The Heber Valley’s love affair with Bart the Bear began with a simple boy-meets-girl story. Bart’s owner Lynn Seus said she always loved animals. When she met fellow animal lover, her now-husband Doug Seus, she had no idea how much her life would change. On their first date, he took her to feed a rat to his pet rhinoceros viper, one of the deadliest snakes in the world.
“I felt bad for the rat but that's nature's way," she said. "And so the rhino viper swallows it whole, Doug makes sure the snake doesn't choke, and then he goes, ‘OK, let's go out to dinner.’ So I thought, ‘Well, I'm not sure, but this isn't going to be boring.’ And it hasn't been. We've been together 54 years, and whatever it's been, it's never been boring.”
Lynn has documented their unboring life as world-class animal trainers of five grizzly bears, a black bear, wolf packs, eagles, a badger named Billy and many more critters in her new book, “The Grizzlies and Us.”
She said the book release is perfectly timed. Utah Wildlife Walls, a public arts initiative dedicated to celebrating Utah’s diverse wildlife, recently completed a Bart the Bear mural at 100 South Main Street in Heber. In collaboration with the official unveiling, the nonprofit is hosting a Bart the Bear Film Fest Nov. 15 and Nov. 16 at the Avon Theater in Heber.
Events will include screenings of some of Bart and his siblings’ most famous films like “The Bear” and “Dr. Doolittle 2.” There will also be an official mural reception, book release party and Q&As with Doug and Lynne. See the full schedule at celebrateutahwildlife.org.
Lynn details many colorful stories in her book, including Bart’s first gig on a Christmas special for “The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams.” The NBC series was one of the most popular shows on television in the 1970s and regularly filmed outside of Park City.
One of her favorite memories was a scene involving Bart, a well-trained raccoon, a tree and a tasty treat. “We let Bart out and he went, ‘Oh, jellybeans.’ He started swinging the tree back and forth, and that raccoon jumped out of the tree, got a hold of his head and was biting the hell out of his head. And Bart is just spinning in a circle, like, ‘How do I get this thing off?’”
That was Bart’s big break, launching a show biz career that took them all over the world. Lynn said Bart reveled in the spotlight and saw life as a situation comedy. He went on to star in more than 30 TV shows and films. From hobnobbing with Hollywood's elite as a presenter at the 70th Academy Awards to appearing with Brad Pitt in “Legends of the Fall.” Pitt later became a supporter of the Vital Ground Foundation, the Seus’ nonprofit that advocates for grizzlies in the Mountain West.
Lynn said Heber was a very different town when they first started adopting animals. Part of Bart’s early training included walks down main street on a lead. They’d stop at Dairy Keen for milkshakes and burgers, hold the pickles on Bart’s, the only part of the meal he didn’t like. And they played on the swings at the nearby park.
“One of my favorite things, I’d love to do it again, just one more time," she reminisced. "There were teeter-totters at the playground and we'd get kids to go on one and Bart at that time was big enough to go on the other. And the kids would go down on the teeter-totter. You couldn't do that now.”
Building their storied career wasn’t easy. There were setbacks and countless hours of “learning” sessions that required repetition and patience.
Bart’s final curtain call came in 2000. Lynn and Doug were with Bart until his last breath when the gentle giant lost his battle with cancer. He is buried under an apple tree in the backyard next to his beloved pond.
“I think the mural is endearing and what an honor. I mean, you know, I don’t want to choke up but what an honor," she said. "It's like hometown boy made good and he's remembered and beloved. When Bart passed, there was an editorial in the Wasatch Wave newspaper that would bring me to tears. He was our bear. He was our bear.”
Bart’s mural on main street breathes new life into the Heber Valley legend who will now be immortalized in a weekend of celebration for Heber’s famous hometown boy.
