It is small wonder that John Capen Adams shocked early San Francisco settlers. He strode through the pioneer town with tamed grizzlies docilely carrying his packs.

There is no other story quite like this true story of a great hunter who loved and understood animals.

In New England his mother had to put up with muskrats, baby foxes, baby wildcats and even skunks until at last the boy was apprenticed to a shoemaker.

When he was twenty-one he was free again to go back to collecting animals. This time for a carnival. Injured by a tiger, he went west to live in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Indians helped him survive the first winter.

His brother found him and persuaded him to collect live animals for zoos. His adventures which glow with friendship with Indians and animals make exciting reading, a fascinating, true, unique story of frontier days in America.

From the dust jacket