1 00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:02,000 Speaker 1: This Day in History Class is a production of I 2 00:00:02,080 --> 00:00:09,799 Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hello and welcome to This Day in History Class, 3 00:00:09,800 --> 00:00:13,640 Speaker 1: a show that demystifies history one day at a time. 4 00:00:14,560 --> 00:00:17,880 Speaker 1: I'm Gay Bluesier, and today we're looking at the birth 5 00:00:17,920 --> 00:00:22,400 Speaker 1: of a modern legend that's enthralled tourists and cryptozoologists alike 6 00:00:22,640 --> 00:00:26,680 Speaker 1: for nearly a century. The one and only, possibly non 7 00:00:26,720 --> 00:00:40,240 Speaker 1: existent Monster of the loch Ness. The day was May second, 8 00:00:40,320 --> 00:00:46,479 Speaker 1: nineteen thirty three, Scottish newspaper The Inverness Courier published an 9 00:00:46,479 --> 00:00:49,480 Speaker 1: account of a local couple who claimed to have seen 10 00:00:49,560 --> 00:00:55,040 Speaker 1: the legendary loch Ness Monster. The story, titled Strange Spectacle 11 00:00:55,160 --> 00:00:58,600 Speaker 1: on loch Ness, marked the first reported sighting of the 12 00:00:58,600 --> 00:01:02,880 Speaker 1: creature in modern times. The article referred to the mystery 13 00:01:02,920 --> 00:01:07,399 Speaker 1: animal as a quote fearsome looking monster, and that was 14 00:01:07,440 --> 00:01:10,920 Speaker 1: a first as well. The use of the word monster 15 00:01:11,440 --> 00:01:15,039 Speaker 1: is likely why London newspapers picked up the Courier story, 16 00:01:15,520 --> 00:01:19,440 Speaker 1: and also why it was eventually reported internationally as well. 17 00:01:20,120 --> 00:01:24,319 Speaker 1: The classic film King Kong had premiered just one month earlier, 18 00:01:24,760 --> 00:01:28,080 Speaker 1: it was still fresh in everyone's mind, and as a result, 19 00:01:28,440 --> 00:01:31,880 Speaker 1: people around the world were captivated by the idea of 20 00:01:31,920 --> 00:01:37,440 Speaker 1: a real life monster. The Mackay couple's sighting made Nessie 21 00:01:37,440 --> 00:01:41,480 Speaker 1: a global phenomena, but in Scotland, reports of a giant 22 00:01:41,600 --> 00:01:44,720 Speaker 1: underwater creature had been part of the country's culture for 23 00:01:44,800 --> 00:01:49,280 Speaker 1: at least fifteen hundred years. Lock Ness is a freshwater 24 00:01:49,440 --> 00:01:52,960 Speaker 1: lake located in the Scottish Highlands, southwest of the city 25 00:01:53,000 --> 00:01:57,480 Speaker 1: of Inverness. It stretches roughly twenty three miles in length 26 00:01:57,720 --> 00:02:01,640 Speaker 1: and reaches a depth of nearly eight feet. The earliest 27 00:02:01,680 --> 00:02:04,680 Speaker 1: known reference to a strange creature living in the lake 28 00:02:05,120 --> 00:02:09,040 Speaker 1: is a carving from the first century around five a d. 29 00:02:09,840 --> 00:02:12,919 Speaker 1: At the time, the Scottish Highlands were home to tribes 30 00:02:12,960 --> 00:02:17,519 Speaker 1: of heavily tattooed people known as pieds or painted people. 31 00:02:18,160 --> 00:02:22,040 Speaker 1: In addition to painting their bodies, they also carved pictures 32 00:02:22,080 --> 00:02:26,680 Speaker 1: into a series of standing stones near loch Ness. Animals 33 00:02:26,720 --> 00:02:29,640 Speaker 1: were one of their favorite subjects, and although most of 34 00:02:29,639 --> 00:02:34,160 Speaker 1: the ones they carved are easily recognizable, there is one exception, 35 00:02:34,480 --> 00:02:38,239 Speaker 1: an unknown creature with a long beak or muzzle, a 36 00:02:38,400 --> 00:02:42,320 Speaker 1: strange protrusion on the back of its head, and flippers 37 00:02:42,360 --> 00:02:46,760 Speaker 1: instead of feet. The earliest written reference to a monster 38 00:02:46,880 --> 00:02:50,440 Speaker 1: in loch Ness came a century later in a biography 39 00:02:50,520 --> 00:02:55,160 Speaker 1: of St. Columba, the Irish missionary credited with introducing Christianity 40 00:02:55,240 --> 00:02:58,880 Speaker 1: to Scotland. As the story goes, Colombo was on his 41 00:02:58,960 --> 00:03:01,600 Speaker 1: way to visit the King of the Northern Picts in 42 00:03:01,639 --> 00:03:05,320 Speaker 1: the year five sixty five. Along the way, he heard 43 00:03:05,360 --> 00:03:08,040 Speaker 1: about a huge beast that had been causing trouble in 44 00:03:08,120 --> 00:03:12,040 Speaker 1: lock nests. When he stopped along the lake shore to investigate, 45 00:03:12,240 --> 00:03:15,239 Speaker 1: he spotted a massive beast out in the water. It 46 00:03:15,400 --> 00:03:19,480 Speaker 1: was getting ready to attack another unsuspecting swimmer, so Columba 47 00:03:19,600 --> 00:03:22,400 Speaker 1: raised his hands in the air and commanded the creature 48 00:03:22,480 --> 00:03:26,480 Speaker 1: to relent in the name of God. This supposedly did 49 00:03:26,480 --> 00:03:29,880 Speaker 1: the trick. The creature backed off and never bothered the 50 00:03:29,919 --> 00:03:34,400 Speaker 1: locals again. Prior to the twentieth century, there were about 51 00:03:34,440 --> 00:03:37,920 Speaker 1: a dozen other references to large beasts and lock nests. 52 00:03:38,520 --> 00:03:41,840 Speaker 1: Some of those accounts borrowed elements from another story from 53 00:03:41,880 --> 00:03:46,640 Speaker 1: ancient Scottish folklore, the myth of the kelpies or water horses. 54 00:03:47,400 --> 00:03:51,080 Speaker 1: These malevolent steeds were said to lure young children into 55 00:03:51,120 --> 00:03:53,920 Speaker 1: the water by inviting them to ride on their backs. 56 00:03:54,400 --> 00:03:56,960 Speaker 1: Any kids who took them up on the offer were 57 00:03:56,960 --> 00:04:01,960 Speaker 1: then carried deep underwater and drowned. Over time, the line 58 00:04:02,000 --> 00:04:06,480 Speaker 1: between mythology and reality gradually began to blur, until the 59 00:04:06,480 --> 00:04:10,080 Speaker 1: accounts of a creature in Lochness were more like eyewitness 60 00:04:10,200 --> 00:04:13,800 Speaker 1: reports than fairy tales. That was certainly the case with 61 00:04:13,880 --> 00:04:17,400 Speaker 1: the sighting in nineteen thirty three. Early that year, a 62 00:04:17,480 --> 00:04:21,080 Speaker 1: new road was completed along the shore of Lochness. It 63 00:04:21,200 --> 00:04:24,000 Speaker 1: gave drivers a clear view of the northern side of 64 00:04:24,040 --> 00:04:26,880 Speaker 1: the loch for the first time, and that's how missus 65 00:04:26,920 --> 00:04:30,640 Speaker 1: Aldi Mackay and her husband were able to spot Nessie 66 00:04:30,680 --> 00:04:34,080 Speaker 1: while driving home. In the May second edition of the 67 00:04:34,120 --> 00:04:39,080 Speaker 1: Inverness Courier, the couple's sighting was described as follows. On 68 00:04:39,240 --> 00:04:42,640 Speaker 1: Friday of last week, a well known business man and 69 00:04:42,720 --> 00:04:46,120 Speaker 1: his wife, a university graduate, were startled to see a 70 00:04:46,120 --> 00:04:49,760 Speaker 1: tremendous upheaval on the loch, which previously had been as 71 00:04:49,800 --> 00:04:53,320 Speaker 1: calm as the proverbial mill pond. The lady was the 72 00:04:53,360 --> 00:04:57,120 Speaker 1: first to notice the disturbance, which occurred fully three quarters 73 00:04:57,160 --> 00:04:59,320 Speaker 1: of a mile from the shore, and it was her 74 00:04:59,400 --> 00:05:02,599 Speaker 1: sudden c eyes to stop that drew her husband's attention 75 00:05:02,640 --> 00:05:07,520 Speaker 1: to the water. There the creature disported itself, rolling and 76 00:05:07,560 --> 00:05:10,919 Speaker 1: plunging for fully a minute, its body resembling that of 77 00:05:10,960 --> 00:05:14,279 Speaker 1: a whale, and the water cascading and churning like a 78 00:05:14,320 --> 00:05:19,159 Speaker 1: simmering cauldron. Soon, however, it disappeared in a boiling mass 79 00:05:19,160 --> 00:05:23,600 Speaker 1: of foam. Both onlookers confessed that there was something uncanny 80 00:05:23,640 --> 00:05:26,839 Speaker 1: about the whole thing, for they realized that here was 81 00:05:26,920 --> 00:05:31,599 Speaker 1: no ordinary denizen of the depths apart from its enormous size. 82 00:05:31,920 --> 00:05:35,760 Speaker 1: The beast, in taking the final plunge, sent out waves 83 00:05:35,800 --> 00:05:37,719 Speaker 1: that were big enough to have been caused by a 84 00:05:37,800 --> 00:05:41,960 Speaker 1: passing steamer. The watchers waited for almost half an hour 85 00:05:42,240 --> 00:05:44,520 Speaker 1: in the hope that the monster, if such it was, 86 00:05:44,800 --> 00:05:47,640 Speaker 1: would come to the surface again, but they had seen 87 00:05:47,640 --> 00:05:51,520 Speaker 1: the last of it. After the couple's sighting went global, 88 00:05:51,800 --> 00:05:55,839 Speaker 1: more reports of the Locknest monster were quickly reported. Another 89 00:05:55,920 --> 00:05:59,400 Speaker 1: couple said they saw the creature on land, slithering across 90 00:05:59,440 --> 00:06:03,080 Speaker 1: a road of the lock. Not long after, the London 91 00:06:03,160 --> 00:06:07,400 Speaker 1: Daily Mail dispatched a big game hunter named Marmaduke weather 92 00:06:07,640 --> 00:06:11,799 Speaker 1: Ll to track down the monster. He never bagged his target, 93 00:06:11,960 --> 00:06:15,800 Speaker 1: but he did claim to have found Nessie's footprints. This 94 00:06:15,839 --> 00:06:19,400 Speaker 1: discovery generated more stories in the press and prompted a 95 00:06:19,440 --> 00:06:23,159 Speaker 1: British circus to offer a twenty thousand pound reward for 96 00:06:23,200 --> 00:06:27,400 Speaker 1: the animals capture. The announcement sent hundreds of hunters and 97 00:06:27,440 --> 00:06:31,240 Speaker 1: fishermen scrambling to lock Ness, along with an even greater 98 00:06:31,360 --> 00:06:36,600 Speaker 1: number of tourists. Eventually, though the footprints found by weather 99 00:06:36,800 --> 00:06:40,000 Speaker 1: l were proven fake. It turned out that the big 100 00:06:40,040 --> 00:06:43,680 Speaker 1: game hunter had fallen prey to someone else's prank. The 101 00:06:43,720 --> 00:06:46,640 Speaker 1: tracks he found had been planted, and they belonged to 102 00:06:46,720 --> 00:06:52,080 Speaker 1: a stuffed hippopotamus foot, not the Lockness monster. Public interests 103 00:06:52,120 --> 00:06:55,080 Speaker 1: sank once the hoax was uncovered, but sightings of the 104 00:06:55,080 --> 00:06:59,360 Speaker 1: creature continued to be reported, and in four someone even 105 00:06:59,440 --> 00:07:02,480 Speaker 1: claimed to have taken a picture of the beast. This 106 00:07:02,680 --> 00:07:06,040 Speaker 1: now infamous photo was submitted to The Daily Mail by 107 00:07:06,040 --> 00:07:10,680 Speaker 1: a reputable London surgeon named R. K. Wilson. It showed 108 00:07:10,680 --> 00:07:14,480 Speaker 1: a dinosaur like creature with a long, slender neck rising 109 00:07:14,560 --> 00:07:17,080 Speaker 1: up out of the water, and for many it was 110 00:07:17,120 --> 00:07:22,280 Speaker 1: the first compelling evidence that Nessie actually existed. The murky 111 00:07:22,320 --> 00:07:25,760 Speaker 1: photo led many to speculate that Nessie might not be 112 00:07:25,800 --> 00:07:29,360 Speaker 1: a monster at all, but the last surviving pleasi asaur, 113 00:07:29,760 --> 00:07:33,360 Speaker 1: a species of large marine reptiles believed to have gone 114 00:07:33,360 --> 00:07:38,760 Speaker 1: extinct during the Jurassic period. That theory technically still stands, 115 00:07:38,800 --> 00:07:42,280 Speaker 1: but the photo that gave rise to it was ultimately debunked. 116 00:07:42,360 --> 00:07:45,880 Speaker 1: Sixty years later. It turned out that the surgeon's photo 117 00:07:45,960 --> 00:07:49,440 Speaker 1: had been staged using a small toy prop. R. K. 118 00:07:49,720 --> 00:07:52,720 Speaker 1: Wilson had been persuaded to sell the photo on his own, 119 00:07:53,040 --> 00:07:55,640 Speaker 1: but the man who actually took it is believed to 120 00:07:55,680 --> 00:07:59,680 Speaker 1: have been none other than Marmaduke weather L. The Daily 121 00:07:59,720 --> 00:08:03,600 Speaker 1: Mail had ridiculed the Hunter following that unpleasant business with 122 00:08:03,600 --> 00:08:07,080 Speaker 1: the hippo foot, and whether Ll allegedly got his revenge 123 00:08:07,120 --> 00:08:09,880 Speaker 1: on the paper by making them fall for a hoax 124 00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:13,840 Speaker 1: just as he had. The plan worked a little too well, though, 125 00:08:14,080 --> 00:08:18,600 Speaker 1: and the truth about the photo wasn't uncovered until well 126 00:08:18,640 --> 00:08:23,240 Speaker 1: after the deaths of everyone involved. Of course, the revelation 127 00:08:23,280 --> 00:08:26,760 Speaker 1: about the nineteen thirty four photo did little to discourage 128 00:08:26,760 --> 00:08:32,080 Speaker 1: either tourists or Lockness Monster investigators. Over the last ninety years, 129 00:08:32,360 --> 00:08:36,079 Speaker 1: there have been dozens of expeditions to find the legendary creature. 130 00:08:36,679 --> 00:08:40,600 Speaker 1: Some have been carried out by amateurs and others by professionals, 131 00:08:40,760 --> 00:08:45,000 Speaker 1: including those at several British universities. So far, though there's 132 00:08:45,040 --> 00:08:48,720 Speaker 1: still no conclusive evidence of a large aquatic animal living 133 00:08:48,760 --> 00:08:53,240 Speaker 1: in Lochness. However, there were still between five and twenty 134 00:08:53,280 --> 00:08:57,400 Speaker 1: new sightings of Nessie every year. Are all those people 135 00:08:57,520 --> 00:09:00,600 Speaker 1: lying like so many others before them, or do they 136 00:09:00,679 --> 00:09:04,400 Speaker 1: really see something that everyone else has missed? For many 137 00:09:04,440 --> 00:09:08,120 Speaker 1: true believers now and in the future, the best way 138 00:09:08,120 --> 00:09:10,720 Speaker 1: to find out is to head the lock nests and 139 00:09:11,080 --> 00:09:16,520 Speaker 1: try to catch a glimpse for yourself. I'm Gabelusier and 140 00:09:16,679 --> 00:09:19,720 Speaker 1: hopefully you now know a little more about history today 141 00:09:20,160 --> 00:09:23,480 Speaker 1: than you did yesterday. You can learn even more about 142 00:09:23,520 --> 00:09:27,280 Speaker 1: history by following us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at 143 00:09:27,360 --> 00:09:30,960 Speaker 1: t d i HC Show, and if you have any 144 00:09:31,000 --> 00:09:33,920 Speaker 1: comments or suggestions, you can always send them my way 145 00:09:34,240 --> 00:09:38,079 Speaker 1: at this day at i heeart media dot com. Thanks 146 00:09:38,080 --> 00:09:40,840 Speaker 1: to Chandler Mays for producing the show, and thank you 147 00:09:40,880 --> 00:09:44,160 Speaker 1: for listening. I'll see you back here again tomorrow for 148 00:09:44,240 --> 00:09:46,240 Speaker 1: another day in History class