In the storied annals of The Broadmoor, it seems only fitting that historians recall a black bear and a golf course from the very beginning.

To be sure, hotel founder Spencer Penrose carried an affinity for both.

In 1916, two years before he would open his Grand Dame of the Rockies, Penrose received a black bear as a gift — the first in a long line of exotic animals he would wind up housing at the resort. That same year, he hired famed Scottish architect Donald Ross to design what would be billed as the world’s highest golf course.

It’s a connection that continues more than a century later.

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Starting Thursday, a field of 156 of the top golfers in the world descend on The Broadmoor for the U.S. Senior Open. The pristine postcard that is the East Course awaits, with its towering pines and its picturesque ponds.

It’s the ideal site for a major championship. And it’s the ideal site for a menagerie of wildlife that wanders the grounds.

“Being right up against this mountain, the golf course is just like a sanctuary,” says Fred Dickman, the longtime director of maintenance at The Broadmoor.

Dickman spends most mornings on the property, where he’s become very accustomed to animal sightings. Deer, squirrels and turkeys are a given. Just this week, he also spotted a bobcat and a coyote.

Nothing, though, compares with seeing a bear — or, even better, a sow and three cubs, as Dickman observed two weeks ago, playing in one of the course’s water features.

It’s another perk to the job and a reward for waking up early. Besides, except for occasionally wrangling a flagstick from a hole, bears don’t wreak much havoc for Dickman and his staff.

“We see them often during the summer,” he says. “It’s usually first thing in the morning before the sun comes up. And then when they see people, they just scatter.”

That’s the pattern, anyway, But that’s not always a guarantee, Dickman has learned, especially during tournament weeks.

In 2008, during the first U.S. Senior Open to be played at The Broadmoor, a bear earned top billing on sports segments across the country after lumbering across the 13th fairway in the middle of the first round.

“Apparently, the U.S. Senior Open is being played in a zoo,” ESPN personality Scott Van Pelt remarked on one of the station’s radio programs.

Two-time Masters winner Bernhard Langer was in that fairway that afternoon, grouped with fellow major champions Tom Watson and Hale Irwin.

“That was a scary moment really,” Langer says. “We hear this commotion, so we look over there and about 100 yards away this bear was coming straight at us. And I’m thinking, ‘What am I doing now?’ I said, ‘Well, if I run away from him, he’s faster than me. I don’t want him to jump on my back and maul me apart.’ So I just stood still and tried to be non-threatening, and Tom did the same.”

First-round tee times for the U.S. Senior Open at The Broadmoor

Langer says the bear came within 10 feet of him before running to the trees on the other side of the fairway.

In 2018, the U.S. Senior Open returned to Colorado Springs, and bear headlines followed. This time, a bear in a tree on an adjacent property caught the attention of fans near the 17th tee box during a practice round. The bear was tranquilized and moved later in the day.

“This is their home, and they don’t know to leave for a week because there’s a golf tournament,” says Russ Miller, The Broadmoor’s director of golf.

Miller and Dickman point to the overwhelming presence of concessions as the key factor in bear sightings. Colorado Parks and Wildlife says a black bear can smell a food source from five miles away.

In other words, dinner is served.

“They’re not going to hurt anybody,” Miller says. “They’re just doing their thing, and we’re in their territory. They just want a hot dog. Or a hundred hot dogs.”

While Miller acknowledges the “huge” publicity that accompanies a bear’s appearance — particularly one on national TV — he hopes it doesn’t happen again this week.

He’s not the only one.

Todd White, an amateur from South Carolina, says he has enough to worry about without factoring in the possibility of a bear in the fairway.

“When you’re playing a golf tournament like this with the greens being the way they are, you know sometimes they say, ‘It’s just surviving to the next hole,’” he says. “Well, that takes it to the extreme right there.”

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