You don't see many pet bears bounding through the streets of Erindale these days.

At some point in the 1820s, Irish settler to the area Thomas W. Magrath came across a female bear cub, and began rearing the ball of fur. He wrote about the beast to his friend, a clergyman back in Dublin.

Billing it as his “pet” for years, he shared that she “follows me about, and has often kept up with my horse, when at a round canter.” Magrath notes that this is despite the black bear being considered “an unwieldly animal.”

His January 1832 letter continues that the animal answered to the name Mocaunse, which is the Anishinaabe-language word for “young bear.” (Ojibwe People's Dictionary offers a pronunciation of the word, spelled “makoons.”)

Once fully grown the animal stood “five feet high when upright.” She was characterized as mild and docile. “She runs about the house like a dog, and is invited to the drawing-room, when any visitor arrives who wishes to make her acquaintance.”

When Thomas would travel the province, the bear would guard his tent. One of the Magrath family’s neighbours even complained that the bear followed the family to St. Peter’s Church on Sundays — and played with the children in the Credit River after the service.

Between the family's arrival in Upper Canada in 1827 and his 1832 letter just five years later, Magrath (an avid hunter) observed a sharp drop in the bear population. He noted that the “winter skin” of a bear was worth up to $7 at the time. He also claimed that the meat of a young bear “is not unlike pork, but infinitely better” and that even their body fat commanded a market.

This particular letter was sent to Dublin, and published as part of a book called Authentic letters from Upper Canada. Magrath's letters weren't intended for an audience, and thus are considered much more authentic to life on this side of the Atlantic. In comparison, other accounts of the “New World” were written by companies trying to encourage immigration by glossing over the hardships immigrants experienced, or by people who merely visited the colony in passing.

While the Peel Art Gallery, Museum and Archives doesn't have these particular letters, it does have its own set of original Magrath letters.

Staff archivist Samantha Thompson is currently updating the archives’ listing for the collection to reflect its importance to potential researchers. “Many of our Magrath family letters date from a single year in the family’s fortunes, so they offer an intimately unfolding narrative of how a moderately well-to-do and proud family coped with settlement. It’s also important that the letters refer to activities of the Anishinaabe people of the area. Their presence is mediated through settler eyes, but it’s important to acknowledge and provide access to it.” A listing of the collection is available on archeion.ca/magrath-family-fonds.