The Importance of Clayton

Sierra Grande and Capulin
Photographs by David L. Witt  

            On March 16, 2012 I had the distinct pleasure of addressing a wonderful group at the Herzstein Memorial Museum in Clayton, NM. I was invited by museum director Victoria Baker to speak on Seton. My adventures earlier that day included touring several sites along the Corrumpa River with Victoria’s husband Rick, a rancher whose family has lived in Union County since 1910.  Joining the backcountry tour was writer/photographer Evan Davison, a Kansan who is an aficionado of New Mexican history and culture; and also Seneca the ranch dog. The parts of the Corrumpa River we saw (without running water due to the drought) ranged from sand and gravel cañons to wetlands to cottonwood forest. We traveled through areas familiar to Lobo, Blanca, and Seton still so remote that a local guide is essential.

I usually talk to groups using limited notes and that evening was no exception. My comments were not recorded, but I emphasized Seton’s connection to northeastern New Mexico. (This is also covered in my book, Ernest Thompson Seton, the Life and Legacy of an Artist and Conservationist.)

For visitors and residents alike, here is something of importance to note. Two major social movements of the twentieth century had their origins, at least in part, in Union County, New Mexico. This is not well known but should be celebrated. During the slightly less than three months Seton spent in and around Clayton, he came up with two vitally important ideas as well as several more decisions of great personal importance.

First, as he added to his knowledge as a naturalist by making a close examination of Southwestern ecology, he came to believe it was his destiny to introduce others to the glories of wild nature. As an educator, he would develop concepts for outdoor youth education that led to several important developments including foundational principles for what became the worldwide Boy Scout movement.

Secondly, even as he was killing wolves and coyotes – acknowledging the economic damage that predators could cause ranchers – he also felt there was a countervailing need for preserving our wild nature heritage. This included the preservation for big game species and, as well, predators such as wolves. He was the first person to popularize wildlife conservation on a mass scale. His work complemented the activities of John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt in land conservation.

I have written in my book about the importance of these movements, both of which went global. But here I want to emphasize that Seton’s stunningly important accomplishments came about as a result of the influence of the people, landscape, and wildlife of Clayton and Union County. That is, both the Scouting and wildlife conservation movements came about directly because of his time in New Mexico – not from the intellectuals of the big cities or universities, but out of the experience of one man, usually alone, and often on horseback, who took the time he needed to think about the world and how to make it a better place.



Seneca

 

 

 

Rick and Evan explore the now dry Corrumpa where dwell the spirits of Lobo and Blanca 

 

 

 

Tecumseh

Ernest Thompson Seton developed a system of ethics for the Woodcraft movement setting out elements of correct behavior for young people. He emphasized not only relationships within the human community but also to nature. He outlined his thoughts in The Book of Woodcraft (the 1912 and subsequent editions) and in a “Blazes on the Trail” pamphlet for the Woodcraft League, “No. 3, Spartans of the West” (1930) from the precursor to the Seton Village Press. (Two earlier essays were combined in the first Blazes on the Trail” issued from the “Indian Village, Little Peequo at Greenwich, Connecticut (1928). In that one he may have introduced the term Lifecraft.)

As his model, Seton cataloged what he felt were virtues of American Indian culture. Keep in mind that he was writing for a White audience often hostile to native history and interests. To his credit, surviving correspondence shows that Seton took an active interest in promoting the political rights of contemporary Indians. But his published writings were mostly about “historic” Indians.

The Indian Seton most admired was one of the more remarkable figures in North American history. Tecumseh, a Shawnee, who through his industry and wisdom, became an important leader in the late 18^th and early 19^th centuries. Playing an important role in complex inter-tribal politics, the decisions he made in peace and war had important implications for Canada, Great Britain, and the United States. A man of the people uninterested in personal wealth, he advocated for the downtrodden (even Whites) and, with his brother, preached the virtues of life lived in harmony with nature. These virtues held the greatest appeal to Seton who believed that North American history would have had a different (and better) outcome had the teachings of Tecumseh prevailed. He wrote in “The Spartans of the West” a section on allegations of cruelty by Indians, giving him an opportunity to introduce the great Shawnee chief:

There are many exceptions to this charge that the Indian is cruel to his enemies, enough, almost, to justify a complete rebuttal, and among these was none more honorably distinguished than Tecumseh, the war chief of the Shawnees; perhaps the greatest of all historic Indians. Like a new incarnation of Hiawatha, he planned a defensive federation of the whole red race, and led them in war, that he might secure for them a lasting peace. All great Indians had taught the doctrine “Love your friends.” But Tecumseh as the first in authority to extend the heaven-taught precept, so they should be kind, at least, to their enemies; for he put an end in his nation to all torturing of prisoners. Above all whose history is fully known, Tecumseh was the ideal noble Redman realized…

Among those aspects of Indian culture found admirable by Seton: a rich spiritual and religious life, an honoring of bodily fitness, reverence for parents, respect for the property of others, a strong sense of morality, a need for honesty in all matters, a commitment to peace and hospitality, and the manifestation of courage, the highest value of all. “He [the Indian] believed that he should so live his life that the fear of death should never enter his heart; that when the last call came he should…meet the end in triumph.” These virtues (and others), taken together are sometimes summarized as “Perennial philosophy,” moral principles generally shared by religious traditions worldwide. Seton recognized the similarities to Christian morality and ethical traditions of ancient Greeks. But since he was writing for an American audience, he felt that the values of courage and honor exemplified by native Americans made for a more relevant model than anything out of European tradition.

I began to wonder how modern scholarship interpreted the life and deeds of Tecumseh. For all that he might have been a “noble Redman,” who was he and what did he represent? He was not interviewed by the press and tragically no authenticated portraits exist. There are, however, many first-hand accounts and one writer, Canadian novelist John Richards, knew Tecumseh when he reached the height of his political influence.

Included in the Academy’s library is a book that belonged to Seton’s daughter, Dee Seton Barber, Tecumseh, A Life. Written by historian John Sugden and published in 1997, the book includes sources known to Seton as well as a vast amount of newer research. Although not a romanticized view, Sugden’s depiction of Tecumseh would seem entirely familiar to Seton.

Sugden tells the history of that sad time in great detail, as well as Tecumseh’s importance to native peoples, but here I am more interested in what he has written about Tecumseh’s character. Sugden’s book is filled with the first-hand accounts from Whites and Indians who knew the Shawnee chief as friend or adversary. They all agree that he conveyed a striking presence from his appearance and ability as an orator, to his sagacity and leadership ability. Among the tribal peoples of that time, chiefs had little authority beyond their personal moral strength, that is, they gathered about them followers for whom they modeled the virtues that exemplified the highest achievements of what Seton would call Lifecraft. According to Sugden, “Everywhere, tribal organization was weak, and the village chiefs had limited ways of enforcing discipline and compliance. They relied upon persuasion, example, and consensus.”

By recognizing the threat White civilization posed to all Indian peoples, Tecumseh worked on a near-continental scale to organize resistance on a cross-cultural scale. Outraged by the unilateral abrogation of treaties by the Whites, Tecumseh reacted with defiance but not with vengeance. He protected non-combatants and disavowed the use of torture as a legitimate act of war – even in the face of genocide by the invading Whites. This strong moral stance did not go unnoticed by Whites or Indians. Apparently this was a lifelong trait, for even as a boy “he gave early evidence of generosity and humanity, as well as the ability to respond to the goodwill he found in individuals.” He believed that Indian land was communally owned and could not be sold by individual chiefs or even by individual tribes. He worked to build a confederacy of tribes to support the belief.

Perhaps Tecumseh’s greatest strength was his unmitigated service to community, first of all to the Shawnees, but over time, to the greater community of all tribal peoples in the Mississippi and Ohio watersheds. His life of service came with a price in terms of personal wealth, inability to achieve a normal family life, and ultimately, losing his own life. Yet for all this, there is no evidence that he held any regret for choosing this course. This example of devoting one’s life to something beyond self interest continues to inspire. Sugden writes, “For Indians today he remains the ultimate symbol not only of courage and endeavor, but also of unity and fraternity.”

Seton was influenced both by his own experience of living close to native peoples in the U.S. and Canada as well as by extensive reading. He probably first read James Fenimore Cooper’s 1826 novel, The Last of the Mohicans: A Narrative of 1757, at an early age. One of the main characters, Chingachgook, is, like Tecumseh, an exemplary warrior, hunter, and moral leader. (Cooper likely would have been familiar with the famous Tecumseh.) Seton was doubtless moved, like other liberals of his generation, by the seminal book on the treatment of natives, A Century of Dishonor, Helen Jackson’s 1885 bleak chronicle of the wars against indigenous peoples. He gave a list of “Standard Indian Books” for further reading in Spartans of the West. These volumes were included in his personal library. Many of the books may be seen in the Academy’s Seton Gallery and Archives. I am always glad to show them when you come by to visit the Gallery and Castle.

Updated Seton Web Pages

 

After about a year of mighty effort, the staff of the Academy for the Love of Learning has published our updated Seton web pages. The new material is an educational supplement to my book on Seton. It is meant for anyone new to the Seton Legacy, but also presents an in-depth consideration of Seton philosophy.

It is divided into three main sections with lots of links so there is plenty to explore.

The “About” region includes sections on Seton Castle plus the Gallery and Archives, the Learning Landscape (exploring our relationship to the land at Seton Village), and a concise Biography.  

The “Learning from Seton” region includes a reprinting of stories from Wild Animals I Have Known plus “Krag, the Kootenay Ram” and “Badlands Billy: The Wolf that Won.”  These are accompanied by helpful comments and study questions that can be used by students and teachers.

The “Lifecraft” region explains Seton’s meaning for this term, and, in addition, gives a contemporary interpretation of Seton’s “Nine Principles” of Woodcraft and the “Fourfold Path.” These concepts were central to Seton’s thinking on education. To give this region more depth we have included comments on the “Learning Field” and other ideas developed by Academy founder Aaron Stern. I can only conclude that Aaron and Ernest would have found one another fellow creatures of the heart.

Finally, we include a brief section of “Other Resources” for those wanting links to other Seton web sites and collections held by other institutions.

You are welcome to browse the highlights and or spend time reading Seton stories and/or exploring the various links elsewhere on the Academy for the Love of Learning web site.

And please do contact us for information on how to become a supporter of the Seton Legacy Project or the Learning Landscape. There are many ways to help from volunteering at the Academy to providing general financial support or underwriting specific projects. Contact me anytime to learn more: davidlwitt@aloveoflearning.org

 
Lots more blog entries to follow in 2013, including a closer consideration of how the little town of Clayton, New Mexico in Union County became the catalyst for much that Seton would accomplish in his life and an essay on Tecumseh. Look also for an introduction to Seton Village wildflowers  and announcements about upcoming Seton programs at the Academy

Lobo the King Wolf Part IV

No hurrahs for Hollywood, but Seton’s Lobo story inspired two films.  Clash of the Wolves (1925) starred Rin Tin Tin as “Lobo” in his 9^th Hollywood feature.  Many years later, Disney released the Legend of Lobo (1962), “A tale of the Old West told in song and story by Rex Allen with the Sons of the Pioneers…Based on a story by Ernest Thompson Seton.”

While the “Lobo” in Clash of the Wolves is not the same one as in Seton’s Currumpaw story, it cannot be ruled out that whatever studio released this picture called its lead character Lobo to take advantage of the name recognition from Seton’s earlier story.  (Rin Tin Tin also portrayed a character named Lobo in a 1929 movie, but I have not seen that one.) The title cards in this silent film give information reminiscent of Seton’s Lobo: “I know that wolf. That’s the famous Lobo.” And: “I’ll give $100 for his hide.” But instead of hunting the wolf, the human protagonist in this one befriends the wounded animal.

This Lobo leads a band of outlaw wolves until he is injured when his foot is pierced by a cactus thorn. (The movie appears to have been shot in a California desert location.) Unable to extract the thorn, Lobo seeks the help of his mate (played by another dog, credited as Nanette in the IMDb notes on the films) in extracting the life-threatening sticker, but no luck there. Knowing that showing signs of weakness leads to death in the wolf world, Lobo attempts to hide his wound, but when it grows worse his fellow wolves drive him out of the pack to die alone. Meanwhile, his mate waits in vain with her puppies for his return.

To Lobo, man is his greatest enemy, from whom he can expect no succor. Against all probability, the wolf is found and brought back to health by a kindly miner who faces problems of his own. Dave Weston (played by Charles Farrell who went on to a role as a minor television actor in the 1950s) is shot by a claim jumper, Borax Horton, who leaves him for dead. Lobo attempts to get help from Dave’s girlfriend May, but both May and Lobo are also threatened by the villainous Horton. Somehow, Lobo manages to get word to his wolf pack which joins him in giving the unfortunate Horton his comeuppance. Dave and May, and Lobo and his mate (Nanette), live happily ever after.

The plot was improbable, but Rin Tin Tin took his role seriously and brought to it the gravitas his audience had come to expect. Or so I assume; I have not found any contemporary reviews by film critics of his time.

According to the IMDb site, at the peak of Rin Tin Tin’s popularity, “Warners maintained 18 trained stand-ins to reduce any stress on their dog star, while providing him (“Rinty”) with a private chef who prepared daily lunches of tenderloin steak (consumed as live classical music was played to help ease the dog's digestion.)” And: “Trainer Lee Duncan, on the first film he made of the dog: ‘At first the dog did not know he was watching pictures of himself, but when it dawned on him his tail wagged ferociously.’" One can only imagine how proud Rinty must have felt when he learned that Clash of the Wolves had been inspired, at least in some degree, by the popularity of Seton’s story!

In The Legend of Lobo, the unnamed wolf actors (played by actual wolves or wolf-dogs of various ages) go through their Disney paces with faux natural history, lots of cute scenes, some tearful scenes, and even less plot than Clash of the Wolves. At least it featured wolves rather than dogs, but without a compelling actor like Rin Tin Tin, it is mostly a bunch of wolves running around doing wolf things with a voice-over narrator trying to impose some kind of order on pieced together documentary nature footage. The narration is overrun from time to time by the annoying accompaniment of singing cowboys.

Since there is no dialog in this film, we are helped by the wanted posters for Lobo with the price on his head increasing from $100 to $1000. The tale of “The bravest wolf of all” spends half or more of its time on the back story of Lobo’s parents, “El Feroz” the dad and an unnamed mother. Amid several scenes of cute wolf puppies at the den, the narrator interjects the occasional Setonism such as: “All of his life, he (Lobo) would be one to learn from experience, store it up, and remember it.” And: “When the buffalo were wiped out it left cattle as the wolves’ only hope for survival. So El Feroz took what seemed his rightful share.”

As in the original story, the plight of the cattlemen having their livestock destroyed is shown as an important problem while at the same time “a kind of nobelness (sic) in the wolf” is also acknowledged.

The young Lobo goes through various traumas, including getting lost from his parents, surviving a threatening encounter with a mountain lion, trying to support his doomed father caught in a leg trap, and witnessing cowboys shooting his mother after she is caught killing a cow. Seton did not spare his young readers from the experience of tragedy and neither do the film makers.

Contrived scenes of puppy Lobo romping with a baby antelope and the two of them joining a swimming party of baby raccoons probably had limited credibility in 1962 and certainly has none now. The only realistic part came when the young wolf attacks one of the raccoons (ending the scene!). Of greater concern, the director set up actual animal fights, wolf vs. badger, wolf vs. wolf, and showed wolves snared in leg traps. In other places, uncontrived documentary scenes of wolf life were rather interesting.

At the end of the movie, following the random scenes of real or imagined wolf behavior, the producers introduce a story plot: a trapper is brought in to rid the world of Lobo once and for all. He traps Lobo’s mate (in this case a black wolf since presumably a white one was not available) and holds her prisoner in a building at the ranch. Lobo rallies his pack to attack the ranch! They stampede a herd of longhorns who knock over the building thus freeing the female from her entrapment. The wolves happily run off and head out for a new promised land free of humans. The narrator calls it quits at this point. Sadly for the wolves no such paradise exists.

But I would like to give the wolves another chance. I hereby announce that for the next film incarnation of “The King of Currumpaw” I am available to write the screenplay.

Lobo the King Wolf Part III

"Lobo stands for Dignity and Love-constancy."

 Ernest Thompson Seton

 

Wolf Skulls

 

The high ceilinged, dimly lit, quiet hall in Ottawa sees few visitors. Two wolf skulls gleam a startling white against a black cloth background, laid out on a heavy wood table. Howl-less they have been for the past 115 years since meeting their deaths in the traps of Ernest Thompson Seton. Their final resting place is in the Vertebrate Collection in the specimen storage facility at the Canadian Museum of Nature (Collections des Vertébrés, Musée canadien de la nature).  

Lobo was one of six wolves happily preying upon defenseless cattle in the closing decade of the 19^th century in northeastern New Mexico. Seton named two of them in the original “King of Currumpaw, a Wolf Story.” At the time of their capture, Seton assigned each mammal specimen in his collection a number along with date killed and notes. (He used a separate numbering system for birds.) He began the hunt in mid-October, but did not manage to capture the first wolf until almost two months later. All six caught in leg traps. In order, they were, according to Seton’s field notes:

#653 December 13, 1893, male, 100 lbs. (maybe shot in trap)

#655 December 25, 1893, male, 87 lbs. (shot in trap)

#662 December 29, 1893, female, 75 lbs. (shot in trap)

#672 January 25, 1894, female, 80 lbs. (shot in trap? strangled?) “Blanca”

#675 January 29, 1894, female, 60 lbs. (maybe shot in trap)

#677 January 31, 1894, male, 78 lbs. (died of injuries after release from trap) “Lobo”

Two of Seton’s wolf skulls are at the Canadian Museum of Nature. By tradition, the Museum believed the skulls to be those of Lobo (#677) and Blanca (#672), but if the tags on the Canadian collection skulls are correct, then the Museum has two of the others: #655 and #662.

Seton #662  Museum #3726

National Museum of Canada tag on #662:

Species: Texas Gray Wolf
Locality: New Mexico, Union County, Currumpaw River, about 35 mi. N.W.  of Clayton, N.M.
December 29, (1887: Crossed out) 1893
Collected by Ernest Thompson Seton

(Seton tag: I didn’t get the information copied from this one, but the number 662 was attached.)

More Museum notes: Blanca. Canis lupus monstrabilis. Collected by Ernest Thompson Seton in Union Co. New Mexico on December 29, 1887.

(My notes: Skull, no bullet hole.)

Seton #665  Museum #1875

National Museum of Canada tag on #655:

Species: Canis lupus nubilus Say, Plains Gray Wolf

Locality: United States: New Mexico
Date: 1893  Sex: Female adult
Collected by Ernest Thompson Seton
Second National Museum of Canada tag on #655
Species: Texas Gray Wolf, Canis Lupus monstrabilis Goldman
Locality: U.S.A., Clayton County
Date: 1893?
Collected by Ernest Thompson Seton

(On this one, I made a note that it was #655.)

More Museum notes: Lobo. Canis lupus nubilus. Collected by Ernest Thompson Seton in New Mexico in 1883.  Loaned by J.H. Fleming. From old mounted specimen dismounted in February 1942.

(My note: Skull (with bullet hole) and pelt.)

DNA

In an email to me dated September 3, 2009, Dr. Kamal Khidas, Chief Collections Manager at the Canadian Museum of Nature kindly shared with me the “Genetic Analysis of Canadian Museum of Nature Samples” by Professor Robert Wayne of the University of California, Los Angeles, dated October 8, 2007, on the two New Mexico wolf specimens. For Seton specimen #662 the researchers took their DNA sample from a tooth. For #665 they used foot skin from the pelt. Both specimens had the same “mitochondrial control region haplotype” or DNA sequence. This is “a unique sequence not previously detected in extant or historic Canis lupus. This “haplotype is in the same clade as historic Canis lupus nubilus haplotypes” observed also from Colorado, Kansas, and Nebraska, the “interior continental U.S. gray wolves.” To be clear, nubilus was a different species from the Mexican gray wolf, Canis lupus baileyi. I write was, because as far as I know, nubilus is extinct. For our time the question is, will Canis lupus baileyi follow Canis lupis nubilus into the forever oblivion of extinction?

I recently received a note from the office of New Mexico Senator Tom Udall. One of his staff wrote me that the Senator supports issuing endangered species postage stamps as a way of raising money for international wildlife conservation. Clearly, help cannot come soon enough.

LOBO

If the wolf specimens in Ottawa really are #662 and #665, then what happened to Lobo (#677) and Blanca (#672)? So far, in my research at least, the record on the disposition of Blanca’s remains is silent. There is, however, a tantalizing clue about Lobo in a letter to Seton from Ms. Caroline Fitz Randolph dated March 13, 1895. Caroline was the daughter of Louis V. Fitz Randolph (who owned the ranch in New Mexico which hosted Seton during his visit) and sister of Virginia Fitz Randolph who Seton met while both were art students in Paris. Seton’s continuing friendship with Virginia led to his meeting her father who sent him to New Mexico where he brought about the death of Lobo and later popularized wildlife conservation. (Seton may have been attracted to Virginia or Caroline or both; if Lobo was the Wolf that Changed America, then an important link in the story was Seton’s relationship to these sisters.) Seton kept the letter from Caroline. It remained at the Castle after his death before being gifted to Library and Archives Canada (along with most of his personal papers) by Dee Seton Barber in 1986.

Here are relevant excerpts from Caroline’s letter:

My dear Mr. Thompson

At last the head of your victim has come, am very proud of it and delighted am I. It is the very best thing of the kind that I have ever seen, and I am already attached to it as the glory of my modest possessions….

Mother[?] says that she can’t bear to meet Lobo’s eye – she fancies that he has a “Mr. Hyde” sort of sneer, a look as though he might be the evil side of a human [ ? ], but for me, I love Lobo. He fascinates and attracts me, and his quaint [ ? ] and [ ? ] charms and satisfy me afresh every time I glance at him. I shall consult Julie [ ? ] before having his mounted and protected. But have a notion of my own that I should like him in a [ ? ] band of plain ebony with a tiny sample rim of gold inside – to signify le rir est mort. Does that sound right and fitting, oh mighty conquerer?

I have said a great deal, but somehow seem to have fallen short of telling you how good you are to me to send me Lobo, and how warmly I appreciate your kindness. I’ve not written [The letter ends at this point, although it must have continued on another, now lost page.]

Caroline wrote on letterhead showing their address as Front Street & Farragut Road, Plainfield, New Jersey. Perhaps the skull of Lobo still resides somewhere in Plainfield. If anyone can find out, I would like to know.

Please send this on to others who might be interested in Seton or wolves.

Text copyright 2012 David L. Witt

Lobo the King Wolf Part II

“I have been bitterly denounced, first, for killing Lobo; second, and chiefly, for telling of it, to the distress of many tender hearts. To this I reply: In what frame of mind are my hearers left with regard to the animal? Are their sympathies quickened toward the man who killed him, or toward the noble creature who, superior to every trial, died as he had lived, dignified, fearless, and steadfast?”
Ernest Thompson Seton

Wolf drawings by ETS

 

Seton’s published account of the Lobo story came out in the November 1894 issue of Scribner’sMagazine – ten months after the wolf’s death. Repackaged with other stories late in 1898, his book Wild Animals I Have Known became an immediate best seller. The book has remained in print to this day. The story of Lobo and Blanca was featured in the 2008 BBC/PBS Nature documentary “The Wolf That Changed America.”

 

 But what of Seton’s personal story? On the day of Lobo’s death Seton made ready to leave New Mexico, a sudden and unexpected change of plans. Somehow, having touched Lobo and looked into his eyes, the wolf hunter could not bring himself to hunt another wolf. Ever.

 

I have told of Seton’s personal transformation from wildlife killer to wildlife protector in Ernest Thompson Seton, The Life and Legacy of an Artist and Conservationist so need not repeat all of it here. Yet it is important to point out that if one were to read the Lobo story while knowing nothing else of Seton, its complete meaning would be missed. Readers of the late 19^th and early 20^th century were able to follow the progress of his personal development through what he wrote. Seton became ever more adamant about the need to protect wild nature, so much so that he became, along with John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt, one of the godfathers of today’s environmentalism.

 

Another way to put this is that the three month period covered in the Lobo story is but one part – although probably the most important – in a longer journey made from his time growing up on the Canadian frontier to his final years teaching the principles of Lifecraft in Santa Fe. The man who hunted Lobo and Blanca later came to bitterly denounce the wanton and senseless destructions of our wild relatives.

 

 The importance of this relatively short period to the longer struggle of developing a consciousness about animals has a literary antecedent, another, much earlier tragedy.

 

 You may recall that the Iliad of Homer describes a scant two weeks of the ten year Achaean siege of Ilium – or two weeks of twenty years if one includes the subsequent travels of Odysseus. (The Achaeans were Hellenistic peoples of the heroic Mycenaean period when the gods of Olympus were believed to have taken an active role in the lives of men at the siege of Troy and elsewhere. Subsequently, following the mysterious fall of Mycenae, the gods retreated and these peoples became recognizable in history as Greeks.) Two warriors, Achilles and Hector, representing their respective armies, are pitted against one another. They have (at the start at least) no special antipathy for one another, nor do they have any reason to be at each other’s throats except that terrible circumstances have brought them together. Achilles is fated to win their deadly competition because of his special advantages, but this does not change the pathos of the humiliating and ultimately pointless death of Hector. Under the circumstances, there is no honor in the way Achilles kills Hector, although Achilles is otherwise an honorable man by the standards of his time.  

 

 The great warrior wolf Lobo wants nothing of this war with the invincible Seton, who for his part, holds no antipathy for Lobo; their conflict is for Seton just a job he has traveled to from a far away land. In the Lobo story, Seton gives us a hint that his attitude towards wolves in general (and about Lobo in particular) is already beginning to change – but that is all we see here, just a beginning of a change in consciousness. It is in the 1901 Lives of the Hunted that Seton seems to recognize the shallowness of his victory. (See quote above.) In 1905, he tells of witnessing another wolf hunt, but one in which he refuses to participate, “Badlands Billy: The Wolf that Won,” in Animal Heroes. If we can extend the Iliad analogy for a moment, Seton, Odysseus-like, continues his journey home (to a new level of consciousness) through a journey of many more years.

 

It is only by knowing this sequel that we can understand the meaning of Seton’s life. The death of Lobo changed first Seton and then the world. I am tempted to write that maybe, knowing the outcome of Seton’s journey, we can begin to forgive him for his murder of Lobo. Or maybe not. Seton did not ask our forgiveness for his heinous act against the wolf. But without Lobo, there would have been no Seton Legacy. Seton learned important lessons about himself and about wildlife from his three months in New Mexico. One could read the balance of his life as a kind of atonement.

 

I hope that in another 3000 years, just as for us now when the Achaeans are better known in legend than in fact, when our civilization is for the people of that time more mythical than real, that the story of Lobo and Blanca will live on as the greatest nature story of the era when still the howl of the wolf could be heard in the West and was its most beautiful sound.

 

Please send this on to others who might be interested in Seton or wolves.

Text copyright 2012 David L. Witt

 

 

Lobo, The King Wolf Part I

“Lobo lived his wild romantic life from 1889 to 1894 in the Currumpaw region, as the ranchmen know too well, and died, precisely as related, on January 31, 1894. The fact that these stories are true is the reason why all are tragic. The life of a wild animal always has a tragic end.”

              Ernest Thompson Seton

Lobo, photograph by ETS

So Seton begins his introduction to “Lobo, the King of Currumpaw,” in his 1898 book, Wild Animals I Have Known. First published in the November 1894 issue of Scribner’s Magazine, Lobo led Seton to huge literary and commercial success when the book came out. As we approach the 114^th anniversary of its publication, the book has sold in the hundreds of thousands of copies through many editions to our own day. While all the stories in the book became popular, the lead story about the wolves became the best known. In the story, a clever hunter (Seton) pursues the brave and noble Lobo to his death. I will present an in-depth consideration of the story in Part II; here, in Part I, is a synopsis of this great American story.

The setting: northeastern New Mexico, October 1893 – February 1894 in the area now known as Union County. (It separated from Colfax County in January 1894.) This semi-arid region of broad tablelands is cut by deep arroyos. Rising from the flanks of two volcanoes, Sierra Grande and Capulin (a National Monument), the Corrumpa Creek (an intermittent stream) strikes eastward across dozens of miles toward the town of Clayton. It was in this area that Seton hunted the wolves. Although written with some embellishment, Seton’s account of his encounter with Lobo is close to the actual events as he recorded them in his journal at the time.

Lobo, Part 1: A large gray wolf, leader of a small pack, preyed upon cattle introduced into the Currumpaw Valley by ranchers (in the mid to late 19^th century). The “Mexicans” called him “Old Lobo” or the “King.” Lobo gained a reputation as the largest, smartest, and loudest of his kindred. The pack consisted of an additional five wolves including a white-coated female, Blanca.

These animals were occasionally spotted – from a distance – by cowboys and shepherds. The wolf pack took a terrible toll on herds and flocks. The problem was made worse by the wolves’ habit of eating only animals they freshly killed.  All attempts to hunt or poison the wolves met with failure. A thousand dollar reward offered for Lobo’s hide brought in bounty hunters. But the hunters wore out their horses and mourned the loss of large wolf-hounds killed by the larger wolves. The killing of sheep and cattle by wolves continued unabated. From the rancher standpoint, all seemed hopeless.

Part 2: The narrator of the story (Seton), formerly a wolf hunter (in Canada) had for some time made his living at a “stool and desk” (as a commercial artist specializing in wildlife illustration) when an acquaintance, a ranch owner on the Currumpaw, invited him to New Mexico. Seton agreed to hunt the wolf pack.

He hunted, however, not with a gun, since the wolves were out only at night, but by scattering poisoned meat and later, poisoned meat baiting metal leg traps. Although he made every effort to hide any hint of human scent from the traps, Lobo seemed to taunt him, gathering up baits and scattering “filth” over them. Lobo kicked rocks onto hidden traps, springing them. When Seton hid traps in devious patterns Lobo backed out them unharmed. Nothing worked.

Part 3: After weeks of unrewarded effort, during which Seton kept up his acute observation of wolf habits, he at last noticed something important. While the wolf pack generally stayed behind Lobo, he discovered that Blanca sometimes ran heedlessly ahead. Seton changed tactics. Rather than continue his fruitless efforts to trap Lobo, he instead turned his efforts toward Blanca.

Seton set traps with his usual cunning, concealing them in the usual way so that Lobo would find and disable them as was his habit. He set out six steel leg traps near a freshly killed cow. He removed the head and tossed it casually aside. There he planted a devious booby-trap. He buried two traps under the dirt by the head, knowing that wolves would not eat it, and knowing that Lobo would not approach, but betting that one of the others might investigate while Lobo busied himself disabling the other traps.

Seton returned the following morning to see if this trick worked. The head was gone along with one of the traps, dragged away by a strong but trapped wolf. He followed the trail catching up within a mile to find Blanca still in the trap and hopelessly dragging the heavy steer head behind her. Despite her terrible situation, Blanca turned to fight with the last of her strength, howling for Lobo, who howled in return, but could do nothing against men with guns. Seton killed her in a manner he came to regret.

He returned to the ranch with her body. All night the cañons reverberated with the plaintive cries of the bereft Lobo. “It was sadder than I could possibly have believed.” Lobo prowled about the ranch in the dark.

Seton came up with another trick to use against Lobo. On horseback, he dragged her body through a field to set out a chaotic pattern that Lobo would attempt to follow if he returned. Counting on Lobo’s love and loyalty for his mate, he set out even more traps. Surely the heartbroken wolf would come looking for Blanca in a reckless state of mind.

And so it came to pass.

Two days later Seton found Lobo caught in three of four traps. Like Blanca, he made ready to fight upon his antagonist’s approach, even biting through and severing a lasso thrown over his neck. Seton aimed at the animal with his rifle but at the last possible instant, held back, somehow unable to carry through.

Seton and a cowboy threw a stick and heavy cord to the wolf who bit into the stick and became entangled in the cord; they drew the cord tight to close his massive jaw. Unable to bite, Lobo ceased all resistance. They threw the wolf over a saddled horse and returned with him to the ranch. Now a prisoner, Lobo silently watched his passing kingdom.

At the ranch, they secured Lobo with a collar and strong chain, removing the stick and cord from his mouth. Seton offered the wolf water and meat, which Lobo ignored. The hunter examined the wolf closely, looking into Lobo’s eyes and reaching out and touching him. But the wolf did no more than stare out onto the prairie where he and Blanca had roamed free.

During the night Lobo died, the spirit gone out of him. He could not tolerate the loss of strength, the loss of his freedom, and the loss of his beloved mate. Seton placed his body next to the remains of Blanca, reuniting them.

Here ends the life story of Lobo, the King of Currumpaw, but, as we shall see in Part II, the legacy of this wolf proved all the greater with his death. Although he never admitted it, Seton spent the remainder of his long life atoning for what he had done. It will not be giving too much away to write that he never killed another wolf.