Near Inverness, Scotland is The Great Glen, a rift valley 60 miles long that splits the Scottish Highlands in two. It forms a chain of rivers, canals and lakes, (or lochs), that connect the North Sea with the Atlantic Ocean. One of these lakes, Loch Ness, is rumored to be the home of perhaps one of the most famous and beloved "monsters" of our time. The Loch Ness monster.
Loch Ness, which lays claim to being the largest freshwater lake in the British Isles, is twenty-four miles long, at one point, and one and a half miles wide. It has an average depth of four hundred and fifty feet and at times plunges to almost a thousand. It is cold and murky, with dangerous currents.
The Loch Ness "monster" -- affectionately known as "Nessie" by fans worldwide -- is supposedly a large, long-necked creature perhaps a throwback to the dinosaurs or a genuine sea serpent, which lives in Loch Ness. Many sightings of the "monster" have been recorded over the centuries, going back at least as far as St. Columba, the Irish monk who converted most of Scotland to Christianity in the 6th century. He reportedly saved the life of a swimmer by bravely going out on the waters and vanquishing the beast through prayer, so that the swimmer's life was spared.
The ancient history of the creature was well-known by the locals, but largely taken to be fiction. A harmless legend concocted by their ancestors of long ago to add a little drama to the area. Good for some chuckles and a bit of conjecture, but not to be taken too seriously. So while there was some talk and speculation, people for the most part came to the lake to vacation or enjoy some leisure time rather than to search for a mythical creature.
Modern Legend
The modern legend of Nessie began its chapter in 1933 after a new road was built along the north edge of the loch providing a clear view of the entire loch. The number of sightings reported suddenly sky-rocketed. Yes indeed, seems old Nessie, far from being extinct, was flourishing somewhere out there in the shadowy depths of Loch Ness. The Nessie revival continued in 1934 when Dr. Robert Kenneth Wilson, a London physician, claimed to have photographed a plesiosaur-like creature with a long neck rising above the murky waters. That picture, since proven to be fake, is known as the "surgeon's photo" and gave credibility to the existence of the Loch Ness monster, that until then, despite inspiring cult-like devotion, had been only the product of legend and myth.
The result of the photograph was renewed interest in the scientific community. Scientific experts were invited to examine the picture firsthand. They agreed that it could indeed be a plesiosaur ... or a tree trunk ... or an otter ... Later a submarine armed with high tech sensing devices was brought in to explore the lake. But the creature proved to be smarter than mere humans and continued to remain elusive somewhere in its hideaway in the depths of the loch.
And then you have the famous or infamous, depending on how you look at it, land sighting of the creature in early 1934. Arthur Grand, a young veterinary student, was riding his motorcycle one night when he almost ran into the monster as it crossed the road. Grant's description of the creature -- small head, long tapering neck and tail with a bulky body and flippers -- seemed tailor-made to match the appearance of the plesiosaurus.
At long last, in April of 1960, Tim Dinsdale, captured the first moving picture of the monster. Though the film shows precious little, a group of Royal Air Force photographic experts, undoubtedly well-lubricated -- translation -- drunk as skunks, pronounced that the object was "probably" animate and as long as ninety feet. Skeptics insisted that the thing was probably a motorboat. Whatever it may have been, Dinsdale was persuaded by what he'd seen to give up his career as an aeronautical engineer and devote the next two decades of his life to finding the creature. For his efforts, Dinsdale had two more sightings of the creature, but he was never able to gather incontrovertible proof of its existence.
Proof?
The next major event for Nessie was a study of the Loch Ness Monster begun in 1970 by the American Academy of Applied Science. The group, headed by Dr. Robert Rines, used automatic cameras and sonar to monitor the loch. In 1972 one of the underwater cameras got four frames of what appeared to be a flipper six to eight feet long.
Though the photograph most often displayed to the public seems to clearly show something that looks like a diamond-shaped fin, some photographic experts have declared that the image has been retouched. In the original images the object is much more obscure.
