Bears On The Frontier
In 1859 the Abbot of St. Vincent undertook his second journey to Minnesota for visitation. He stopped at St. Cloud and from there went on to St. Joseph, where in those days there were only a few houses. The brothers who lived there worked mostly in the “Indian bush” during the week in order to ready a place for their future monastery. The local superior was Fr. Clemens Staub,4 a former officer from the special forces of Switzerland. He received the abbot with greatest joy and after greeting him, asked him to wait a moment, so he could introduce him to his two novices. He opened the door and whistled, and immediately two shiny black bears hurried toward him, which he then introduced to the abbot. The abbot, however, was not very happy with such company at first sight, until Fr. Clemens explained that he had brought the two from the woods when they were still very young. In winter they crawled into the straw pile beside the stable, and in spring they came back out again. They always stayed around the house and were as tame as dogs.
But once they had innocently frightened the whole population of the settlement. This happened one afternoon when most of the settlers were working in the fields, and all of a sudden the church bell started to ring. Such a thing had never happened before in this quiet neighborhood at that time of day. Everyone feared that something bad had happened. Some said, “There must be a fire!” while others called out, “The Indians!” Brother Cook, however, who also was the sacristan, immediately discovered the source of the frightening occurrence. As soon as he had heard the first peal of the bell, he looked over to the church door from his kitchen, and noticed how the bears were beating a hasty retreat through that door. They paused for a moment and, detecting no danger, returned to the church. But they were no longer alone. The brother snuck up behind them, with a stick in his hand. The bears climbed up to the organ loft and starting to swing from the bell rope, playing in the manner of cats.
—From Boniface Wimmer, Abbot of Saint Vincent in Pennsylvania, translated by Dr. Maria Von Mickwitz and Father Warren Murrman, O.S.B., editor.