Animals: Angry Author

Zane Grey, wild west novelist, owns a large ranch on the rim of Arizona’s Tonto Basin. On his ranch he had fat pigs. Last year Novelist Grey discovered that roving bears were hugging many of his delectable pigs to death. Since it was two weeks before the regular bear season opened, he wired the State game warden for special permission to do a little shooting. The warden refused. Later, although Novelist Grey pays taxes on two pieces of Arizona property, the warden would not issue to him a resident hunting license.

Last fortnight, after having thought the matter over for a year, Novelist Grey decided that he had been insulted by this refusal, so grossly insulted that he would never go back to Arizona again. He said he would not even write any more of his famed Arizona stories (Under the Tonto Rim, Roping Lions in the Grand Canyon, etc.). He charged neighboring hunters with spreading untrue, derogatory tales about his sportsmanship. Said he: “In twelve years my whole bag of game has been five bears, three bucks and a few turkeys. I have written 15 novels with Arizona background. Personally it cost me $30,000 to get material for one book alone—To the Last Man. My many trips all over the State have cost me $100,000. So in every way I have not been exactly an undesirable visitor. Nevertheless I have been grossly insulted . . . lied about . . . and otherwise alienated. This has hurt me so it has taken me a year to speak of it. … But this is not the only reason I shall not write any more about Arizona. . . . The Game Commission and the Forest Service have gone over to the commercial interests. . . . The Grand Canyon on the North Rim is a tin-can gasoline joint and the hunting season is a shambles.”