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Timothy Treadwell

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File:Timothy treadwell.jpg
Timothy Treadwell and a bear

Timothy Treadwell (April 29, 1957 – October 5, 2003), born Timothy Dexter, was an environmentalist and bear enthusiast who worked among the Coastal brown bears of Katmai National Park in Alaska for approximately thirteen seasons. At the end of his thirteenth season in the park in 2003, he and his girlfriend Amie Huguenard (age 37) were attacked and killed by a brown bear.

Biography

Much of what is known of Timothy Treadwell's early life is documented by Treadwell himself. Treadwell characterized himself as an aspiring actor, recovering alcoholic, drug addict, and eco-warrior. According to his personal accounts, he became involved with drugs after failing to gain the role won by Woody Harrelson in the sitcom Cheers. Some consider Treadwell’s accounts of his early life as unreliable.

After several visits to Alaska in the early 1990’s, Treadwell became interested in bears, and in the last 5 years of his life, documented many of his experiences and interactions with bears via home video. Treadwell attributed his recovery from addiction to his relationship with bears.

By 2001, Treadwell became a notable figure in the environmental community. Through his videos, he became known for attempting to create personal relationships with the bears he worked with.

As an activist, he actively communicated with the public, including traveling the United States to educate schoolchildren about bears, and appearing on the Discovery Channel, Late Show with David Letterman, and Dateline NBC to discuss his experiences. He was also a co-author of the book Among Grizzlies: Living with Wild Bears in Alaska, where he described his adventures on the Alaskan Peninsula.

Treadwell founded Grizzly People, a grassroots organization devoted to protecting bears and preserving their wilderness habitat. Despite the organization's name, Treadwell did not associate with grizzly bears, a term properly applied only to brown bears that live farther inland.

Death

In October 2003, Treadwell and his girlfriend, Amie Huguenard, visited Katmai National Park in Alaska. Treadwell, who never carried any means of defense against bear attacks, chose to set his campsite near a salmon stream where bears commonly feed in the winter. Treadwell was in the park later in the year than usual, at a time when bears fight to gain as much fat as possible before winter, and limited food supplies cause them to be more aggressive than in other months.

On October 5th, 2003, Treadwell and Huguenard’s bodies were discovered by the Kodiak air taxi pilot who arrived at their campsite to retrieve them from their trip. A large elderly male bear protecting the campsite was killed by park rangers while they attempted to retrieve the bodies. A second adolescent bear was killed a short time later after it charged the park rangers. An autopsy showed that the first animal had consumed parts of the couples' remains. This bear is not believed to be one of the bears Treadwell usually encountered, though this point is disputed.

A video camera, with the lens cap in place, was recovered at the site. The video camera had been turned on at some point during the fatal attack, presumably by Huguenard, but the camera only recorded six minutes of audio before running out of tape. According to authorities, there are no plans to ever make the recording public.

In the documentary film “Grizzly Man”, director Werner Herzog listens to the audio recording of the bear attack while interviewing Treadwell's former girlfriend, Jewel Palovak. Herzog advises her to never listen to the tape, and furthermore, asks her to destroy it to prevent it from haunting her for the rest of her days. In the Discovery Channel companion special to “Grizzly Man”, Palovak states that she will never destroy the tape, because she'd have trouble destroying anything she felt Treadwell had created.

Legacy

Treadwell's methods were controversial among authorities and public alike. He named many of the bears he encountered and developed such a close relationship with several of them that he could safely touch them.

Many wildlife experts objected to his methods, believing that his attitude toward the bears was too cavalier and that he dangerously anthropomorphized them. Experts also believe that he inadvertently endangered the animals by habituating them to humans, thus increasing the likelihood of dangerous encounters in the future. His death by bear attack is seen by some as a natural conclusion of his methods of interacting with bears.

His critics also note that while Treadwell believed that he was protecting the bears from a significant poaching problem, wildlife control experts have stated that incidents of poaching in the area were low and did not affect the population level.

Documentaries and Media Coverage

Grizzly Man

Grizzly Man, a documentary created from new interviews by director Werner Herzog and drawing from over 100 hours of the video footage shot by Treadwell during the last five years of his life, premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. It was co-produced by Discovery Docs, Discovery Channel's theatrical documentary unit, and Lions Gate Films. It was released in theaters on August 12, 2005.

The DVD version of the movie omits the clip from the David Letterman show, replacing it with another TV interview near the beginning of the film.

Discovery Channel aired Grizzly Man on February 3, 2006 on television. Discovery Channel's 3-hour presentation of the film included a 30-minute companion special that delved deeper into Treadwell's relationship with the bears and addressed controversies, notably the view of Treadwell's friends that the documentary gave an inaccurate impression that Treadwell was mentally unbalanced, as well as being overly accepting of the authorities' position that there was no bear poaching problem. The special also dealt with claims of fictitious interviews in the documentary.

"The Man Who Loved Grizzlies"

A profile of Treadwell, written by Ned Zeman, was published in the May 2005 issue of Vanity Fair magazine. Titled "The Man Who Loved Grizzlies," Zeman's article outlines a detailed portrait of Treadwell and his life with the bears. The article later became a finalist in the running for the 2005 National Magazine Award for Profile Writing. "The Man Who Loved Grizzlies" can be found in The Best American Magazine Writing 2005, a book published by the American Society of Magazine Editors.

Actor Leonardo di Caprio has agreed to star in a biopic of Treadwell, co-written by Ned Zeman and based on "The Man Who Loved Grizzlies." The film takes the same title as the article and a release date has not yet been announced.

See also

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