Ransom "Doc" Wilcox's ventures began in Taber, Alberta, Canada in 1907, but he was soon whisked to the back country of Northern California where his family farmed, tended livestock, and sometimes survived via hunting and fishing-always with dogs and horses. Once, when the hunter became the prey-of a charging wild boar-Wilcox stuck a pole he was carrying into the ground and climbed up Another time his Australian Shepherd saved him from...