Original subtitles

The story of Grizzly Adams is big and powerful and beautiful.

They call me Mad Jack.

And me and my burro number seven been traipsing these slopes and valleys for a

long spell. So I know the story from the beginning. My friend Adams was accused

of a crime he didn't commit.

So he escaped into the mountains, leaving behind the only life that he

knew.

Now, that wilderness out there ain't no place for a greenhorn, and his chances

of surviving were mighty slim.

There was no time at all, for he was beaten down, ragged, and nearly starved.

Long about then, he come upon a grizzly bear cub, all alone and helpless.

Now, Adams knew that little critter couldn't survive without his help, so he

started right down that cliff, risking his own life.

To save it.

Now that cub took to Adams right off.

And that was when he discovered he had a special kind of way with animals.

They just come right up to him like he was a natural part of the wilderness.

But that bear cub, he was extra special.

As he growed, he became the best friend Adams ever had. And together, they

became a legend.

When Mother Nature planned the wilderness, she was thoughtful enough to

mountain men about as perfect a place for living as a person could want on

green earth.

When you wake up every morning breathing in that fresh air, your whole being is

so charged up you feel like you want to climb a mountain or something.

Now, nature takes care of the animals, but once in a while, things can get out

of kilter for the critters of the forest.

When that happens, well, my friend Adams lends a helping hand to Mother Nature,

trying to set things right. Now, Ben can be helpful, too, in his own way. Like

Adams, he has a deep liking for every living thing in the wilderness, whether

be a tree or a bird or an animal that just ain't feeling up to snuff.

Adams, he's got a way with critters.

Like no one I ever seen. He cares about what goes on in the forest, particularly

when things don't seem to be going just right.

Easy now, little fella.

Come on, Ben, let's go.

You just rest easy.

We'll find out what's ailing.

It's okay, little guy.

It's okay. You're going to be just fine.

Give this guy a little minute and go out there and take ourself a look -see.

This isn't going to taste real good, but you've got to drink it.

Now, me, I'm like Adams in a way, but instead of having a helpful friend like

old Ben, the Almighty somehow or other arranged for me to have the most ornery,

contrary animal that ever existed.

There you go. Come on.

Come on.

Where?

Servant.

Servant, are you?

Now, big nabbit, your belly ached all the way. up here asking for a drink of

water and I bring you to the freshest dream in all of these mountains and you

won't touch nary a drop.

Do you know what I think?

I think it's time for a number eight. That's what I think.

Now, don't talk like that.

You know, sometimes I say things I don't mean.

I don't even remember I said most of them.

Now, what can that be?

Hey there, little fella.

You ailing?

Huh?

Have a look at you.

You're not feeling too good, are you?

You're ailing.

Well, I've got a friend that's going to fix you up real good.

We'll just get you over there.

Howdy, Jack.

Adams. I see you brought a friend with you.

Well, he's more like a pig.

I think he's ailing.

One of them little critters from up there at Beaver Falls?

Up by that burnout?

No, couldn't be from there.

I was up there about a week ago and they was all skedaddle.

We know they're all going to want to go back up there.

We're going to have to go up there and replant that area before the rains come.

We're going to have mudslides all over.

Where did you find this little guy?

Up at Hoodow Creek?

You know, there's something mighty strange going on here, Jack.

I've been doing nothing but treating animals all morning.

Probably what happened is the ashes floated down here and got all over the

bushes and the grass.

That's what made them sick.

Nah, their instinct would tell them better than that. I don't think they'd

eating any food with ashes on them, would you?

Well, then maybe they were so hungry when they got out of the big burn that

ate too much and got the bellyache. You know, that happens to me once in a

while, and I'm made to aren't.

You haven't had any trouble with Seven, have you?

Well, just the usual.

Now, you stay out of there. That's medicine.

That'll make you sick.

On the way up here, old number Seven was just dying

at first.

You know that? And I went two miles out of my way just to get him a drink.

And when we got up there, he wouldn't touch nary a drop. Now, that just shows

you how... A cantankerous and ornery critter like that can be.

What creek did you say?

Hoodow, like I told you.

Was there anything strange going on there?

Well, no.

When you got a stubborn burrow like this and you're pushing him up hills all day

long, you don't see much except in his heels.

he's a goat.

Oh, he's probably going down to the lake on the other side of the slope.

A whole swarm of bees moved in last week when he was down there visiting.

Ben, you be careful.

If them bees are building the new hive, it's going to be mean.

Ben, why don't you stay away from Hoodow Creek?

There's a lot of strange things going on down there.

You seem to be doing a lot better.

At least whatever you ate, you didn't eat too much of it.

How about we put you on the ground and see how you're doing?

Think you can stay on the log?

There you go.

He's doing a lot better.

Be careful.

You know, Jack, I think we ought to take some medicine and go up and see what we

can do for the rest of those animals.

Well, number seven and me was figuring on just sort of...

Sit in the spell.

You know, Adams, a couple of animals get the bellyache and you think there's a

whole epidemic going on.

A little walk wouldn't hurt.

Well, all right.

Want some help?

No, I can get up.

Come on, number seven.

Gotta go stop the big epidemic.

Just as Adam said suspected, Ben was out looking for honey, but his luck was

sure bad.

That day when he reached the beehive, he found out that another sweet -toothed

critter had beat him to it.

Still, Ben weren't too disturbed since it was a real pretty day to be out for a

walk. So he decided to mosey on and visit some of his old friends in the

on the other side of the slope.

Ben liked having feathered friends, too.

Especially owls, because they were such wise old birds.

Since he was so near the creek, Ben thought it might be a nice idea to say

to a new family of geese who had flown down from the north a few weeks ago.

But those geese, they had nowhere known what a friendly bear Ben really was.

So even though Ben put his best paw forward, so to speak.

They just swam off about as fast as they could without even saying goodbye.

They swam off without something else, too.

An egg.

An egg containing a gosling who was just about ready to come into this world.

Ben had himself a problem. He couldn't go after the family because that would

mean leaving the gosling behind.

Poor Ben.

That baby goose was about to be born and it had nobody around to help. No

family, no friends.

Nobody except Nicole.

I still say you're making mountains out of molehills.

Now look at there at them critters.

The animals are all right up here.

Things might be nice and quiet out here in the meadow, Jack.

But I've been up in these mountains long enough to know when I smell trouble,

and that's the truth.

Adams.

Adams. Jack.

Dead fish up at Hoodow Creek.

Isn't that where you found that sick raccoon?

Well, it was somewhere near there.

You know, there could be something wrong with that water.

Nah, I think it's indigestion, Adams.

Fish just don't dive indigestion, Jack.

Nicole, we ought to go up and take a look at that creek.

Doesn't that stream run right through your village?

We best go see if we can find any of the sick animals. Let's go.

Adams?

Jack, something's poisoning that stream. We gotta find out what it is. We gotta

work fast.

Now, while we was a -headin' up Hoodow Creek, there was two strangers up there

in the hills.

One was an old rendezvous friend of mine by the name of Hard Luck Harry.

Poor old Harry.

Nature sure shortchanged him. Not only did he have the worst luck of any

mountain prospector, he also had the shortest supply of brains.

But once in a while, like now, Harry found someone more gullible and greedy

he was.

Someone that would grub -stake him. This year it was a greenhorn from St.

Louis by the name of Elijah Bowman.

Any luck, Harry?

Not yet.

But I never give up.

Well, I'm ready to call it quits.

Two months in these mountains and not a single nugget worth even two cents.

It takes time, Elijah.

When we strike it rich, folks are going to call you the Silver King.

I found a silver rainbow.

You really believe that, Harry?

Sure do.

Look. Lookie here.

This could be a silver nugget.

See there?

Well, none of the other ore samples panned out. This quicksilver test showed

them worthless.

See there?

Nothing.

Like this whole trip.

Quicksilver test.

Does that really work?

Well, down in St. Louis...

I met a fella from California.

Said they used it there with gold. No reason it shouldn't work with silver.

All I know is old -fashioned panning. You either find it or you don't.

No fancy chemicals don't help you, Annie.

Well, I'm gambling everything on these new ways.

That's why I sold my barber shop and spent every last cent on all this

equipment. Every last cent?

Everything.

I just kept my barber shears and my tooth pliers.

Need any teeth pulled?

No, thanks.

But I got an old mountain friend named Mad Jack.

He's always saying he needs his molars yanked.

Well, if we meet, I'm his man.

This water doesn't smell right to me.

Yeah.

It's just dirty.

You've seen dirty water before.

Probably from the runoff after the fire.

No.

Doesn't taste right either.

What do you think, Nicoma?

Well, he was here just a minute ago.

Same sickness as a raccoon, you think?

Cole, go up and see if you can find any other sick animals.

Try to carry that choke cherry medicine.

We're going to get you feeling better in no time, little guy.

Got to get a little of this in you.

There you go.

Do you still think there's nothing wrong with this water now?

Well, this still doesn't prove it's water sickness.

Well, I'm thinking it is. At least so we find out different.

Wonder how Ben's doing.

Ben wasn't doing much better than we was.

Luckily, he was on the other side of the slope, miles away, so his problem had

nothing to do with water.

His problem was this brand new little gosling about to see the light of day.

Now, when little ones are born, there's usually a mama around to say, howdy.

as the critter gets its first peek at the world outside.

Poor Ben, he sure was in a powerful fix.

There being no Ma or Pa Goose in sight, he figured it was his bounden duty to

watch over that young gosling until its real family showed up.

That baby was in sore need of protection.

Now that dove was probably wondering what Ben was going to do next.

As a matter of fact, so was Ben.

Now that little gosling, with its first breath on this earth, knew what it

wanted. Its mama.

All it saw was this big black furry thing.

Not knowing any different, the little feller just figured, well, Ben was his

mama.

Realizing that this gosling was... Taking him for its mama, Ben got moving

find the real mother goose fast.

But that newborn gosling, it just hung right in there. He weren't going to

let mama get away.

It was downright embarrassing for Ben.

What would the other critters think of him?

Just my luck.

Hurt my shoulder when we might have been getting close to the vein.

Well, I'll take over.

No, no, no.

You just might chop off a toe or a foot.

Harry, if we can't dig, then we gotta blast.

Elijah, blasting's mighty dangerous. That's the job for hard rock miners, not

greenhorns. It's just like setting off firecrackers on the Fourth of July.

You take the fuse, attach it to the explosive powder, you light the fuse...

And hide behind a boulder.

You gonna put the whole keg in? Why not?

Harry, I got a feeling this is gonna work out big for both of us.

Harry.

Harry, we're blasting ourselves a silver rainbow.

I'm gonna get these horses in a safe place.

Harry didn't know much about blasting out rock, but he knew enough to know it

was dangerous for man and beast.

So he made sure the horses would be safe no matter what happened.

Now, Harry didn't rightly agree with what Elijah was fixing to do, and he was

mite scared to boot, but he didn't try to stop Elijah because, well, he felt

responsible for them being out there.

Anyway, when Elijah lit that fuse, It was too late to do anything but take

cover.

Jack, we've got to work our way up to the top of that bluff.

But, boy, there's no water up there.

That is a small stream that runs along the top of the ridge.

It goes down to Hoodow Creek.

Then it levels off over on that plateau and starts back down the hill.

Adam, all this talk about poison water, it's befogging your brain.

Now, I've been around that country for years, and there ain't no water up

Well, Ben and I caught some fish up there, and I remember those boulders.

We didn't know it, but there was more than boulders up there. There was a

and it was burning itself down mighty fast.

Well, all right.

I'll come along with you.

It's not going to be easy going, you know that.

We're going to have to work our way up around that bluff and hike up through

those rocks. Now, if you want to stay behind, you can.

Stay behind?

I'm not only not going to stay behind, I'm going out ahead of you so you and

coma don't get in any trouble.

Come on, Seven, we've got to climb this cliff here.

Coming down Jack

you

all

right Of course, I'm all right.

Where's seven?

He's over there. He's just fine

The whole mountain could fall on me, and I'd still be all right. You're a

mountain man.

Hurricanes, earthquakes, mountain slides, nothing bothers you. When you're

of art, fire only makes you stronger.

Give me your hand. I'll help you up. Boy, I wish I knew who was doing this

blasting. So do I. I'd sure like to get my hands on it.

You know, this blasting could have something to do with spoiling the water.

What would blasting have to do with spoiling the water? Besides, there ain't

water up there.

All right.

If you then feel that way about it, then you stay here.

I'm not going to stay here.

I want to get my hands on whoever's doing that blast.

Where's my hand?

Thank you.

Lookie here.

You all right?

Yeah.

That was something, wasn't it?

Oh, come on, you old bag of bones.

Get up this cliff.

Harry! Harry, we're stuck in rich!

Well?

They don't call me Hard Luck Harry for nothing.

Plenty of rock and dirt, but no pay dirt.

I still got one small keg of explosive powder left.

Is there any other site that might have silver?

Well, yeah, not too far from here I seen a bluish outcropping. Could be worth a

blast or two. Right.

Let's get to it. Come on, Harry.

Come on.

Now, while we faced the problem of going up the hill to find the blaster, Ben

was still looking for the family of the gossip.

The critters of the forest just couldn't believe their eyes.

The Joshin bird calls didn't make Ben feel any better.

But Ben was never one to shirk a responsibility. He just

ignored the Joshin and... Kept a -searching.

The baby gosling kept sticking close to Ben like a teeny little shadow.

Could it have been this friendly otter had seen a wandering goose family?

Nope. Ben's luck was as bad as hard luck Harry.

When the gosling suddenly disappeared, Ben started worrying like a mother bear

over a missing cub.

A newborn gosling simply shouldn't be wandering around alone.

And our old gosling had little chance of surviving on its own. It needed a mama,

any mama, even an adopted grizzly.

Come on, you lop -eared excuse for a mountain goat.

We're almost to the top.

This is where it must have happened, the coma.

Jack, over here.

What's the matter? Are you tired?

Tired?

Me tired?

Not a bit.

It's number seven here.

Look at him.

He's just trying to make me look bad. He's the one that's tired.

Somebody sure is wasting a lot of gunpowder.

Yeah, I know.

But it's not close enough to stream to hurt the animals.

What stream?

Adam.

Look at that.

That there explosion shook this underground stream right up to the top.

Reminds me when I was still a greenhorn in the high country away north here. We

had an earthquake, and after that earthquake, there was rivers and streams

everywhere. And big gushes of steam coming out of the ground and blowing up

the air, mud and sulfur.

Hey, Adams, that's it.

It's the sulfur.

Nicole, what is this black stuff? Do you know?

Some beer.

Well, it's sulfur in there. That's what's making the critter sick.

No, it's not sulfur.

Something else in here, but we got to find out how it got here.

Well, if it ain't sulfur, I can't help you now.

The men that were here, they know what it is.

There was two of them on horses.

Looks like they went off that way. It won't be too hard to track them.

Come on.

It looked for a while there like we was all chasing shadows.

Harry and Elijah was a -digging for silver that weren't there, and Adams and

Nicoma and me was a -trying to find what poisoned the water, and, well, Ben's

still out there searching for that baby gosling.

Maybe the little fella was playing its first game of hide -and -seek.

If so, it was a -winning.

But in the game of life, it was another story.

A gosling wandering alone and lost in the forest had the proverbial two

of surviving.

Slim and none.

needed help and he needed it real bad.

So he started making the rounds of the neighborhood.

His only hope now seemed to be that some creature somewhere somehow had seen the

gossip.

If

there

was some palaver, It might have been Ben asking, Hey, you two fellas seen a

little gosling about yay high?

And the owl's answering, Sorry, Ben, we can't help you.

We would if we could.

And Ben grumbling, Well, if the little fella comes by, give a hoot.

Or a holler.

What's a grown bear like you would do in looking for a tiny gosling?

Number seven, this is the last time I let you...

This time I'm going to make myself scarce.

That last blast liked to blow my head off.

Using too much powder, Elijah.

Nobody was hurt.

Ain't no fault of yours.

The last thing I want to do is cause any harm.

Be sure the horses and any other animals are out of the way.

Don't worry about the critters. That other blast probably scared every one of

them back into the next valley.

You all right, Elijah?

I'm doing just fine. It's fine, Harry.

Ben was over in the next valley, still searching.

But the only thing on his mind was a little ball of feathers probably crying

his mom.

No, he hadn't seen it and he wasn't about to look.

His hopes took a rise when he heard a noise in the brush.

But them hopes sunk right down to his paws when he...

Saw that it wasn't a little gossip.

Yes,

sir. It's getting to be downright discouraging.

They came this way, Nokoma, and not too long ago, either. Their trail should be

easy to follow.

Looks like they're headed up towards that ridge.

Fresh tracks going along here.

Now, come on, you nuts, meek, lop -eared...

Pebble brain, bag of bones, just... Why don't you go back and help Jack? He's

having troubles number seven.

I'm going to go on up ahead.

Now that there fuse Elijah was about to set off was attached to so much

gunpowder that...

Anything or anybody in the vicinity would be blown clear to kingdom come.

And that anyone in the vicinity was Adams.

Running up that hill with no way of knowing the charge was set to go off any

second.

When Adams seen that burning fuse, there was only one thing he could do.

Did you hear anything?

What'd you say?

It didn't go off.

Why don't you go out and look?

And get myself killed?

You won't.

Unless it goes off.

Let's give it another minute.

You fellas know what you're doing. Mining, sir. And you better get down

right away before the blast.

I've cut the fuse.

Hard luck, Harry.

You cross -brained polecat. What you trying to do? Blow down the whole

Howdy, Jack. Don't you howdy me. You like to bury me, and that's just what

going to do to you.

Now, just toe the mark. Simmer down.

Just get back at them. Toe the mark. Don't get yourself all riled up, would

You going to let them get away with what they've been doing?

I believe it's all my fault, gentlemen.

Who are you?

Elijah Bowman, sir.

I'm here prospecting for silver.

Silver? Yeah.

Silver? Why, there's no silver up here.

Who told you they were silver in these mountains?

Well, you're up to your old tricks, are you?

Getting some dumb greenhorn to grub -stake you so as you can... Who says

ain't no silver up here? Next thing you tell is there ain't no gold in

California. I'll tell you what I'll do.

Every ounce of silver you find in these mountains, I'll eat.

Harry's luck got worse.

Ben's was a -getting better.

His powerful, educated nose had finally caught a long -lost scent.

Now that baby gosling's wanderings had brought him across Ben's path.

And it's a toss -up which one was the most relieved, Ben or that baby that

thought it had found its mama again.

But happy as he was, as Ben sat himself down, he knowed his problem was far from

over. If he couldn't find that gosling's rightful folks and return the little

one to him, well, sir, Ben figured he would become Ma and Pa to that gosling

the rest of his life.

Since giving up weren't Ben's nature, he reckoned he'd take one more last look

-see.

When it come right down to it, it was nature herself who lent a helping hand.

Yes, sir. Mother Nature, which had placed Ben in this predicament in the

place, told that gosling he was heading for his true mama and papa at last.

Now, when Ben saw that, Ben was the happiest critter in all these here

mountains. Well, maybe not happier than that goose I left.

Hard luck.

As dumb as you are, you should have been smart enough to not let him use that

much powder.

Why, you... And you.

You could have started a forest fire to burn down all the timber in these here

mountains and left a barren spot bigger than the one over at Beaver Falls.

Why, you could have... Adams!

Do you have any idea what happens after a forest fire up here?

No. Well, all the animals lose their homes.

When the rains come, we have floods and mudslides.

It takes years for it to grow back.

I understand.

But believe me, I'm really sorry.

Is there anything I can do to make amends for almost burying you, sir?

What do you have in mind?

Well, I happen to be a barber by trade.

Oh, no, no. Us mountain men, we never get haircuts.

He also pulls teeth.

I was telling me that your molars were troubling you. I'd be glad to remove

them. Get your finger out of my mouth.

How'd you plan to get them out anyway?

Blast him out?

No, I got my tooth yanker here.

Well, uh, no, no, my molars is all right.

It's just that my jaw's a little loose after that explosion.

Jack, your jaw's been loose ever since the first day I knowed you.

Mr. Bowman, have you been doing any blasting down at the stream?

No. Why?

Well, there's been some slick on the stream down below, and it's been

the water and poisoning the animals. Couldn't be my doing.

Only used the stream to wash the equipment.

Don't you notice any slicks coming off of your pants?

No, just cleaned it with sand.

Cleaned it?

Well, rock and dirt cleaned with water.

Yes. I used quicksilver to separate the ore.

Quicksilver? That's mercury. Didn't any of it get in the water? That's how I got

rid of it. I cleaned the pan in the sand.

That's deadly poison.

Poison? I didn't know that. Otherwise, I wouldn't have used it.

The mercury's heavy and it flows to the bottom where the fish are.

The fish eat that and they get sick.

The other animals eat the fish and they get sick.

Now you've got Nokoma's tribe in trouble.

That stream goes right through their fishing village.

Nokoma, why don't you go down to your tribe and get as many braids as you can.

We're going to have to dam up this stream and collect the rocks.

What are you going to do with the rocks?

We're going to have to bury them in a safe place, Harry.

Believe me, Mr. Adams, I had no idea that what I was doing would hurt anyone.

You know, you're like a lot of other folks that come up here and do harm to

forest and don't mean it.

Well, is there anything we can do to help?

Yeah, there is if you'd like.

We had a fire up at Beaver Falls, and I was going to try and reseed that area

before the rains came, but now we've got this mercury problem.

Well, Harry and I used to hard work.

We insist on making amends.

We do?

Well, if you really want to help, you can take over that job of replanting

burnt -out area.

We'll do it, and I speak for Harry, too.

Mr. Adams, where do we get those seedlings?

Well, that won't be hard to find. The seedlings grow around the base of the

trees. I'll have Jack take you up there and show you where they are, and he'll

take you over to the burnout area and show you how to do it. Mr. Adams, we'll

show you that we're as good as our word.

All right, look.

It's mighty nice of you to volunteer for all that work.

It shouldn't take you more than two or three months to... Get all that hillside

planted. Keep your arms out of trouble.

Yeah. Come on, Harry.

Let's do it.

On the way back to the cabin, Ben ran into something that might have caused

trouble. It was a nest of unhatched eggs.

But he'd had enough of motherhood to last him a lifetime.

He could hardly wait to get back to where he belonged.

Where a bear could be a bear, not a mother goose.

Hi, Edmund. Hi, Jack.

Where you been?

I just come down from Beaver Falls.

Did you see Harry and Elijah up there?

Nope.

Word's out about a big silver strike up north, and they was the first two to

leave.

But you know something?

They did everything they said they was going to do before they left.

Planted that whole burn in Aspen and Pine.

You know, I'm really glad to hear that.

Because they're nice enough fellas.

You know, they didn't mean no harm.

I never thought they'd do it.

How's the streams around here?

They're looking beautiful again, Jack.

Water's nice and fresh and clean and clear. Just jumping with trout.

Oh, Elijah told me to give you this.

James Adams.

Let's see what it is.

It's a newspaper clipping.

What does it say?

It says here that Elijah...

and Harry are new kinds of heroes by helping nature and setting things right

the wilderness.

Yeah. That's nice.

Well, go on.

Well, that's all there is.

Well,

it didn't say anything about me.

Well, after all, I was the one that took them up there and showed them how to do

it and everything.

Well, the important thing is that it got done, not who gets the credit for it.

It's going to help the people know about the wilderness and how to protect it.

What's the matter with Ben?

I don't know, Jack.

Every time he sees a goose, he runs off and hides.

Deep inside the forest is a door into another land.

Here is our life and home.

We are staying here forever in the beauty of

this place. All alone, we keep on hoping.