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Bear management in Glacier National Park (GNP), Montana, has evolved from 1960 to 1994. Grizzly bears (Ursus arctos) and black bears (U. americanus) have become more highly valued in both a social and an ecological context. Management has shifted from focusing on removing problem animals to preventing problem bear behavior by modifying human behavior. Reducing the availability of human foods to wildlife and tolerating natural defensive reactions by bears coincided with a decline in the number of bears killed or relocated. Reported sightings of black and grizzly bears have risen from 192 in 1967 to 2,075 in 1994, suggesting that bear populations have increased. However, we suggest the number of bear sightings is an unreliable indicator of population trend. Human injuries resulting from black bear encounters declined to near zero with the control of human food and garbage. The grizzly bear-inflicted human injury rate, however, continued to increase. Progress in understanding the causes will not be made until reliable information on bear populations and human backcountry use is available.