirt road peering into the cover one could dream about the opportunity of a large black bear coming out onto the road and presenting me with a shot. Of course your mind could also envision an enraged black bear charging out of the brush intent on attacking and devouring me as it stored fat for the winter. When you are young, by yourself in the woods, and have a flamboyant imagination as I have that is where your mind tends to settle.

Dusk now began to close in. In the dimming light objects that are immovable become animated. Stumps begin to look like critters. You stand and look, did that object move, naw, its a stump, no by God it moved. Closer examination reveals a stump crouched down partially obscured by a hillock mimicking the appearance of a black bear about to pounce. Of course those sites and sounds heighten your excitement and your mind can really create all kinds of scenes you may not want to participate in.

All of a sudden three shots rang out. They were close by. In the distance I heard a voice drift through the hardwoods, "He's heading north." I am north! Holy Shit! The two rut road I was on ran mostly east/west and was fairly straight in the section I was on. So of course, my mind now has this wounded, enraged bear madly careening through the brush trying to escape its antagonists. It is ready to maul and kill any other potential assailant it runs into. Holy Shit!

As I crept along, finger on the safety, hair on my neck on end, every nerve quivering with fear and excitement I was poised to make my play. Annoyingly a thought kept intruding into my concentration that I was all alone. What the hell would I do if the bear came at me and I didn't kill it first? Holy Shit!

These thoughts grow in intensity at times like this. Your eyesight narrows and focuses on movement. Your become oblivious to things around you except for what you anticipate to be the source of the bear attack.

As I slowly, so slowly eased down the road about ten feet away, to my left and behind me a partridge flushed. Now a partridge in my home area is not truly a partridge, but a ruffed grouse. Their stubby powerful wings make a noise that will cause an experienced hunter to flinch even when they are hunting the bird and expect a flush. I was expecting a bear, not a bird. I cannot adequately describe the onset of anxiety, fear, and downright panic that took hold of me when that partridge flushed just behind me. Holy Shit!

As soon as I was able to calm down I jacked all of my shells out of the rifle, walked back to the car and got the hell out of the woods. I would like to tell you that Joe and I were successful that year, but we were not. I've never killed a bear and now have no desire to do so. I did learn fear that day, I also learned that I was able to function in that environment. However, I also learned that I can be humbled by a bird that weighs nor more than a pound or two. I will never forget that incident as long as I live.