On June 6, 1901 John McCarty set off from his remote camp near Clear Creek on Arizona’s Mogollon Rim to hunt for some rare pigeons and four dozen tassel-eared squirrels. He was never seen alive again. A few months later a body was discovered and identified as McCarty’s, but was it really his?
Little is known about McCarty’s past. Census records
suggest that he was born around 1855 in Scott, Virginia, to James and Mary
McCarty. At any rate, he was in Arizona when he began to advertise
as a professional hunter around 1890.
For the next ten years, newspapers related his adventures as
he roamed the Territory, hunting bears, mountain lions and other livestock
predators. He also collected rare animal specimens for museums and
universities. Because of his extensive knowledge of the territory
and its wildlife, he was appointed Fish and Game Commissioner in the fall of
1898.
On April 15, 1900, he married Lillie S. Sparks, then
aged sixteen. McCarty left his young wife, pregnant with their first
child, with her grandparents when he set off on his last hunting trip a little
over a year later. Shortly before he departed, he had taken out six
separate life insurance policies that totaled $27,000, nearly $750,000 in
today’s currency.
When McCarty did not return from his hunting trip on
the Mogollon Rim east of Pine, his partner, J. K. Day, went to search the
area. Week after week, the search turned up nothing. Finally, on
August 19, a body was found. Near it lay McCarty’s shotgun with a
burst barrel. It was surmised that McCarty had been stalking a
bear. Apparently, the barrel of the gun had burst when he fired,
likely disabling him and leaving him at the mercy of the angry bear.
The body was taken to Flagstaff, where an inquest
ruled McCarty’s death accidental. His associates had his body transported to
Phoenix for burial in the Masonic Cemetery. Find out more at the PMMP!
-story shortened, by Donna Carr
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