Boston’s Spooky Sea Serpent (episode 312)

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Jake:
[0:04] Welcome to Hub History, where we go far beyond the Freedom Trail to share our favorite stories from the history of Boston. The Hub of the Universe.

Introduction to Boston’s Spooky Sea Serpent

Jake:
[0:14] This is episode 312, Boston’s Spooky sea serpent. Hi, I’m Jake. And this week I’m gonna be resurrecting an on again off again. Hub History tradition. October is the Spooky season. And over the years, I’ve found excuses to tell some spooky but historical stories on the podcast, the very first episode of the show landed during Halloween week in 2016 and the topic was Pope’s Night.

Jake:
[0:45] Now, there’s nothing supernatural about Pope’s Night, but it does feature creepy effigies of the Pope bonfires and giant nighttime brawls. Since then, we’ve talked about the forms of folk magic that were practiced at the Fairbanks House, America’s first UFO S as spotted over the Charles River by Boston founder John Winthrop and the witch trials in Boston that predating the ones in Salem, for Halloween 2020. I surveyed ghost stories from the otherworldly observations of Cotton Mather to the drag queen who haunts Boston’s most famous gay bar. I linked to those past episodes in the show notes this week, but Now, I want to talk about the sea serpent that’s been spotted plotting the waters of Boston Harbor and the Massachusetts Bay. Since the earliest days of English colonization. Together we’ll dig into the historical record and newspaper archives to see why people believe in this mythical beast. But first, I just wanna pause and say a big thank you to the listeners who support hub history. I usually use this time at the top of the show to ask for your monthly support on Patreon. That’s an important source of funding for the show. But there are plenty of people who might want to help me make the show without a recurring monthly payment. That’s where paypal comes in listeners, Scott Kay Doug, C and Jack B all made recent contributions on paypal to help cover this podcasts expenses.

Jake:
[2:14] While the ongoing support I get on Patreon helps with ongoing expenses. I can rely on paypal for one time purchases for things like MICS cables, a new windscreen for my field recorder and pretty soon a new laptop to replace the aging but well loved Lenovo that I use for podcasting, to everyone who’s already supporting the show. Thank you. And if you’re not yet supporting the show and you’d like to start, it’s easy, just go to hubor.com and click on the support us link to go to paypal or Patreon. And thanks again to all our new and returning sponsors.

Jake:
[2:54] Well, there have been many reports of a giant sea serpent along the coast from Boston’s North Shore all the way up to Maine over the centuries. The closest report I could find to Boston proper comes from 1839.

Historical Accounts of the Sea Serpent

Jake:
[3:07] It seems like whenever you hear a story like this, it’s always something that happened to a friend of a friend of my cousin’s boss or something like that. And in this case, it’s from a story in the September 14th Springfield Republican, which was reprinting a story from the New York dispatch, which in turn cited the Boston mercantile journal.

Jake:
[3:26] Once you untangle that web, the story of a reliable witness to an extraordinary creature follows as Lieutenant John Boer of the United States Navy was passing in a sailboat from Deer Island to Nahant on Friday. Last about one o’clock PM, he saw remarkable fish on the water rapidly crossing the boat’s bow at the distance of an eighth of a mile, the head of the fish was plainly to be seen resting on the surface of the water. Then after the space of about eight or 10 ft, there followed a number of protuberances such as have heretofore been described after which there was a space of about 15 or 20 ft when some smaller protuberances followed. Apparently the tail of the fish, the whole length of the monster was estimated by Lieutenant Bobier at from 120 to 135 ft in length. And the size of the head was nearly the size of a barrel. Thus corresponding with descriptions which had been previously given beneath the head of this extraordinary looking fish. There was a white appearance but whether this was owing to the color of the skin or to the foam caused by the rapid motion of the animal or to a glimpse of the horizon between his head and the water could not be ascertained.

Jake:
[4:38] Mr Boer is an experienced officer having entered the service in 1813 and is familiar with the appearance of the inhabitants of the sea in every quarter of the globe. Yet in all his goings down to the mighty deep, he has never seen anything bearing any resemblance to this animal before he is positive, it could not have been any species of fish with which he has been acquainted. There were in the boat with him, several men belonging to the navy yard, one of whom with a readiness which bears testimony to his courage and simplicity grasped the boat hook and stood ready to grapple with the monster.

Reports from Gloucester Harbor

Jake:
[5:16] The encounter near Deer Island was the closest one I could find with the New England sea serpent. But the earliest comes from the book, an account of two voyages to New England by John Jocelyn. The last time Jocelyn made an appearance on the podcast, it was all the way back in episode 74 he was an Englishman whose two voyages to the New England coast occurred in 1638 and 1671. Last time we heard from Jocelyn, he reported on Samuel Maverick’s attempt in East Boston to breed enslaved Africans through forced rape during his first voyage. A few months after that dark chapter, Jocelyn recorded a conversation that he had on June 26th, 1639 while he was staying near today’s Scarborough outside Portland Maine. At this time, we had some neighboring gentlemen in our house who came to welcome me into the country where amongst variety of discourse, they told me of a sea serpent or snake that lake coiled up like a cable upon a rock at Cape Ann, a boat passing by with English aboard and two Indians, they would have shot the serpent. But the Indians dissuaded them saying that if you were not killed outright, they would all be in danger of their lives.

Jake:
[6:30] The only problem with this account is that the very next paragraph describes how one of these visitors saw a mermaid at Casco Bay. So it’s possible that John Jocelyn was like Fox Mulder and he wanted to believe just a bit too much.

Jake:
[6:47] However, the idea that there was a sea serpent on Cape Ann would resurface in the early 19th century and resonate even into the 20th. In an article in the April 1956 edition of American Heritage Magazine Everts Erickson describes the creature sightings that were reported north of Boston in August 1817, the skipper of a coasting vessel forced into Gloucester by bad weather came into Lippo’s auction room with a curious story at the entrance to the bay. He said, gravely, he and his crew had seen a terrible creature that looked like a sea serpent 60 ft long. He was laughed out of the room. But in two weeks, all Gloucester was in an uproar. Everyone seems to have seen it or by local usage seen him. He was colored like an eel, he made the bay is home. Sometimes he lay extended on the surface, sometimes he played like a porpoise, but mostly he preyed on the herring caught in record numbers that year, when he swam with his head raised above the surface, his head and long neck moved slowly from side to side. While his body proper seemed to move with the vertical motion of a caterpillar. Most witnesses agreed that they saw neither horns, gills, teeth nor scales on the snub headed animal. Though some women claimed that his eyes were as large as pewter plates.

Jake:
[8:14] Samuel Adams Drake’s 1910 book New England Legends and folklore relates how widely reported and nearly universally accepted these reports of a cape and sea serpent war. In the days. Following that first report, words are inadequate to describe the widespread consternation which the apparition of such a monster created among the hardy population of our New England seaboard for he was soon perceived to possess none of the attributes of a sportive and harmless fish, but to belong strictly to the reptile tribe, and what a reptile, the most exaggerated reports of his length prevailed throughout all the fishing towns of Cape Ann and up and down the length of the coast. One skipper swore that he was as long as the main mast of a 74 another would eat him if the steeple of Gloucester meeting house could hold a candle to him for length. Still another declared upon his solemn affidavit that having sighted the shaggy head of the snake early in the morning with a stiff six knot breeze and everything full. He had been a half a glass in overhauling his snake ship’s tail as he lay motionless along the water.

Jake:
[9:23] In a paper published in the American Quarterly. In 1990 Chandos Michael Brown describes how one of the early American scientific societies similar to the American Philosophical Society attempted to study the Cape and Sea Serpent, stimulated by newspaper bulletins. The Lennan Society of New England called a special meeting on August 18th 1817 where it appointed a committee to collect evidence with regard to the existence and appearance of any such animal. The society grasped this opportunity to impress the public with its expertise and moved aggressively to consolidate its claims upon any final description of the creature. It was important to act quickly for in addition to the international acclaim that would accompany a scientific description of the beast. The popular market for a pamphlet was very much a thing at the moment.

Jake:
[10:15] Recently established in 1814, the society drew members by its invitation only from a comparatively small circle of scientific savants and amateurs who resided mainly in the vicinity of Boston. The society was not purely local in membership. However, its museum and proudest accomplishment was swollen by contributions from the 100 or so corresponding members scattered about the country and the world, early in 1816, the Overwhelmed Society moved the whole collection to a large hall situated above the New South Market House in Boston and opened it to the public at no charge on Saturdays.

Jake:
[10:57] The pamphlet they eventually published was titled report of a committee of the Linen Society of New England. Relative to a large marine animal. Supposed to be a serpent seen near Cape Ann Massachusetts in August. 1817, this report contains signed affidavits from 13 people who claim to have seen the serpent. That month of which I’ll quote just a few first up. I Solomon Allen the third of Gloucester and the County of Essex ship master, depose and say that I have seen a strange marine animal that I believe to be a serpent and the harbor and said Gloucester, I should judge him to be between 80 90 ft in length and about the size of a half barrel, apparently having joints from his head to his tail. His head formed something like the head of the rattlesnake, but nearly as large as the head of a horse. When he moved in the surface of the water. His motion was slow at times playing about in circles and sometimes moving nearly straightforward. When he disappeared, he sunk apparently directly down. It would next appear at 200 yards from where he disappeared in two minutes. His color was a dark brown and I did not discover any spots upon him.

Jake:
[12:14] Building on that report of joints from head to tail. Our next witness confirms that the creature’s body appeared to be segmented but estimates the size as being about half that of Alan’s estimation. I EPPS Ellery of Gloucester and the county of Essex ship master depose and say, that on the 14th day of August 1817, I saw a sea animal that I thought to be a serpent in the harbor inside Gloucester. I was on an eminence near the low water mark and about 30 ft above the level of the sea. When I saw him, I should judge that he was about 150 fathoms from me. I saw the upper part of his head and I should say about 40 ft of the animal. He appeared to me to have joints about the size of a two gallon keg. I was looking at him with a spy glass when I saw him open his mouth and his mouth appeared like that of the serpent. The top of his head appeared flat. A third witness agrees with Ellery on the size of the creature but confirms the color reported by Allen while not mentioning anything about a segmented body. I Matthew Gaffney of Gloucester in the County of Essex ship carpenter to pose and say, that on the 14th day of August 1817, between the hours of four and five o’clock in the afternoon, I saw a strange marine animal resembling a serpent in the harbor. Inside Gloucester.

Jake:
[13:42] I was in a boat and was within 30 ft of him, his head appeared full as large as a four gallon keg, his body as large as a barrel and his length that I saw, I should judge 40 ft, at least, the top of his head was of a dark color and the under part of his head appeared nearly white as did also several feet of his belly that I saw, I supposed and do believe that the whole of his belly was nearly white. I fired at him when he was nearest to me. I had a good gun and took good aim. I aimed at his head and think I must have hit him. He turned towards us immediately after I had fired and I thought he was coming at us, but he sunk down and went directly under our boat and made his appearance at about 100 yards from where he sunk.

Jake:
[14:33] That’s a lot of very respectable men of Gloucester making very definitive accounts of a sea serpent in Gloucester Harbor in the wake of these reports. New Englanders combed the shores and shallows in search of evidence of the serpent’s existence. Erickson’s 1956 article in American heritage recounts the temporary excitement that reigned in Boston after a baby sea serpent was reportedly killed and brought to the Lian Society for further study. The creature was small but it had bumps all along its length that corresponded

The Role of the Lian Society

Jake:
[15:06] with the segmented body reported by several witnesses. In August 1817, a Cape Ann farmer pitchforked in his sea girt pasture, a three and one half foot snake with humps like the monsters, Boston’s Lennan society to whom the snake had been brought, decided it was the serpent’s progeny. They dissected it, making an engraving of its innards and named it scoliosis Atlantic. This piece of news from the hub sent small fry along the coast in a frenzied hunt for sea serpent eggs until a French naturalist pointed out that the reptile in question was actually a common black snake in a diseased condition.

Jake:
[15:47] While the Lian Society was largely discredited by this very public blunder. Their report also mentioned that the creature had been spotted near Nahant. An animal of similar appearance was again seen in August 1819 off to hunt Boston and remained in the neighborhood for some weeks. 200 persons witnessed it. 13 folds were counted and the head which was serpent shaped was elevated 2 ft above the surface.

The Sea Serpent’s Seasonal Visits

Jake:
[16:17] Its eye was remarkably brilliant and glistening. The water was smooth and the weather calm and serene.

Jake:
[16:27] At the time of the first reports of a local sea serpent, Nahan was just emerging as a summer destination for well off Bostonians. At the time of the first reports of a local sea serpent, Nahan was just emerging as a summer destination for well off Bostonians, seaside hotel started springing up by 1802 and daily steam ferry service from Boston to the hunt was offered starting in 1817. After the serpent’s initial appearance there in 1819, Samuel Adams Drake wrote in New England legends that the creature disappeared from the waters around the hunt to escape capture. Stimulated by the large reward offered for the serpent alive or dead vessels were fitted out manned by expert whales men which cruised in the bay. The revenue vessel then on the station was ordered to keep a vigilant lookout and she kept her guns double shotted for action. Nets were also spread in as snake ship’s accustomed haunts and one adventurous fellow who had approached so near as to see the white of his glittering eye emptied the contents of a ducking gun into the monster’s head. But he seemed to bear a charmed life and having easily eluded his pursuers, derisively shook the spray of Nahant Bay from his tail air. He disappeared in the depths of the ocean.

Jake:
[17:50] This Nahan sea monster soon returned, however, and its presence was reported nearly every summer by visitors and locals alike for most of the rest of the century. For example, the Greenfield reporter notes an appearance in July 1822, the sea serpent again, the Boston evening gazette of Wednesday last states that the famous sea serpent whose existence is believed by about one half of the world and denied by the other half has again made his appearance on our coast, that several gentlemen had a distinct view of him at the ha on the 28th ultimo and that he has since been seen several days in succession by different individuals of the highest respectability, reports pour in regularly in the following summers with the New England farmer reporting in June 1833 the sea serpent made his first appearance for the season Saturday, the 29th of June off Nahant. He exhibited himself to 40 or 50 ladies and gentlemen who it is said, will testify to his identity, enormity and other qualities and qualifications calculated to excite astonishment.

Jake:
[19:03] Only a month later, the Boston Post carried a report from a sea captain who’d been a serpent skeptic until seeing the creature himself. Sea serpent again, the schooner Charles of Provincetown Jacob Cook, Master James M need a mate. Arrived here this morning reports that yesterday between 11 and 12 o’clock went about 1.5 miles east of Nahant, he, heard a tremendous rush of water and on looking out, saw about 300 yards distant, an immense serpent lying in the shape of a hoop. The circle was large enough for a schooner to lie in it suddenly stretched out and appeared to be 60 or 70 ft in length, resembling a string of casks. All hands had a distinct view of it for nearly an hour. Captain Cook had a good glass and could plainly distinguish the line of the serpent with its humps and Hollows. Captain Cook has always been an unbeliever in the sea serpent story. He has followed the sea for 20 years, been on a number of whaling voyages and never saw anything similar before. He says that had he been fitted for a whaling voyage? He would not have hesitated to have got out of his boats and harpooned them. He was within gunshot but unfortunately had no firearms on board.

Jake:
[20:26] By mid century, the sea serpent was one of the major tourist draws for Nahant with proper ladies and gentlemen flocking to seaside hotels and their weekend homes in hopes of catching a glimpse of this mythical creature. By the 18 forties, letters to the editors of several Boston papers joked that the sea serpent only seemed to appear off the shores of Nahant during the peak season. And when the hotels were open for visitors. And an ad in the June 29th, 1841 edition of the Boston Post entice visitors to the shore. For just that reason.

Jake:
[21:03] This weather makes people think of Nahant any of our citizens who would escape for a day from the heat and dust of the city can do so by going on board the elegant little steamer flushing at nine o’clock am at Liverpool Wharf, which will quickly transport them to the summer quarters of the sea serpent, and bring them back at six in the afternoon.

Jake:
[21:25] Just a few days later, a letter to the editors of the post reported that the serpent had dutifully appeared to the passengers on the flushing as if on demand.

The Sea Serpent as a Tourist Attraction

Jake:
[21:35] Mister editor on our passage in the steamboat flushing from Boston to Nahant on Friday, July 2nd, about half past 10 o’clock. A ma strange and wonderful object was discovered in the sea about two miles distant, bearing about southeast from the boat, the captain and many of the passengers were convinced from its singular appearance and from its motion in the water that it must have been some living object, its strange and outlandish appearance for we could distinctly see three large humps on its back and about 25 ft appeared to be out of the water with a head, as large as a hog’s head and very black, induced us all to believe that the sea serpent or some other strange inhabitant of the sea had really made its appearance again in our waters. And I hastened to communicate it to you in order that you may inform the public through the medium of your valuable paper of the wonders of the sea. Respectfully. Thomas Sargeant Nahant July 2nd 1841.

Jake:
[22:40] The idea that the sea serpent was a seasonal visitor to Nahan corresponding with the summer tourist season continued into the 18 fifties with a brief comment in the May 24th, 1854 Springfield Republican noting, the sea serpent was seen off Swampscott on Friday making its way leisurely towards Nahan where it will arrive in due time with the other fashionable.

Jake:
[23:07] During most of the 18 sixties, the creature wasn’t seen on our shores, perhaps because both newspaper editors and readers had more important news to keep up with or perhaps because the serpent itself had joined the federal blockade of secessionist ports. As suggested by a note in the Springfield Republican in September 1865 the sea serpent has not been seen off to hunt this year. Being on a visit to the Virginia Coast. A man saw him there the other day and thought he was 225 ft long.

Jake:
[23:41] By the mid 18 seventies, the creature was back on the coast of Nahant helping to keep hotel rooms booked and pleasure seekers from Boston entertained, one of the most detailed accounts of a sea serpent sighting in decades, was included in the July 19th 1877 edition of the Boston Globe.

Jake:
[24:01] That slimy sea serpent which has been such a terror along the New England coast during the past few years has made its debut in the hunt waters this season.

Jake:
[24:11] He was seen on Monday and again this morning and the circumstances of his presence are given in such detail by the astonished beholders that there is general credence given to the statement that an unusual and prodigious serpentine monster is disporting himself in the waters of Massachusetts Bay. The first discovery was made by a pleasure party who were over on King’s Beach at about four o’clock on Monday afternoon, who say that all of them nine in number observed about half a mile from shore between themselves and egg rock moving with great rapidity. What could have been nothing else than a huge fish or snake? They say that it was perfectly calm at the time and a large part of the body’s length was visible above the water line as were also its snakelike motions. The gentlemen all declare that it was not less than 40 ft in length, that it moved in nearly a straight line and having made the mile between the point first scene in the Lincoln House, the monster suddenly turned and with the same rapidity and the same unerring straightness with the head, not much raised and the body more or less visible all the time, swam to a point a half a mile nearer Little Nahan than that at which he was first seen. He then lay motionless for some 10 minutes, evidently sunning himself. At the end of which time, he lashed the water into foam for a moment and then disappeared.

Jake:
[25:40] As the 19th century waned toward the turn of the 20th reports of sea monster sightings off the shores of Nahant declined again. And in the early decades of the 20th century, the creature was no longer heard from, writing in the globe on November 15th, 1923 at the end of a season in which there were no reports of a sea serpent in the waters off Gloucester or Nahant Katherine Bartlett asked what has become of the New England sea serpent?

Decline of Sea Serpent Sightings

Jake:
[26:09] Is it possible that a season has passed without a single wiggle, Is the rum pirate to monopolize all the free advertising while the more kindly monster of the deep languishes in innocuous destitute or betakes himself to foreign shores. These are a few of the questions which exercise the minds of the old timers. The unwanted dearth of sea serpents in New England last summer is all the more painful to the local patriot when he remembers the a one assortment which the native varieties offer. New England challenges the world when it comes to sea serpents.

Jake:
[26:46] You can hear the tone of the reporting on New England sea serpents shift over the decades from the slack draw credulity of John Jocelyn in the 16 thirties to the earnest scientific approach to the line in society in the 18 teens, to the knowing bemusement of the hotel reporters in the later 18 hundreds, and then silence in the archives, funny how it disappeared right at the same time that photography advanced enough to be able to prove its existence. Huh. The only known photo of the New England sea serpent was taken by George Dexter in 1910. It shows Na Hunt’s egg rock in the background with the head and several humps of a giant sea serpent emerging from the water in the foreground. The creature appears to be about 50 ft long and it’s pictured with the legs of a child that it’s eating, hanging out of its mouth.

Jake:
[27:43] Of course, it was a known hoax that Dexter created as a joke for his neighbors in the hot. So don’t get too excited. Almost from the beginning. There were skeptics of the claims of an unknown giant ocean reptile, haunting our shores starting with the scientists who pointed out that the linen serpent was a mutated black snake.

Jake:
[28:06] The September 14th, 1839 Springfield Republican story about the Deer island serpent that I started the episode with cites a number of possible explanations for the creature that Lieutenant Boer saw, including a group of porpoises, swimming at the surface, drifting clumps of seaweed and a large horse mackerel leaving awake on the surface during the peak of tourist fever for sea serpents. The Boston Journal reported in July 1851 visitors at Nahant, Hull and other places along the seashore who repaired thither in anticipation of the annual visit of the sea serpent have had a dark cloud cast over their expectations by the reported capture of one of his snake ships progeny by Captain Burr as related in our paper a day or two since and the consequent apprehensions that by way of revenge, the old patriarch would withdraw himself entirely from our shores. We rejoiced to be able to furnish grounds for the belief that their fears are unfounded.

Jake:
[29:09] The Boston journal then reprints a letter that was originally addressed to the editors of the New England Journal of Commerce. Attracted by the notice in your paper of Wednesday of the infant sea serpent. At the Marine surveyor’s office, I called there and recognized the specimen to be a part of a fish for fish. It certainly is having nothing of a reptile character about it. Not unknown to naturalists though rare on these coasts. If you’ll take the trouble to look into stores, fishes of Massachusetts or Doctor Decay’s account of the fishes of this state. In the state survey, you will in either of them find a rather meager description but tolerably exact figure of the animal in question described as fistular serata, the American pipe fish.

Jake:
[30:00] Any pipefish species that I’m aware of would be too small to be mistaken for a sea serpent. But the giant oarfish of the deep sea could make a handy stand in for a huge snake growing up to about 25 ft long with a fin all the way down their narrow backs that could be mistaken for humps or hoops and with a cluster of feather like spines near their heads. They’re long narrow and exotic looking enough to form the basis of sea serpent myths. However, they usually live hundreds or thousands of feet below the surface in the open ocean and they’re typically only found on the surface near the shore when they’re dead or close to it. Such as when some snorkelers in Southern California drag one to shore this August.

Jake:
[30:45] At the height of local fascination with the Nahant sea serpent. The Boston evening transcript reported on some of the false alarms and misidentification that cast doubt on the whole affair on August 16th 1858, and fade of the sea serpent without much doubting the existence of such a creature as the sea serpent ourselves. We have reason to believe that something else is seen very often and reported to be the real serpent. The creature called a sea serpent may be frequently seen, but then other things or creatures are also seen and also called the sea serpent. And this mistake often makes trouble and tends to bring discredit upon those who have really seen the sea serpent, of late years at Nahan, everything uncommon and sometimes even a ledge of rocks which surely is not very uncommon here is cracked up to be the sea serpent. And thus, the credulous are imposed upon the veracity of many intelligent and truth speaking witnesses discredited and an air of falsehood thrown over the whole story.

Jake:
[31:54] If we assume that the tourists and sea captains who believe that they saw a serpent weren’t lying or experiencing mass hallucinations. My personal belief is that whales are the likeliest explanations for the phenomenon this summer. I’ve really enjoyed driving out to Provincetown, taking my jeep to a quiet stretch of sand on Race Point beach and looking for whales. Well, I have lunch cooking on the grill. I can sit back with my binoculars and watch whales that feed on the horizon and you know what they’re called humpbacks for a reason, when they don’t leap headfirst out of the water in a breach, their humpbacks do look a lot like giant serpents on the surface. I imagine that if you saw a few large whales at a distance or a bunch of smaller porpoises up close, their backs all arching up out of the water in a series or row could easily be mistaken for a giant sea monster.

Modern Day Sea Monster Sightings

Jake:
[32:56] The tradition of the New England sea serpent was resurrected in 1970. This time on the South Shore on November 16th of 1970 the Harvard Crimson reported that an unidentified serpent like creature had washed up on a beach near Scituate. And the next day’s issue followed up with more details. Cecil, the seasick sea serpent swept to a situate shore Sunday and successfully stank up the surrounding sand. So wish that there was an author attached to this story because I deeply appreciate the alliteration, late Sunday night and into the early morning hours yesterday, thousands of curiosity seekers descended on Man Hill Beach near situate to view the carcass of a reported 30 ft four ton sea monster that had been washed ashore by Saturday evening’s 11 ft mammoth high tide. However, experts including Tyson Royal Roberts, Harvard’s assistant curator of Fishes dispelled all belief that the object at Man Hill was a sea monster. They’ve definitely determined that the carcass is that of a mangled basking shark which may have died at sea and was partially eaten by other sea life as it drifted ashore. And of course the most famous 21st century sea monster was spotted in Boston Harbor nine years ago, but it turned out to be a sunfish.

Conclusion and Resources

Jake:
[35:09] About the Boston Harbor sea serpent. Check out this week’s show notes at hubor.com/three 12. I’ll have pictures of the beast including George Dexter’s Hoax photo and some dramatic but speculative engravings from Ball’s pictorial companion. I’ll link to the full text of the line in society’s discredited report on the creature’s 1817 appearance in Gloucester Harbor. John Jocelyn’s second hand account of a creature on the rocks at Cape Ann in 1639 and an online copy of Samuel Adams Drake’s book of New England Folklore. There will also be links to Evers, Erickson’s 1956 article about the serpent in American Heritage magazine and Chandos Michael Brown’s 1990 piece from American Quarterly, plus links to all the news articles I cited in the show though most of them are paywalled.

Jake:
[36:06] If you’d like to get in touch with us, you can email podcast at hubor.com. We are Hub history on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and still most active on Twitter. If you’re on Mastodon, you can find me as at hub history at better dot Boston, or just go to hubor.com and click on the contact us link while you’re on the site hit the subscribe link and be sure that you never miss an episode. If you subscribe on Apple podcasts, please consider writing us a brief review. If you do drop me a line and I’ll send you a hub history sticker as a token of appreciation.

Jake:
[36:48] That’s all for now. Stay safe.