Speaker 1: M. What you're dealing with, especially with ger Sticker, is
Speaker 1: a young man who is really really influenced by romanticism,
Speaker 1: the sort of dark unknown out there. This week on
Speaker 1: the Bear Grease Podcasts, we're going to explore the tragic
Speaker 1: death of a bear hunter and hear the account firsthand
Speaker 1: from the guide that was standing there when it happened.
Speaker 1: Then we're going to search for his hundred and eighty
Speaker 1: year old grave. In the process will look into the
Speaker 1: adventurous life of the comrade of the deceased, Frederick Gerstalker.
Speaker 1: We're gonna talk with the national expert on the Ozark region,
Speaker 1: and we'll hear from the man who held one of
Speaker 1: the keys in trying to find the old grave, and
Speaker 1: then we'll go on a search for the grave ourselves.
Speaker 1: You're not gonna want to miss this one. M. My
Speaker 1: name is Clay Nukelem, and this is the Bear Grease
Speaker 1: Podcast where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search for
Speaker 1: insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the story
Speaker 1: of Americans who lived their lives close to the land.
Speaker 1: I want to tell you a story, or really I
Speaker 1: want the story to tell itself. If we think about
Speaker 1: the now of time as the front edge of a
Speaker 1: wave that we're writing Like a surfer. We can't get
Speaker 1: back anything that's behind us. The wave no longer exists.
Speaker 1: All we have is the remembrance of the imagery sight,
Speaker 1: sounds in the context of the moment on the waves
Speaker 1: stored in our giant human brain. But humans don't just
Speaker 1: have brains. I'm quite certain that we have spirits which
Speaker 1: also collect data that informs us of a deeper and
Speaker 1: more meaningful connection to the events of our lives and
Speaker 1: the lives of others. But it's more than just stored
Speaker 1: data like temperature or the color of the sky or
Speaker 1: what was said. The spirit can see the thing behind
Speaker 1: the thing. Spirits are made of flesh and bone, and
Speaker 1: you can't find it like an organ in the body.
Speaker 1: But the spirit is the conduit that connects our lives
Speaker 1: to something much bigger. It's what makes our lives more
Speaker 1: than just a biological record of a human eating and
Speaker 1: drinking and producing offspring. The spirit is what makes us human.
Speaker 1: There's some stories that just impact us in more significant
Speaker 1: ways than others. The story you're about to hear for
Speaker 1: me is one of those stories that has shaped my
Speaker 1: life in a significant way, and it's hard for me
Speaker 1: to even explain why. The question I'm trying to answer
Speaker 1: is this, What is the mechanism that can make someone
Speaker 1: else's story so meaningful in our lives. When I was
Speaker 1: in college, I had a professor that knew I was
Speaker 1: interested in Arkansas black bears in passing. One day, he
Speaker 1: suggested I read a book called Wild Sports by Frederick Gerstacker.
Speaker 1: His sales pitch was weak. It's about an old German
Speaker 1: guy that has some Arkansas bear hunting stories in it.
Speaker 1: He said. The pitch was so weak that it would
Speaker 1: be five years before I had ever read the book.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess I can't blame him for poor marketing,
Speaker 1: but I thought, what's a German guy got to do
Speaker 1: with Arkansas bear hunting? When I finally read the pages
Speaker 1: of the book, I was mesmerized by the words of
Speaker 1: the adventurous young German. I was mesmerized by his life.
Speaker 1: He was witty, he was an incredible right, he was
Speaker 1: tough as alligator leather, and fearless, and maybe most of all,
Speaker 1: much of his adventure took place within twenty miles of
Speaker 1: where I live. But even more, he was insightful into
Speaker 1: human life. He valued people, and he even recognized the
Speaker 1: wasteful and unsustainable ways of the market hunting culture of
Speaker 1: his time, of which he even participated in. Frederick Gerstoker.
Speaker 1: Some people say gersh Sticker was a well educated, middle
Speaker 1: class German that came to the United States in search
Speaker 1: of white tailed deer and black bear. Doesn't sound like
Speaker 1: that bad of a guy. He came over on a
Speaker 1: ship called the Constitution and arrived in New York and
Speaker 1: July eighteen thirty seven. He embarked on a six year
Speaker 1: long adventure that would take him through seven states and
Speaker 1: one Canadian province. He kept detailed journals of his writing,
Speaker 1: and at times he would send him back to his
Speaker 1: mom in Germany. Six years later in eighteen forty three,
Speaker 1: when he arrived back in Germany, he found himself an
Speaker 1: acclaimed writer and national hero. His mother had been submitting
Speaker 1: his articles to a local German publication. In the word
Speaker 1: of his adventures spread like wildfire. There are too many
Speaker 1: of ger Stalker's incredible stories to tell on this podcast,
Speaker 1: but I want to tell you one that cut me
Speaker 1: to the quick when I first read it. It involved
Speaker 1: a man being killed by a bear in a Creek
Speaker 1: drainage less than twenty miles from where I live. I
Speaker 1: was shocked and slightly offended that nobody ever told me
Speaker 1: this story. I want you to hear the first hand
Speaker 1: account from Gerstalker of the death of his friend Erskine.
Speaker 1: This is an excerpt from the book Wild Sports, published
Speaker 1: in eighteen fifty four. This story is taken out of context,
Speaker 1: so there are some characters you'll need to know. Conwell
Speaker 1: as Gerstalker's older American hunting partner and friend with hair
Speaker 1: as white as snow, he said. Conwell lived in Arkansas.
Speaker 1: Wachiga is a Cherokee that became a trusted friend and
Speaker 1: hunting partner of ger Stalker. And you'll be introduced to
Speaker 1: young Erskine, who Gerstalker had met some years before in
Speaker 1: the back country. So we were off again before noon
Speaker 1: and gained the source of the hurricane. Rode across the
Speaker 1: devil's stepping path, a narrow rock with a precipice on
Speaker 1: each side, left the pilot rock on our left, and
Speaker 1: came towards evening into the pine forest, where we were
Speaker 1: sure of finding kindlers. Descending the steep side of a mountain,
Speaker 1: we observed a thin column of blue smoke by the
Speaker 1: side of the stream, showing that some hunters were in
Speaker 1: camp there. We went straight towards it and found it
Speaker 1: to be an Indian camp, and our former acquaintance, young Erskine,
Speaker 1: among them there were Cherokees with three young choptaws, these
Speaker 1: two tribes being on good terms like ourselves, they were
Speaker 1: out bear hunting, but it had better luck. A quantity
Speaker 1: of bear meat was hanging about the camp, and even
Speaker 1: the dogs would eat no more. Casting ourselves down by
Speaker 1: the fire, one of the squalls, for there were several
Speaker 1: women in the camp, immediately cooked for us some bear,
Speaker 1: which we duly regaled ourselves. M Night came on, and
Speaker 1: soon we were all sunk in deep repose. Early in
Speaker 1: the morning we began to move, dividing into two parties
Speaker 1: for the better chance of finding game. Conwell went with
Speaker 1: some of the Indians, amongst whom he had found an
Speaker 1: old acquaintance, to make a circuit around the Pilot Rock,
Speaker 1: while Erskine and I, with three Cherokees, proceeded to the
Speaker 1: sources of the Frog Bayou. Night found us far from
Speaker 1: our camp, so we made one for ourselves. Where we
Speaker 1: were on the morning of February one. We had hardly
Speaker 1: started ere we heard the dogs, which he could, declared
Speaker 1: instantly that they were his brothers, and disappeared behind the
Speaker 1: rocks without another word. As we stood listening, the sound
Speaker 1: seemed to take a different direction. We ascended the mountain
Speaker 1: as fast as we could to cut off the chase,
Speaker 1: but found that we must have been mistaken, for in
Speaker 1: a few minutes all was as silent as a grave.
Speaker 1: Once we thought we heard a shot, but we couldn't
Speaker 1: be certain. We ascended to the highest terrace and walked
Speaker 1: slowly on, looking out for fresh signs, and listening to
Speaker 1: catch the sound of the dog below. Amongst the broken
Speaker 1: masses of rock, they might be near without being heard.
Speaker 1: Along the mountaintops, they're audible at a great distance. It
Speaker 1: may have been too in the afternoon, and we had
Speaker 1: seen nothing when bears Grease raised his nose in the air,
Speaker 1: remained for an instant or two in a fixed position, then,
Speaker 1: given a short smothered how rashed down the mountain side.
Speaker 1: Listening attentively, we heard the chase coming down the Hurricane river.
Speaker 1: Erskine called out triumphantly, we shall have plenty of bear
Speaker 1: this evening, and dashed after the dog. I was soon
Speaker 1: by his side. I must observe by the way that
Speaker 1: we were both very hungry. Presently, a bear broke through
Speaker 1: the bushes of projecting rocks, stopped him for an instant.
Speaker 1: When Erskine saluted him with a ball, he received mine.
Speaker 1: As he rushed past and disappeared. The dogs, encouraged to
Speaker 1: greater efforts by our shots and the stronger scent, followed
Speaker 1: him out bears Greece, who was quite fresh leading the van.
Speaker 1: Soon they came upon him and stopped him. We rushed
Speaker 1: to the spot, without waiting to reload, and arriving in
Speaker 1: time to see the beast, excited to the greatest fury,
Speaker 1: kill four of our best dogs with as many blows
Speaker 1: of his paws. But the others threw themselves on him
Speaker 1: with greater animosity, and if our rifles had been loaded,
Speaker 1: we could not have used them. Just as a large,
Speaker 1: powerful brown dog, which had curiously attacked the bear, was
Speaker 1: knocked over, bleeding and howling. Erskine called out, oh, save
Speaker 1: the dogs, threw down his rifle and rushed on with
Speaker 1: his knife among the furious group. I followed on the
Speaker 1: instant when the bear sauce coming, he exerted still more
Speaker 1: force to beat off the dogs and meet us. Seizing
Speaker 1: his opportunity, my comrade ran his steel into his side.
Speaker 1: The bear turned on him like lightning and seized him,
Speaker 1: and he uttered a shrill, piercing shriek. Driven to desperation
Speaker 1: by the sight, I plunged my knife three times into
Speaker 1: the monster's body with all my force, without thinking of
Speaker 1: jumping back. At the third thrust, the bear turned upon me.
Speaker 1: Seeing as Paul coming, I attempted to evade the blow,
Speaker 1: felt a sharp pang and sunk senseless to the ground.
Speaker 1: When I recovered my senses, bears grease was licking the
Speaker 1: blood from my face. On attempting to rise, I felt
Speaker 1: a severe pain in my left side and was unable
Speaker 1: to move my left arm. On making a fresh effort
Speaker 1: to rise, I succeeded in sitting up. The bear was
Speaker 1: close to me, in less than three ft from him,
Speaker 1: lay erskine, stiff, and cold. I sprang up with a
Speaker 1: cry of horror and rushed towards him. It was too true.
Speaker 1: He was bathed in blood, his face torn to pieces,
Speaker 1: his right shoulder almost wrenched away from his body, and
Speaker 1: five of the best dogs ripped up with broken limbs
Speaker 1: lying beside him. The bear was so covered with blood
Speaker 1: that his color was hardly discernible. My left arm appeared
Speaker 1: to be out of socket, but I could feel that
Speaker 1: no bones were broken. The sun had gone down, and
Speaker 1: I had hoped that the other hunters might have heard
Speaker 1: our shots and the barking and howling to the dogs.
Speaker 1: It grew dark. No one came. I roared and shouted
Speaker 1: like mad, but no one heard me. I tried to
Speaker 1: light a fire, but my left arm was so well
Speaker 1: that I gave up the attempt. But as it would
Speaker 1: have been certain death to pass the night under these
Speaker 1: circumstances without a fire, I tore away part of the
Speaker 1: back of my hunting shirt, and the fore part, being
Speaker 1: saturated with blood, sprinkled some powder on it, rubbed it well,
Speaker 1: and with my right hand I shook a little powder
Speaker 1: into my rifle. Placing the muzzle on the rag, I fired,
Speaker 1: blowing it up to a flame. I piled on dry
Speaker 1: leaves and twigs and succeeded in making a good fire,
Speaker 1: though with great pain and trouble. Now it was dark,
Speaker 1: I went to my dead comrade, who was lying about
Speaker 1: five yards from the fire. He was already stiff, and
Speaker 1: it was with great difficulty that I could pull down
Speaker 1: his arms and lay him straight, Nor could I keep
Speaker 1: his eyes closed, though I laid small stones on them.
Speaker 1: The dogs were very hungry, but it was impossible for
Speaker 1: me to break up the bear only ripped him up
Speaker 1: and fed them with his entrals. Bearscreached, laid himself down
Speaker 1: by the corpse, looking steadfastly in his face, and went
Speaker 1: no more near the bear, and hoping of obtaining help,
Speaker 1: I loaded and fired twice, but nothing moved. The forest
Speaker 1: appeared one enormous grave. I felt very ill, vomited several
Speaker 1: times as well as I could. I laid myself down
Speaker 1: beside the fire, and lost all consciousness of my wretched situation.
Speaker 1: Whether I slept or fainted is more than I can tell,
Speaker 1: But I know that I dreamed that I was at
Speaker 1: home in my bed, and my mother brought me some
Speaker 1: tea and laid her hand on my breast. Such an
Speaker 1: awakening as I had, was worse than I could wish
Speaker 1: to my bitterest enemy. Bears greased had pressed close to
Speaker 1: my side, lying his head on my breast. The fire
Speaker 1: was almost out, and I was shivering with cold, and
Speaker 1: the wolves were hollowing fearfully around the dead, keeping at
Speaker 1: a distance for fear of the living, but by no
Speaker 1: means disposed to lose their prey. I rose with difficulty
Speaker 1: and laid more wood on the fire. As it burned up,
Speaker 1: the face of the corpse seemed to brighten. I started,
Speaker 1: but found it was only an optical delusion. Louder and
Speaker 1: fiercer howled the wolves and the dogs, of whom five
Speaker 1: were alive besides Bear. Grease answered them, but the answer
Speaker 1: was by no means one of defiance, rather a lament
Speaker 1: for the dead, partly to scare away the wolves, and
Speaker 1: partly in the hope of finding help. I loaded and
Speaker 1: fired three times. My delight was inexpressible. As I heard
Speaker 1: three shots in return. I loaded and fired until all
Speaker 1: my powder was expended. As morning broke, I heard two
Speaker 1: shots not far off, and soon after a third. A
Speaker 1: shipwrecked mariner hanging to the side of a plank could
Speaker 1: not raise his voice more lustily to hail a passing
Speaker 1: ship than I did, And joy upon joy, I heard
Speaker 1: a human voice, and answer the bark of the dogs.
Speaker 1: And now to stranger and what Chiga advanced out of
Speaker 1: the bush while he exclaimed. Staring at the shocking spectacle,
Speaker 1: he felt poor erskine and shook his head mournfully. He
Speaker 1: turned to me. I showed him my swollen arm, which
Speaker 1: he examined attentively, without speaking, Forming a hollow with his
Speaker 1: two hands and placing them to his lips, he gave
Speaker 1: a loud, piercing shout. The answer came from no great distance,
Speaker 1: and in a few minutes my old dear friend Conwell
Speaker 1: and most of the Indians were at my side. I
Speaker 1: grasped Conwell's hands sorrowfully and told him in few words
Speaker 1: how it all had happened. The old man scolded and
Speaker 1: said it served us right. There's no greater danger and
Speaker 1: sticking a knife into a bear's paunch when he's fallen
Speaker 1: with the dogs upon him. But if he has been
Speaker 1: thrown and then catches the sight of his greatest enemy man,
Speaker 1: he exerts all his force to attack him, and woe
Speaker 1: to him who comes within reach of his paws. It
Speaker 1: was all very well talking. He had not been present
Speaker 1: and seen one dog after another knocked over, never to
Speaker 1: rise again five minutes more, and not one would have
Speaker 1: been saved. And who knows whether the enraged beasts would
Speaker 1: not have attacked us. Then. Meanwhile, the Indians had been
Speaker 1: digging a grave with their tomahawks, wrapping the body in
Speaker 1: a blanket. They laid him in it and covered him
Speaker 1: with earth and heavy stones. Conwell cut down some young
Speaker 1: stems and made a fence around the solitary grave. I
Speaker 1: could not avoid a shudder at the quiet coolness of
Speaker 1: the whole proceeding, as the thought struck me that the
Speaker 1: same persons, under the same circumstances would have treated me
Speaker 1: in the same cool way had I fallen instead of Erskine.
Speaker 1: Like me, he was a lonely stranger in a foreign land,
Speaker 1: having left England some years before, and his friends and
Speaker 1: relations will probably never know what became of him. Thousands
Speaker 1: perish in this way in America, of whom nothing more
Speaker 1: is heard, and perhaps in a few months the remembrance
Speaker 1: of them was entirely passed away. After the dead was
Speaker 1: quietly laid in the grave, Chiga came with an elderly
Speaker 1: Indian to look at my arm. Chiga moved it while
Speaker 1: the other looked steadfastly in my face. The pain was
Speaker 1: enough to drive me mad, but I would not utter
Speaker 1: a sound. Next, the Indian took hold of my arm,
Speaker 1: laying his left hand on my shoulder, and while Chia
Speaker 1: suddenly seized me around the body from behind, the other
Speaker 1: pulled with all his force. The pain at first was
Speaker 1: so great that I almost feigned, but it gradually diminished.
Speaker 1: In spite of my resolve to show no signs of it,
Speaker 1: I could not suppress a shriek. Conwell soon after asked
Speaker 1: if I could ride on my answering yes, he helped
Speaker 1: me on a horse. Then, throwing the bear's skin and
Speaker 1: some of the meat on his own, we moved slowly homewards.
Speaker 1: My sufferings on the way were very great, but I
Speaker 1: uttered no murmur. I only longed for pose. This was
Speaker 1: just a couple of pages out of a four hundred
Speaker 1: page book, but I want to take some inventory of
Speaker 1: the components of this story. A German, a British guy
Speaker 1: and an American hunting with a mixed tribe of Native Americans,
Speaker 1: Cherokees and Choctaws in the eighteen forties. They were bear
Speaker 1: hunting with dogs, the Native Americans dogs to be exact
Speaker 1: for black bear. In the month of February in the
Speaker 1: Ozarks of Arkansas, an incredible bear chase ensues and a
Speaker 1: man who we only know his first name, Erskine, dies
Speaker 1: at the hand of a bear after stabbing it with
Speaker 1: his bowie knife. They didn't have time to reload. His
Speaker 1: comrade charges in and kills the bear with a knife
Speaker 1: and in the process gets smacked so hard it dislocates
Speaker 1: his shoulder and knocks him out. Girl Stalker spends the
Speaker 1: night with an arm's reach of a day bear, five
Speaker 1: dead dogs, and Erskine's corpse. Gray wolves which used to
Speaker 1: be in Arkansas, kept him awake, howling through the night.
Speaker 1: He laid stones on the eyelids of the corpse to
Speaker 1: keep his eyes shut. The next morning, he's found by
Speaker 1: the hunting party and the natives set his shoulder into
Speaker 1: place and buried the dead in the shallow grave dug
Speaker 1: with tomahawks. They throw the bear meat and the hide
Speaker 1: over the back of a good horse and head home.
Speaker 1: End of story. Now you know the story of Erskine's death,
Speaker 1: and you've seen a bit into the life of Gerstalker.
Speaker 1: But we need to know more information to understand the
Speaker 1: significance of this wild story. And I'm still wondering why
Speaker 1: and how this short snippet of time just a little
Speaker 1: part of somebody else's wave has impacted me the way
Speaker 1: it has. As I sit down with Dr Brooks Blevins,
Speaker 1: He's wearing a black suit and a pink tie. He's
Speaker 1: all dressed up because he was just on the documentary
Speaker 1: for TV talking about the backwoods of the Ozarks. He's
Speaker 1: an in demand guy, you see. Dr Blevins is a
Speaker 1: professor at Missouri State University, and he is the Jedi
Speaker 1: Master of Ozark history and probably one of the coolest
Speaker 1: guys I've met in a long time. He drives a
Speaker 1: mid nineteen nineties Sedan with duct tape on one of
Speaker 1: the side mirrors, and he's written over fifteen incredible books
Speaker 1: about the Ozark region. I wanted to get some context
Speaker 1: from Dr Blevins about the time period that Gerstalker was here.
Speaker 1: Context is king. So, Dr Blevins, Gerstalker was in the
Speaker 1: Ozarks and Washingtas from eighteen thirty seven to eighteen four
Speaker 1: prety three. What can you tell us just about that
Speaker 1: general era, who was here and kind of what life
Speaker 1: was like. Well, first of all, in Arkansas, this is
Speaker 1: right after Arkansas becomes a state in eighteen thirty six.
Speaker 1: One of the things that that we would immediately notice
Speaker 1: is how few people there were. You know, there were
Speaker 1: You're talking about fewer than a hundred thousand people in
Speaker 1: the entire state. The Washingtalls and the Ozarks especially would
Speaker 1: have been very very thinly populated. And of course that's
Speaker 1: why he's there. He's he's there to find animals, not
Speaker 1: not people. You're talking about sparse population. You're talking about
Speaker 1: a population of people who have mainly come from the
Speaker 1: upper south east of the Mississippi. So you've got lots
Speaker 1: of tennessee Ins who are here. You got Carolinians, people
Speaker 1: from Virginia, Kentucky. Those are the people who are for
Speaker 1: the most part coming to the Ozarks and Washingtalls. And
Speaker 1: a lot of these people are gonna have backgrounds in
Speaker 1: in hunting of various kinds, and in a lot of
Speaker 1: cases that's why they're out here in the first place.
Speaker 1: You know, they've kind of exhausted their hunting grounds back
Speaker 1: east and they're just kept moving west. A lot of
Speaker 1: people come because they want to hunt, especially if they
Speaker 1: want to hunt commercially. You know, the commercial hunting was
Speaker 1: pretty much a dead letter by the eighteen thirties and
Speaker 1: forties back east of the Mississippi. And if you were
Speaker 1: interested in making a living selling skins and and bear
Speaker 1: grease and and meat and stuff like that, you had
Speaker 1: to go to the to the edge. This would have been,
Speaker 1: during that time considered part of the western edge of
Speaker 1: the frontier. Really, oh yeah, I mean, so we don't
Speaker 1: think of Arkansas being the frontier or the west, but
Speaker 1: this was like far west. So yeah, the uh, the
Speaker 1: Washingtons and the Ozarks, Arkansas, they're all the edge of
Speaker 1: the edge of American civilization. Gerstalker seemed to have the
Speaker 1: intent of coming from Germany to hunt in America. Was
Speaker 1: that common? I mean? And I guess my question is
Speaker 1: what was the reputation of the American frontier on the
Speaker 1: global stage. I think, well, I guess it depends on
Speaker 1: how you defined common, But I would say it certainly
Speaker 1: wasn't uncommon for Europeans who had the means and the
Speaker 1: interest to come to the United States, and especially the
Speaker 1: western part of the United States and hunt. I mean,
Speaker 1: we see that happening even after the Civil War, where
Speaker 1: you have European buffalo hunters come over. For instance, would
Speaker 1: they have heard of Daniel Boone? By that, I mean
Speaker 1: Daniel Boone would have already been dead for twenty years
Speaker 1: or so. I mean, would they have heard of Daniel
Speaker 1: Boone globally by that? Yeah? I think. I think Well,
Speaker 1: if you were well read, like GERSH. Dicker obviously was,
Speaker 1: if you were an educated person and you were interested
Speaker 1: in the exotic, you know, American frontier, as these guys
Speaker 1: obviously were, you would have been well versed in Daniel
Speaker 1: Boone stuff. But as we know that as late as
Speaker 1: eighteen eleven, so we're talking about roughly a quarter century
Speaker 1: before ger Sticker shows up, Daniel Boone had done a
Speaker 1: long hunt in the Ozarks. A long hunt is a
Speaker 1: description of the style of hunting. It may be intuitive,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't to me. It was a term used
Speaker 1: from the mid seventeen hundreds through the mid eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 1: That simply means dudes went hunting for long periods of time,
Speaker 1: like six months up to a couple of years. But
Speaker 1: what you're dealing with, especially with ger Sticker, is a
Speaker 1: young man who is really really influenced by Romanticism and
Speaker 1: everything that mean. And I'm not talking about you know,
Speaker 1: Valentine's Day and kissy stuff. We're talking about the sort
Speaker 1: of dark unknown out there that that that calls to people,
Speaker 1: especially young men, who want to go out and explore
Speaker 1: and see what's out there. And that romanticism would have
Speaker 1: been like portraying something as just like amazing and mystical
Speaker 1: and like looking at the positives and something that actually
Speaker 1: may not have been very positive. Like he he he
Speaker 1: romanticized about the West and about hunting. And you can
Speaker 1: tell that, you know, uh, one of the things that uh,
Speaker 1: that I did in in my book Arkansas, Arkansas as
Speaker 1: I as I contrasted the romantic thinkers and what I
Speaker 1: call the Enlightenment thinkers. And and that's a good point.
Speaker 1: What what ger Shticker saw as romantic and positive and
Speaker 1: earlier traveler like say Henry Roe Schoolcraft, who came through
Speaker 1: roughly twenty years before Gersticker did. Schoolcraft would have found
Speaker 1: repulsive and uncivilized. And he couldn't wait to get back, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, he he really couldn't wait to get back
Speaker 1: to the Hudson River Valley and to civilization. But they
Speaker 1: were both educated young men, but one just had a
Speaker 1: different outlook on on live. I mean, he had chosen
Speaker 1: to come here, you know, thinking about the reputation of
Speaker 1: the American frontier, like what Gerstalker would have maybe heard
Speaker 1: and seen back in his home in Germany. It's it's
Speaker 1: hard to imagine a section of a massive continent that
Speaker 1: would just be unknown, like we we don't live inside
Speaker 1: of that paradigm any longer. Like the Earth has been explored.
Speaker 1: There's there's micro cosms that hold mystery today. But this
Speaker 1: was like massive mystery and intrigue of the West and
Speaker 1: the in the in the even the animals. I mean
Speaker 1: like they were introducing animals to these people that they
Speaker 1: had never heard of before. I mean bison and elk
Speaker 1: and in in black bears. They didn't have black bears
Speaker 1: in Germany, they would have had brown bears. It's hard
Speaker 1: for me to imagine. I can see the draw. I
Speaker 1: can imagine the draw to the American West. I mean
Speaker 1: it would have just been this like mythical place. And
Speaker 1: now what we see inside the book, and what gir
Speaker 1: gir Stalker does such a great job of showing, is
Speaker 1: how difficult it was. I mean, what I came out
Speaker 1: of this book understanding and having respect for him was
Speaker 1: just and these people was just their resilience and their
Speaker 1: just ability to persist through hardship and there. They didn't
Speaker 1: know any better. I mean, they didn't they didn't know
Speaker 1: any different. They didn't know the comforts that we have
Speaker 1: today that they could have compared with. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: you would assume, and you would hope that the resiliency
Speaker 1: and internal strength and physical strength of us today would
Speaker 1: have been comparable to them. But it's hard to make
Speaker 1: that jump. Like I'm I'm a hunter, and when I
Speaker 1: hear these stories of Girl Stalker and Erskine, I just
Speaker 1: think I couldn't have done it. But there's this hope
Speaker 1: inside of me, Dr Blevin's that if I didn't know
Speaker 1: any different, that I would have been able to do it,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. Yeah, I know exactly what
Speaker 1: you're saying. And and the the amazing thing about Girl
Speaker 1: Shticker is to a certain degree he did no different.
Speaker 1: You know, he did grow up in a in a
Speaker 1: middle class and in as civilized and modern a place
Speaker 1: as you could have grown in the world. And yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right on planet Earth. So the Ozarks became nationally
Speaker 1: known during that time period for bear hunting. How did
Speaker 1: that happen? Well, part of it is that there was
Speaker 1: a basis in fact for all of the legends. I
Speaker 1: mean that this really was and you you find this
Speaker 1: not only from girl Shticker who gets here relatively late,
Speaker 1: but earlier explorers who talked about the wealth of wildlife
Speaker 1: in this place. The Ozarks and the Washingtons were in
Speaker 1: the in the middle part of the continent. They were
Speaker 1: this just sort of promised land of of of wildlife
Speaker 1: by the late seventeen hundreds and early eighteen hundreds. Part
Speaker 1: of that because the Ozarks especially had been uninhabited. It
Speaker 1: had been the hunting ground of the O Sage for
Speaker 1: a century or more by the time the first European
Speaker 1: settlers got here. But they really didn't live here. They
Speaker 1: didn't they didn't leave a really big footprint on on
Speaker 1: the area. So there was just this abundance of wildlife
Speaker 1: of bears, deer, elks, buffalo, you know, you just name it,
Speaker 1: and and they found everything here. What Dr Blebens is
Speaker 1: describing may need a little explanation. We often have this
Speaker 1: idea that Native Americans had permanent settlements and regions for
Speaker 1: thousands of years without interruption. However, the archaeological records shows
Speaker 1: something different. Paleo Indians arrived in the Ozarks about twelve
Speaker 1: thousand years ago and used bluffs for shelter, and they
Speaker 1: left a lot of artifacts. They lived here in very
Speaker 1: small numbers for thousands of years, but the last one
Speaker 1: thousand years it's less certain who was here and for
Speaker 1: how long. It's believed that the Ozarks was only used
Speaker 1: as a seasonal hunting ground for the Osage tribe, meaning
Speaker 1: there would be long stretches of time where there were
Speaker 1: no humans here. Just think about that for a minute.
Speaker 1: When the French arrived in the Ozarks in the seventeen hundreds,
Speaker 1: they found the place almost entirely devoid of permanent Native
Speaker 1: American settlements. What starts happening is by the late seventeen hundreds,
Speaker 1: the o Sage, to a lesser degree, the Cherokee, who
Speaker 1: are starting to come in, and the Choctaw and some
Speaker 1: of the other groups start to convert from their traditional
Speaker 1: lifestyles to market hunting. And when they do that, you
Speaker 1: really start to see the wildlife numbers start to go down.
Speaker 1: And then when you add to that all of these
Speaker 1: white market hunters who start coming into the region in
Speaker 1: the early eighteen hundreds. Henry row Schoolcraft, in his first
Speaker 1: book about the Ozarks, mentions that just in the White
Speaker 1: River Watershed. He estimated there were between a thousand and
Speaker 1: fifteen hundred full time market hunters in in eighteen nineteen
Speaker 1: uh and And you can imagine the destructive capabilities to
Speaker 1: the wildlife populations that that many hunters, combined with Native
Speaker 1: Americans who had who had made the switch over. And
Speaker 1: so you've got bales and bales of pelts and hides
Speaker 1: coming into St. Louis and and Memphis and these other cities.
Speaker 1: By the time schoolcraft comes, bear hunting is just starting
Speaker 1: to be the big thing. It's the next big thing.
Speaker 1: Ger Stecker really comes in at the end of that,
Speaker 1: at the end of the commercial bear hunting age. He's
Speaker 1: he his timing was just right, that he didn't miss it,
Speaker 1: and he even noted he even mentions this, he he
Speaker 1: realizes that this is coming to an end, that that
Speaker 1: these destructive of practices of these hunters was quickly bringing
Speaker 1: an end to this what once had been a wonderland
Speaker 1: of wildlife. He was he was noted and he's noted
Speaker 1: today of having foresight and and having kind of a
Speaker 1: conservation mindset, even though he participated in it. You see
Speaker 1: Inklands in his writing that he recognized that this wasn't
Speaker 1: sustainable and it wasn't good for his time. That was
Speaker 1: kind of progressive thinking, which is noteworthy of him. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right. Girl Stalker's main dog that he had his
Speaker 1: whole time in Arkansas was named bears grease. Can you
Speaker 1: talk to me about bear grease and its importance in
Speaker 1: the region. Bear grease was it was part of that market. Uh,
Speaker 1: it was even in eighteen nineteen when Schoolcraft first gives
Speaker 1: us some numbers. He even tells us what the price
Speaker 1: of a bear high. It's well, I think it was.
Speaker 1: It was a buck fifty at that time. He talks
Speaker 1: about the price of bear meat. That bear meat was
Speaker 1: was highly valued. It was, it was the most expensive
Speaker 1: meat in the area. But also bear grease was it
Speaker 1: was used for. Uh. It could be used as actual
Speaker 1: cooking grease. And bear grease is the rendered fat of
Speaker 1: a bear. Yeah, it's bear fat. It's cooked down then
Speaker 1: turned into liquid oil. It could be used actually for
Speaker 1: cooking oil. But it was often used as well for
Speaker 1: candle making. And but it became one of the one
Speaker 1: of the really valuable products of the bear hunting process.
Speaker 1: There was a at one point in the eighteen thirties
Speaker 1: we know that there was a bear oil rendering plant
Speaker 1: that was established at the mouth of Bear Creek near
Speaker 1: the Arkansas Missouri line. It would have been probably I
Speaker 1: think it would have been a Boone count modern day
Speaker 1: Boone County, Arkansas. But we know there was a rendering
Speaker 1: plant there that, by some accounts employed several dozen people
Speaker 1: down to New Orleans. That's right, Yeah, they would ship
Speaker 1: them to New Orleans and that was a big thing.
Speaker 1: Why do you think he would have named his dog that? Like,
Speaker 1: does that tell us anything? Because it it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: there's certain things inside of society and we do it
Speaker 1: today that has like a metaphorical meaning. What was he
Speaker 1: alluding to? You think it could have It could have
Speaker 1: just been a something that I mean, the word itself
Speaker 1: for a German could have just sounded very American or something.
Speaker 1: I'm not really sure. I mean, obviously it would have
Speaker 1: been symbolic for him, as a guy who aspired to
Speaker 1: be a bear hunter to have a dog named bears Grease,
Speaker 1: but it could also reflect how valuable the dog was
Speaker 1: to him. It was as valuable as Greece. I mean,
Speaker 1: and we know, I mean, we know not just from GERSH. Decker,
Speaker 1: but all kinds of bear hunter stories that there was
Speaker 1: nothing more valuable to a hunter than a good dog.
Speaker 1: I mean, if it could mean the difference between life
Speaker 1: and death. If you if you remember, the most emotional
Speaker 1: that the German Gersh Decker ever gets in his book
Speaker 1: is when he has to say bye to his dog
Speaker 1: and he tears up. You know, he has to turn
Speaker 1: away so bears Greece won't see him crying. I heard
Speaker 1: you one time say that bear hunters were the rock
Speaker 1: stars of the Antebellum South. Can you can you describe
Speaker 1: what you meant by that? Because I like it? What
Speaker 1: is the Antebellum South? Can you tell me the word
Speaker 1: antebellum means before the war. Human history is so wrought
Speaker 1: with war that we have an English word that generically
Speaker 1: means the time before the war. Clearly, in this context,
Speaker 1: the war we're talking about is the Civil War. You know,
Speaker 1: you're talking about an era when most of the modern
Speaker 1: sports that we follow we're not even invented. Yet. You're
Speaker 1: talking about an era when you know, horse racing was
Speaker 1: probably the biggest competition type sport that there was. So
Speaker 1: it's an age when people again romanticized and sort of
Speaker 1: made made heroes out of people who did these kind
Speaker 1: of brave, dangerous things, especially on the frontier. There was
Speaker 1: nothing that qualified better than bear hunting. So there was
Speaker 1: this kind of daredevil, rock star, you know, athletic he yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's even better than than modern day uh athlete.
Speaker 1: He rose because some of these guys didn't make it out.
Speaker 1: I mean there, you know, there were guys like Erskine
Speaker 1: who died uh and and further sort of burnished the
Speaker 1: stories of the survivors. When I first read this book,
Speaker 1: I was intrigued by girl Stalker's relationship with the Native Americans.
Speaker 1: Many times in the book he recounted camping and hunting
Speaker 1: with them, and their interactions were always peaceful and he
Speaker 1: seemed to have the utmost respect for them. Once Gerstalker
Speaker 1: described staying in the Native camp and the men coming
Speaker 1: back into camp the next morning with a giant black bear,
Speaker 1: which was quote the largest I'd ever seen. He said
Speaker 1: the men would sit around the fire at night, smoking
Speaker 1: their pipes, stoically staring into the fire and not say
Speaker 1: a word. He would try to talk, but they basically
Speaker 1: told him to be quiet. Anyway. I asked Dr Blevins
Speaker 1: about the relationship between natives traveling Europeans and Americans. How
Speaker 1: would how would they have known that these Native Americans
Speaker 1: weren't hostile as I as I was as I was
Speaker 1: reading this book, playing the story through my head. They
Speaker 1: had no qualms with these people, And I mean the
Speaker 1: Native Americans had no qualms inviting these guys into their camp.
Speaker 1: Like was that normal? Where if you're if you're dealing with, uh, say,
Speaker 1: the Cherokees, that would have been normal. The Cherokees were,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's you know, it's a it's a cliche
Speaker 1: and and and a statement that you know contains racist
Speaker 1: ideas within it. But historians used to call them the
Speaker 1: the so called civilized tribes, and the Cherokees were one
Speaker 1: of the foremost of those. And what that meant to
Speaker 1: historians a few generations back is that the Cherokees had
Speaker 1: adopted the ways of white people. And by the early
Speaker 1: eighteen forties, you're talking about generations of Cherokees and Mountain
Speaker 1: white people who had lived in the vicinity of each other.
Speaker 1: There had been inner marriages, and there were all kinds
Speaker 1: of of connections, and certainly the Cherokees who were in
Speaker 1: the Indian Territory lived lives that were very, very similar
Speaker 1: to the Conwales and these other white settlers in the
Speaker 1: back country. I mean they were raising cattle and hogs,
Speaker 1: they were living in log houses, they were growing corn.
Speaker 1: They were so they had uh, they had adopted many
Speaker 1: of the trappings of white society. Many of them would
Speaker 1: have known English, and it would have been pretty common
Speaker 1: for them to interact with white Europeans. Ger Stalker describes
Speaker 1: in detail the burial of Erskine by the Native Americans.
Speaker 1: He noted the cold, stoic, and precise nature of the procedure,
Speaker 1: and gir Stalker even said that odd deaths and unceremonious
Speaker 1: funerals were common on the American frontier. Dr Blevins had
Speaker 1: some unique insight. I guess the short answer is is,
Speaker 1: I don't know how common that stark and that sort
Speaker 1: of detached, you know, burial would have been if Erskine
Speaker 1: hadn't been such a stranger. You know, he's not he's
Speaker 1: not related to any of these people. We don't even
Speaker 1: know his last name. He's not even American, he's not
Speaker 1: Native American. He's a he's a traveler from another world,
Speaker 1: like like ger Shticker is. If he had had more
Speaker 1: of a connection. I can't help but think that his
Speaker 1: burial would have been attended with some more you know,
Speaker 1: feeling and maybe you know, ceremony or something. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, they're deep in the woods, deep in
Speaker 1: the mountains, you know, they got bears to haul back
Speaker 1: to where they're going, and it was just and yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, what we're if they if they take his
Speaker 1: body out where I mean, who's gonna want it? You know? Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like you know, he doesn't have any family, So I
Speaker 1: think that's obviously what scares the dickens out of girl
Speaker 1: Sticker is he's thinking, I'm Erskine, you know, to these people.
Speaker 1: And that's what he says that that, I mean, this,
Speaker 1: this could have been me. Just this unceremony. You start
Speaker 1: throw some dirt over him and let's get out of here.
Speaker 1: And that's really that ends his career. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: that's really what he decides. You know, I may need
Speaker 1: to go back home. Thinking from this standpoint, if you're
Speaker 1: talking about if you assume that these guys are Cherokees,
Speaker 1: it's possible that they just lived through the trail of
Speaker 1: tears five or six years earlier. And we know in
Speaker 1: the Trail of Tears. There were a lot of people
Speaker 1: buried on that trail. You know that guys we're familiar,
Speaker 1: may they may not be terribly unusual for them. You know.
Speaker 1: I think that's a great point, because these would have
Speaker 1: been people that would have been familiar with death, and
Speaker 1: and Gerstalker said they had a very specific way that
Speaker 1: they did it. It wasn't haphazard. Would do what they
Speaker 1: they line They lined the tomb with stones, and they
Speaker 1: covered it with stones, and they just went to work
Speaker 1: as efficient. You know, I've never connected that to the
Speaker 1: Trail of Tears. And also you think about it like
Speaker 1: these people would have inventially been hardened, not not hardened,
Speaker 1: but you would speculate that to deal with that kind
Speaker 1: of trauma that for sure, if not them themselves, but
Speaker 1: their family members would have gone through they had a
Speaker 1: way of emotionally dealing with death that probably would be
Speaker 1: different than I would. We don't know exactly where Erskine's
Speaker 1: hundred and eighty year old grave is, but we do
Speaker 1: know it's in the Hurricane Creek drainage in Arkansas. The
Speaker 1: only clue we have was documented in a nineteen fifties
Speaker 1: paper in the Arkansas Historic Quarterly, when a professor from
Speaker 1: Oklahoma got curious, drove to the Ozarks and set out
Speaker 1: in search of Erskine's grave. He recounted stopping at houses
Speaker 1: in the remote region and asking locals if they knew
Speaker 1: anything about the grave. He only found one clue. One
Speaker 1: young man didn't know anything about Erskine years before had
Speaker 1: found some suspicious old carvings on a rock in the
Speaker 1: Hurricane Creek drainage. The man told him where the carvings were.
Speaker 1: After examination, it was decided they were likely connected to
Speaker 1: Erskine's grave, and to this day it's the best and
Speaker 1: only clue we have. This is where the story gets interesting.
Speaker 1: That young man in the nineteen fifties was named Ori Province.
Speaker 1: You may have heard an interview I did with Ori
Speaker 1: on my past podcast, the Bear Hunting Magazine podcast titled
Speaker 1: Old Mountain Hunter Episode twenty one. You can go back
Speaker 1: and listen to it. In early March of nineteen, I
Speaker 1: drove to ORI's home and interviewed him about his life.
Speaker 1: I'd known Ori for at least ten years prior, but
Speaker 1: one month later after our interview, Or he passed away
Speaker 1: in April of nineteen at the age of two, My
Speaker 1: kids and I turkey hunted the morning before his funeral,
Speaker 1: not far from where he lived. We changed our camo
Speaker 1: into funeral clothes on the side of a dirt road.
Speaker 1: So many people were at the country church there was
Speaker 1: no room in the main hall and we had to
Speaker 1: sit outside or He was an incredible guy. At the
Speaker 1: end of the interview, I asked him about the professor,
Speaker 1: the carvings, and what he knew about Erskine's grave. I
Speaker 1: just couldn't tell this story without including Corey. This is
Speaker 1: what he said. Hey, how are you doing? Oh I'm
Speaker 1: doing fire against Good to see you, Yeah, good to
Speaker 1: see you. Hello, miss Mary, how are you? This is
Speaker 1: my youngest son, Shepherd. I don't think he's ever been
Speaker 1: over here before. I don't haven't seen him before any
Speaker 1: Come around and have a seen here. How are y'all doing?
Speaker 1: Excuse the flour. I was in the middle of vacuumen,
Speaker 1: but I ain't. I got done, so don't worry about
Speaker 1: the hand. Oh this is great. So back in the
Speaker 1: nineteen fifties, there was a college professor from Oklahoma that
Speaker 1: came over here looking for a grave back in the
Speaker 1: Hurricane Creek drainage, and they came here and asked you
Speaker 1: if you knew where it was? Is that right? Tell
Speaker 1: me all that you remember about that. Well, they come
Speaker 1: and ask about it. Then uh uh, two of my
Speaker 1: brothers went with them. Work. Um, I'm sating on this
Speaker 1: rock eating dinner, uh, deer hunting, you know what dinner
Speaker 1: there got looking coming on that rock and there's their
Speaker 1: inationals are. Anyway, it had earl pointing right up the hill. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I found it and I told the once about it,
Speaker 1: you know, and so and nobody had ever to your knowledge,
Speaker 1: nobody had in recent time had found that. So you
Speaker 1: just were up there on that rock hunt. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: then so these guys came back in here in the
Speaker 1: nineteen fifties looking for an old grave. These guys believe
Speaker 1: that the engraving that you found was connected to that grave,
Speaker 1: and they were looking for Erskine's grave and uh, and
Speaker 1: so you gave him some intail back in the nineteen
Speaker 1: fifties for where to potentially find that grave, and they
Speaker 1: they claimed to have found it back in there a
Speaker 1: long time. Yeah. Yeah, but anyway, yeah, that the grave
Speaker 1: was just firm here defense for rock. So well, you know,
Speaker 1: you're in an article in the Arkansas Historic Quarterly that
Speaker 1: was written sometime in the nineteen fifties. Who whoever that
Speaker 1: professor was And I have to look back. I've got
Speaker 1: the article. Yeah, it's in Uh he's from Oklahoma. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but your name is in there. I mean because he
Speaker 1: said or he may not have said your name, but
Speaker 1: it was it was you that he was talking about
Speaker 1: that had you know, there was a young man that
Speaker 1: had found this engraving on a rock that had an
Speaker 1: E and they felt like that stood for Erskine and
Speaker 1: that it was marking where the grave was three and
Speaker 1: had a cut marking pretty deep down in that sand rock. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well that's a neat story. I'm I'm fascinated by that
Speaker 1: story of Erskine's death. I really am. We've got to
Speaker 1: wind back the clock about a decade. In two thousand
Speaker 1: and ten, or he had told a friend and I
Speaker 1: where the rock carvings were. I swore a vow of
Speaker 1: silence to its exact location, and I don't plan on
Speaker 1: going back on my word words, So don't ask me
Speaker 1: where the engravings are. I won't tell you. In the
Speaker 1: spring of two thousand and ten, myself, my son, Bear,
Speaker 1: and my friend Mo set out on a series of
Speaker 1: expeditions in search of Erskine's grave. Our search for the
Speaker 1: old Bear Hunter is one of those odd experiences that
Speaker 1: impacted me and my family in ways that's hard to describe.
Speaker 1: I want to take you into the hurricane drainage. You're
Speaker 1: all ready to go. It's not a short walk. It's
Speaker 1: cold too. I don't know. It's at least it's over
Speaker 1: a mile and a half. What do you think of
Speaker 1: this country? Man? It's beautiful? What do you think? Ship?
Speaker 1: Pretty cool? Is it? This is pretty easy walking though,
Speaker 1: isn't it. This is about as rough as it gets
Speaker 1: into the ozarks? Oh? Who down here? Hey? Look you
Speaker 1: see that? That's it? Yeah, let's go to it. Every
Speaker 1: time I come through here, I look for anything that
Speaker 1: resembled the pile of rocks. But a hundred and eighty
Speaker 1: years later, I don't think you really expect to see
Speaker 1: a pile of rocks. All all that we know, the
Speaker 1: only clue of this whole story is what Oor Province
Speaker 1: told that professor in the nineteen fifties. They came back
Speaker 1: in here, and at the time the professor claimed to
Speaker 1: have actually found a grave. You know, like a pile
Speaker 1: of rocks that looked like a grave, which at that
Speaker 1: time would have only been like, you know, about a
Speaker 1: hundred and ten years later. Today there's there's no pile
Speaker 1: of rocks. Like, so we're kind of speculating that this
Speaker 1: engraving has anything to do with this other than it
Speaker 1: fits the geographic location to a t. And you know,
Speaker 1: we're kind of taking this old professor at his word
Speaker 1: that at one time there was a grave here. So
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to understand and I've kind of just
Speaker 1: come to terms with it, doesn't We don't need an understanding.
Speaker 1: We can just make a choice in our life to
Speaker 1: be impacted by people and stories and what people did.
Speaker 1: But like, this story really shaped my life. It shaped
Speaker 1: my adventure. It shaped like not very many days go
Speaker 1: by where I don't think about ger Stoker and Erskin,
Speaker 1: a man we didn't even know his last name. He
Speaker 1: died back in these mountains. Why why, why do you
Speaker 1: think these stories can be so impacting? This is my wife, Misty.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but I was thinking this week about
Speaker 1: that same thing. When you said we were going to
Speaker 1: go out here, I was thinking about you reading that
Speaker 1: story to our little bitty kids when they were little,
Speaker 1: and kind of seeing the imprint of Erskine's life in
Speaker 1: You know, our daughter still wears she's a high school senior.
Speaker 1: She still wears a a bear claw around her around
Speaker 1: her neck, a real pretty one, but a bear claw.
Speaker 1: And I think that part of her sense of adventure
Speaker 1: comes from that. I think our boy's interest in the
Speaker 1: wild comes in large part because of the stories that
Speaker 1: they heard. And I just thought it was notable that
Speaker 1: this guy, you know, he died out here, and in
Speaker 1: the in the book it even says his family might
Speaker 1: not even ever know why. But I just thinking about
Speaker 1: how his life and the loss of life might have
Speaker 1: seemed insignificant or unnotable, But yet what happened in these
Speaker 1: woods still impacts us a hundred and fifty two hundred
Speaker 1: years later. Well, there's there's a lot inside this story.
Speaker 1: There's the these guys were involved in market hunting and
Speaker 1: wanton way of wildlife in many ways, and so we
Speaker 1: can look back on these and remember that and that
Speaker 1: informs our future. But how we'll never do that again.
Speaker 1: And we're now like these ultra focused managers of wildlife
Speaker 1: that are trying to use wildlife commodities to the highest extent,
Speaker 1: and we've placed cultural value on on eating the food,
Speaker 1: utilizing the animal. But even as important as we've placed
Speaker 1: cultural value on valuing the hunt, the experience, the immersion
Speaker 1: into the wild. This is a wild place for where
Speaker 1: we live, and this story gives this place value. If
Speaker 1: this place had been devoid of human experience for the
Speaker 1: last thousand years, we would come here and it wouldn't
Speaker 1: have as much meaning. We're humans. We value other people,
Speaker 1: we value what they did. And to me, ger Stoker,
Speaker 1: he's the one that lived his life, is an inspiration
Speaker 1: because he at his time was what had foresight into
Speaker 1: the future. He was one of the few guys of
Speaker 1: the time that said, hey, the way these Americans are
Speaker 1: doing this is bad, talking about market hunting and hunt
Speaker 1: and waste and stuff. Um. He also just his spirit
Speaker 1: for adventure and he valued people everywhere he went. He
Speaker 1: talked about the people even then. This story talks about
Speaker 1: his old dear friend Conwell. Like as I read this book,
Speaker 1: like I saw how he cried when he left the
Speaker 1: Conwell's home. This is a German with his American family,
Speaker 1: and like, that's me, that's I want to value people
Speaker 1: like that, um, his deep sense of adventure. I mean,
Speaker 1: girsh darker, Holy cow, he did stuff that makes us
Speaker 1: look like city slickers. Yeah. I think his appreciation for
Speaker 1: the story and for for documenting the journey and documenting
Speaker 1: the process and all the things. I mean, that's that's
Speaker 1: so valuable and that I mean, that's why we know
Speaker 1: the story is because he took the time and energy
Speaker 1: to to write it down and and that indicates that
Speaker 1: he saw value in the experience. Yeah, and that those
Speaker 1: stories give this place meaning and give this place life
Speaker 1: and shape. And you know, the land impacts people, and
Speaker 1: people people give meaning to the land. The reason we
Speaker 1: love stories and there's such a powerful part of the
Speaker 1: human experience is because they have an impartational value though
Speaker 1: we weren't there, and understanding of what happened and how
Speaker 1: people responded inspires and instructs us in a very functional way.
Speaker 1: In modern times, stories are often just seen as entertainment,
Speaker 1: but they're a highly effective medium of transferring values and knowledge.
Speaker 1: Even in what seems like mindless entertainment on television, which
Speaker 1: is essentially a story, is power awfully transferring values into
Speaker 1: your home. You have a choice of what stories impact
Speaker 1: you and your family. As a family, we weren't big
Speaker 1: into superheroes, but we allowed Gerstalker to become like one
Speaker 1: in our family. I have a frame sketch of the
Speaker 1: scene of Erskine's death that I drew framed in my office.
Speaker 1: My father in law and I made a commemorative bowie
Speaker 1: knife that we called the Girl Sticker. I don't have
Speaker 1: a great reason why this story impacted me so much.
Speaker 1: On the surface, it's probably because he was a bear
Speaker 1: and deer hunter, and he hunted in the Ozarks like me.
Speaker 1: Gerstalker valued people and he had some uncommon insight for
Speaker 1: the time period, and I respect that Gerstalker's life can't
Speaker 1: be seen in this one small story. I guess I
Speaker 1: don't have a good answer, but I'm content just letting
Speaker 1: stories do what stories have done for a long time.
Speaker 1: Um they have impacted us and instructed us and inspired us,
Speaker 1: and if we choose the right stories, it makes us
Speaker 1: better people. H m hm