Sam Fathers

Sam is a major figure in Faulkner's most famous hunting stories, "The Old People" and "The Bear." Even in this story he still lives in Ike's memory as the mentor who initiates him into the fraternity of hunters and their prey, though he has been dead for many years. Sam is identified here as "half Indian" and "half Negro," the "grandson of a chief" and a Negro slave (273); unlike "The Bear," this story does not make any mention of his white ancestors.