An unidentified animal living in
Loch Ness, the largest body of fresh water in Britain. It first came to the attention of the general public in the thirties when a London surgeon R.K.Wilson took a photo of what looked like the head-and-neck of a dinosaur-like creature. What with
The Lost World and
RKO's King Kong in the cinema, there was an explosion in public interest.
The monster's image, however, was to be forever tainted by the
pantomime which followed, in which a game big hunter called Wetherall came to Loch Ness and discovered footprints on the shore. The tracks turned out to have been made by a
hippo foot, which was some kind of ashtray or other
keepsake. What kind of a
big game hunter couldn't work out that they were all hippo tracks made by the same foot I don't know, but he left Loch Ness. In 1994 the now-famous
surgeon's photo turned out to be a fake, a model on a toy submarine made by Wetherall - revenge on the world that mocked him. Over the years there have been a number of photos and films of unidentified creatures in Loch Ness. Some have been proved as fakes (to be honest, I wasn't surprised when the surgeon's photo turned out to be a fake. I'd always thought there was something odd about it). But there is still strong film evidence and a lot of eye-witness evidence to support the existence of a long-necked animal of some kind. Modern scientists often dismiss eye-witness evidence as non-evidence. I'm glad they're not running the judicial system, otherwise they'd have every prisoner released. What doesn't help is a decidedly vulgar
merchandising industry which has turned the monster into nothing more than a theme park attraction. The official Loch Ness exhibition centre now officially doesn't believe in
Nessie anyway. Their cinema now shows visitors a film telling of all the reasons why Nessie is a hoax, accompanied by silly music. You leave the cinema at the end of the film and are then confronted by a shop selling plush Nessies, Nessie mugs, china Nessies, Nessies with tartan hats and endless other over-priced junk. Personally I'm sure there were unidentified animals in Loch Ness until recent years. I think, what with their proven sensitivity to noise, and what with Loch Ness now covered in countless noisy boats of every shape and form, that whatever was in
the Loch has either died out or returned to the sea never to return. Either way, I think it's better for the welfare of these creatures that their existence is never proved.
Newsflash, 3/4/2011:
The existence of long-necked creatures in
Loch Ness has been proved. Now every science laboratory in the world wants one to dissect. Every zoo wants one, and every
gourmand in the world wants to taste the flesh of one in some revoltingly over-priced restaurant.
Within the year, the
loch ness monster will be as dead as dodos and
Stellar's sea cows.
