That big black bear is walking right up to where my mother and father are standing (outside of their car) in the beautiful YELLOW STONE PARK in northern Wyoming.

As it approaches my mother, it stands on its hind legs and places its paws on my mother’s shoulders, looking her in the face.

Standing a few feet from them, very softly my father said to my mother “Stand very still and don’t look him in the eye.” And believe-you-me, that is precisely what my frightened mother did. After a couple minutes this big black bear appeared satisfied with what he saw, got down and slowly ambled away. Whew!!!!!!!

NOW…..my mother and father started breathing again!!! Well….at least my mother started to breath again, as nothing ever seemed to bother my father except those cactus thistles in the desert in bloom when he reached to pick a flower and pulled back a handful if stickers. OUCH!!!!!!!!

At another time, my mother took this picture while sitting inside their car. she wasn’t taking any chances as the lady in this photo is doing although this was several years later and people were no longer a novelty. The encounter my mother had with the bear was in the early depression years when very few people traveled to Yellowstone Park.

My father enjoyed to the fullest, telling and re-telling this little story to anyone who would listen. I lost track of how many trips my parents made over the years crossing the Rocky Mountains to their destination Pomona California.

Here is an example of how tall cactus in our western desert sometimes grows! That is my father, his cousin Minnie her husband Frank and Guy McMahon. My mother was the photographer. Our family owe her a gratitude of thanks for the multitude of pictures she took over the years, that was our wonderful mother!

WOW!!! Look at the size of that tree trunk in the NATIONAL PARK!!!!! They have just driven the car through the trunk of that tree and stopped to get this picture.  They are Guy McMahon, my little Susie, Nellie McMahon and my father, my mother took the photo.

While my father and the others wait in the car, my daughter Susie accompanied by my mother and her camera are outside for a little adventure.

So my little Susie, who at age seven went along on this trip to California, gets to hand feed this hungry faun. What a pleasure for my little animal loving daughter.

And here you see they made sure she got to visit this prize THE BIG ROCK CANDY MOUNTAIN! And she brought home a little bag of ROCK CANDY she shared with her little two year old sister Meredythe.

What a wonderful educational trip in the year 1949 for a little seven year old! That is the same age I was my first time to make the same trip in the spring of 1930.

FRF ♥