Three decades later, Lava Hot Springs remembers the terrors of Ligertown
Doug Long
LAVA HOT SPRING, Idaho (KIFI) — In a story that sounds more like a Hollywood script than small-town history, a terrifying event unfolded three decades ago in the quiet canyons of Lava Hot Springs. But this wasn’t a movie. Thirty years ago, the sleepy Idaho resort town was thrust into a harrowing hunt for dozens of exotic animals, a story that would forever change the lore of the resort town.
On September 20, 1995, just before sunset, the town’s tranquility was shattered by a single, sharp rifle crack. Lava Hot Springs was about to become world famous: the lions of Ligertown were on the prowl.
Located in a rural stretch just outside of Lava Hot Springs, Ligertown was the bizarre creation of Robert Fieber and Dottie Martin. The compound was a ramshackle maze of wood and wire, housing African lions, tigers, hybrid wolves, and ligers—the offspring of a male lion and a female tiger. At the time, Idaho lacked any laws regulating the ownership or breeding of exotic animals, a legal loophole that made the notorious facility possible.
The First Shot and the Panic
The first person to encounter the escaped animals was local resident Bruce Hansen, who was the first person I spoke to when covering the escape 30 years ago. His widow, Colleen Smith, remembers the start of the panic vividly.
“He [Bruce] came into the house, picked up his rifle, and turned around and said, ‘The lions are loose,’” she recalls. “I said, ‘What?’ He says, ‘The lions are loose.’ I said, ‘What lions?’ It didn’t even dawn on me. He says, ‘The Ligertown lions!’ And he takes off.”
Bruce Hansen’s shot was the first of many. As word spread, law enforcement from across the region swarmed the area. By the end of that first night, 15 exotic animals had been shot and killed, but the hunt was far from over.
Tailed terrors stalk a town through the tall reeds
For those who grew up in the shadow of Ligertown, the presence of the big cats had become a strange kind of normal. Bonnie Hansen, Bruce and Colleen’s daughter, remembers clearly what it was like having the big cats as neighbors.
“Growing up, it was normal to hear the lions roar morning and night, and so every night before the sun would go down, the lions would roar and the wolves would howl,” says Bonnie Hansen. “That was normal for me growing up. I didn’t know how weird that was.”
But on that fateful week, that normalcy shattered into a mix of fear and disbelief. The danger was amplified by the revelation of the owner’s negligence prior to the incident.
“It was scary, it was. It was frightening, especially when they discovered he [Fieber] had been letting them out to go down to the creek, to drink water,” said Colleen.
The palpable fear spread to every corner of Lava Hot Springs. Chelsey Linderman now works in town at Mike’s grocery store, but she was in elementary school when the news of the escaped lions hit town.
“I just remember getting off the bus and having parents and adults standing there watching us go into the school,” Linderman says. “No going outside. You had to stay there for the whole 8 hours, indoor recesses, no going outside, even when you were home at night.”
The Final Shot and a Lasting Memory
Eight days after the initial escape, a final lion was spotted near Lava Elementary School. Woney Peters saw the big cat from a balcony on the back of his home that bordered the schoolyard. He shot the last of the escaped lions, bringing an end to more than a week of exotic-tailed terror.
After all was said and done, a total of 18 animals had been killed, while 20 more were captured and taken to an exotic wildlife refuge in California. Bannock County bulldozed the ramshackle compound, piled up the scrap, and set it on fire. All that was left of Ligertown was ashes.
Today, if you didn’t know any better, you’d never guess that a compound housing dozens of dangerous animals once sat outside the rural town of Lava Hot Springs. A Home stands on the former site, its new inhabitants far less wild than the ones who once lived there. But for those who lived through the harrowing event, there is no forgetting.
“Oh yeah, I can still remember it, always in my mind it will always be there,” said Bonnie Hansen.