James Capen Adams was born in Medway, Massachusetts in 1807, went to San Francisco during the 1849 gold-rush and became famous as a hunter and trapper working alone in the California Mountains. Skilled at capturing and training animals, he returned to the East in 1860 to work as an animal trainer for P.T. Barnum. He died of complications from a head injury sustained while training a monkey. He is buried in Charlton, Massachusetts. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Theodore H. Hittell, The Adventures of James Capen Adams: Mountaineer and Grizzly Bear Hunter of California (Boston,MA: Crosby, Nichols, Lee and Company, 1861), 1-5.
Record Data
Date Certainty
Exact
Type
Personal
