General History (for detailed chronology, see Historical Timeline below)
Roping the Bear
Roping the bear at Santa Margarita Rancho of Juan Forster by James Walker, ca. 1877 Image: The Denver Art Museum.
William Heath Davis, a friend of Domingo
Peralta, recalls the slaughters.
When cattle were slaughtered,
bears came to the lace at night to
feast on the meat that was left
after the hides and tallow were
taken. The bears coming, the
rancheros, with vaqueros, would
go there for the purpose of
lassoing them. This was one of
their greatest sports; highly
exciting and dangerous, but the
bear always got the worst of it.
One would lasso a bear by the
neck, and another lasso the same
beast by the hindfoot, and then
pulling in different directions the
poor bear was soon strained and
strangled to death. Sometimes
half a dozen or more would be
taken in a single night in this way.