, by Peggy Adler and Dibirma Jean Burnham, is the true story of Emil Pallenberg (1888-1963), considered to have been the greatest bear trainer of his time. In 1908, he became the first person to teach a bear to ride a bicycle. He also taught his bears to roller skate, dance, walk on stilts, play musical instruments and walk the tight rope. The Pallenberg’s bears appeared in major motion pictures -- and one was on Broadway for over a year. Laura was in the 1932 Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein Musical, Music in the Air, while Mischka (aka Carmichael) was featured in a movie with Jack Benny. Yet when the Pallenbergs and their Wonder Bears weren’t performing, they all lived in our little shoreline town of Clinton, Connecticut.
