Departures of note

After surviving a near-fatal heroin overdose in the late 1980s, Timothy Treadwell traveled to Alaska to watch bears and found his calling. He wrote that his first encounter with a wild bear convinced him his destiny was entwined with theirs, and he credited his recovery from drug and alcohol addictions entirely to his relationship with the animals. Over the next 13 summers, he camped among coastal brown bears in Katmai National Park, Alaska, naming individual bears, touching them, and playing with cubs. He recorded nearly 100 hours of video footage and produced a large collection of still photographs, which later formed the basis of Werner Herzog's documentary Grizzly Man (2005).

Treadwell was born Timothy William Dexter in Mineola, New York, in 1957. He attended Bradley University on a swimming and diving scholarship, where he set the university's three-meter springboard records before dropping out. He moved to Los Angeles to pursue acting, appearing on an episode of the dating show Love Connection, but his father said Treadwell 'spiraled down' and developed an alcohol abuse disorder after losing the role of Woody Boyd to Woody Harrelson in the sitcom Cheers. In 1987, he legally changed his surname to Treadwell, a name from his mother's family.

Treadwell's years with the bears were marked by conflict with authorities. The National Park Service recorded at least six violations from 1994 to 2003, including guiding tourists without a license, camping beyond the seven-day limit, improper food storage, wildlife harassment, and conflicts with visitors. He refused to install an electric fence around his camp and refused to carry bear spray, though he wrote in his 1997 book that he had used bear mace once but felt terrible grief over the pain it caused and refused to use it again. He co-founded the bear-protection organization Grizzly People with Jewel Palovak and co-wrote the book Among Grizzlies: Living with Wild Bears in Alaska.

In October 2003, Treadwell and his girlfriend, physician assistant Amie Huguenard, returned to Katmai National Park for an additional week after an argument with an airline ticketer over the price of altering his return ticket. They were in the park later than usual, when food was scarce and bears were more aggressive. On October 5, 2003, Treadwell was killed and almost fully eaten by a 28-year-old male bear; Huguenard was also killed. A video camera recovered at the site had recorded only six minutes of audio during the attack, capturing Treadwell's screams and Huguenard's attempts to intervene. It was the first known fatal bear attack in the 85-year history of Katmai National Park.