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Wyoming Authors Look At Accuracy Of Classic Children's Book On Grizzlies

Ernest Thompson Seton

  

Last month, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced they were moving forward with de-listing Yellowstone area grizzly bears from the Endangered Species List. The news raised the hackles of many wildlife advocates. 

It’s not the first time grizzlies have made headlines though, and not even the second time. Just read the classic children’s book Wahb: The Biography of a Grizzly, written way back in 1900 by Ernest Thompson Seton. President Roosevelt once called Seton a “nature faker” for attributing human feelings to wild animals.

Two Wyoming authors edited a new version of the book, Jeremy Johnston and Charles Preston, both curators at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody. Wyoming Public Radio's Melodie Edwards talked to Preston about how the novel got grizzlies right as well as how it sometimes missed its mark. 

We start with a reading from chapter two, picking up just after the grizzly cub Wahb’s mother and two brothers were shot by a rancher.

 

Listen to the full chapter

preston_wahb_grizzly-chap_2.mp3
A reading from chapter two of Wahb: The Biography of a Grizzly.

Melodie Edwards is the host and producer of WPM's award-winning podcast The Modern West. Her Ghost Town(ing) series looks at rural despair and resilience through the lens of her hometown of Walden, Colorado. She has been a radio reporter at WPM since 2013, covering topics from wildlife to Native American issues to agriculture.
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