Hoax Museum Blog: Cryptozoology

The Hibbing Monster — Reporter Aaron Brown is hoping to boost the fortunes of his hometown of Hibbing, Minnesota by propagating "a mysterious local legend to drum up economic development for the region." As he points out, it's worked for other places. Case in point: I'm off to Loch Ness next week solely because of some murky legend of a sea serpent. So what kind of monster should lurk around Hibbing? What about a 1000lb wild hog? No, that's already been done. But Minnesota does already have the Iceman, so maybe they could play that up a bit.

Loch Ness Air — Here's an eBay auction I'm sorry I missed: some guy trying to sell a box of Loch Ness air... the same air that Nessie breathes. He didn't have any takers. What gets me is that it doesn't even sound like the box was tightly sealed, so all the Loch Ness air would have leaked out by the time it arrived at its destination. But although the market for Loch Ness air hasn't taken off, there's apparently quite a strong demand for bottles of Loch Ness water. Hey, I'm going to be in Loch Ness in two weeks, so if anyone wants me to pick them up some Loch Ness water while I'm there, put in your orders now. Loch Ness soil samples are also a possibility. I'll collect any water and soil samples once I'm done sampling Nessie's Monster Mash Beer.

Virgin Sacrifice at Loch Ness — In just a few weeks, on the night of September 6th and 7th, a white-magic ritual will be performed on the banks of Loch Ness to call up Nessie. Performing the ritual will be Kevin Carlyon, High Priest of British White Witches. Now here's the interesting part. Should the ritual fail to achieve anything, Carlyon will then bait Nessie with an irresistible lure: a virgin adorned with vegetables and tied to a stake in the waters of Loch Ness. I certainly don't see how that could fail to get Nessie's attention.

Carlyon is currently accepting applications for the role of the virgin bait. He specifies that whoever it is must be female (so I guess Marc can't apply), aged between 18-25, pretty, petite, a non-smoker, a non-drug-user, and in good shape. Carlyon reports that he's already received quite a few applications, including ones from a transvestite and a woman who wanted to know if she could bring her kid along (she must not have understood the 'virgin' part of the job requirement).

I personally find the timing of this event extremely frustrating. In September, as part of my long-planned European vacation, I'm going to be visiting Loch Ness, but I'll be arriving on the 10th... THREE DAYS after the virgin sacrifice. So it looks like I'll miss it. And it's too late to change the dates of my flight. The one time in my life I visit Loch Ness and I miss getting to see a virgin sacrifice by a few days. That's just my luck.

The Truth About Loch Ness — Greg Atkins (or someone calling themselves Greg Atkins) has created a website, truthaboutlochness.com, in order to expose an incident he claims occurred on the loch during filming of Werner Herzog's upcoming movie, The Enigma of Loch Ness. He says that one of the production company's boats was rammed by something in the water (could it have been Nessie!!!), resulting in the death of two of the crew. All this has been hushed up, of course, which is why there were no news reports of these deaths. He also has video footage on his site of a large creature moving beneath the surface of the loch. Cynics are speculating that his site is simply yet another hoax website created by a movie studio in order to create buzz about Herzog's film, in the same vein as the Blair Witch Project. Probably is. But I have a softspot for Nessie (I'm rooting for her to be real), so in this case I'm happy to play along with the site, even if there are some obviously hoaxy things about it.

Bigfoot: the controversy continues — Bob Heironimus claims that the famous Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot film shot in 1967 was a hoax... and that he was the man wearing the Bigfoot costume. Apparently Patterson was in on the hoax. All is revealed in a new book written by Greg Long, The Making of Bigfoot. Of course, the Bigfoot believers are dismissing Heironimus' story, so I predict that these latest claims will do absolutely nothing to end the debate.

Mokele-Mbembe — The Arizona Republic has a short piece on Mokele-Mbembe, the African Loch Ness Monster.

The Sasquatch Militia — The Republic of Cascadia is recruiting for the Sasquatch Militia. Help defend the Sasquatch homeland against invading cryptozoologists, Canadians, and others. Militia activities include boulder throwing, stomping, and delimbing.

Bigfoot Movie — The actor Judge Reinhold is set to produce a movie based on the life of Ray Wallace, the man whose prank led to the name 'Bigfoot' being coined. Of course, i still haven't seen Shattered Glass, the movie based on the career of media hoaxer Stephen Glass. I want to, but it doesn't appear to be playing in San Diego.

Across Loch Ness — Lloyd Scott plans to walk across Loch Ness... beneath the water. Everyone is hoping he'll bump into Nessie.

The Truth About the Abominable Snowman — The Abominable Snowman, or Yeti, is really just a legend derived from stories about the Himalayan Brown Bear, says this Japanese researcher. He found that 'meti' means brown bear in the language of the indigenous people around the Himalayas. But in one region they say 'yeti' instead of 'meti.' Thus the tales about the Yeti.

Museum of Cryptozoology — Buck Wolf reports that Loren Coleman has opened a Museum of Cryptozoology in his home. Included is a Feejee Mermaid. Of course, it can't be THE Feejee Mermaid displayed by Barnum. No one knows what happened to it (though some claim that the mermaid now owned by Harvard University is the authentic one).

Bigfoot Symposium — Two interesting links via BoingBoing. First, the website of the International Bigfoot Symposium that will be held September 12-14 in Willow Creek, CA (very close to where the famous Patterson-Gimlin film of a Bigfoot creature was shot). Second, the somewhat surprising news that Jane Goodall, the famous primate researcher, is a Bigfoot believer. You can listen to her discuss her beliefs in a segment recorded from NPR's Science Friday.

Nessie News — I believe it's now officially confirmed that I'm an idiot. I run a website called the Museum of Hoaxes, and yet I fall for an obvious hoax. Back on July 17 I trumpeted the news that a fossil of a sea serpent had been found on the shores of Loch Ness, and that it wasn't a hoax. What was I thinking? Of course it was a hoax. I believed it because I thought it was perfectly reasonable for someone to find a plesiosaur skeleton. But to find one on the shores of Loch Ness should have raised all kinds of alarm bells. Now researchers who have had a chance to examine the fossil say that it was likely planted there. Thankfully visitors to this site are much more intelligent than I am, and one of them named Cal pointed out to me a few days ago that the fossil probably was bogus.
In other Nessie News, a team from the BBC has done sonar tests to officially determine that there is no monster in Loch Ness, which, of course, will not convince any of the believers.

Nessie Fossil — Loch Ness Monster fossil found. And it's not a hoax.

Hunt for the Yeti — A Japanese mountaineer has put together an expedition to hunt for the Yeti in the Himalayas. Good luck to them.

The Lake Tianchi Monster — Apparently China has its own version of the Loch Ness Monster called the Lake Tianchi Monster (I never knew). Its legend stretches back over 100 years, but unlike the creature in Loch Ness, there appears to be more than one of whatever is in Lake Tianchi (which is up by the border with North Korea). Sightings of the Lake Tianchi monsters have increased dramatically in recent weeks.

Mysterious Blobs — Two days ago a giant blob-like creature washed up on a beach in Chile. Chilean scientists were baffled. They had no clue what the creature was. Based on the emails I've received, a lot of people immediately suspected it was some kind of elaborate hoax. But I don't think this was a hoax. Scientists now say that they believe the blobby thing was either the body of a giant octopus or discarded whale blubber.
I assume the Chilean blob bears no kinship to another blob which surfaced on the internet about two years ago. To this day I have no clue what this earlier mystery blob was. A real person? A photoshop trick? A fat suit? I've often seen it given the caption 'Splat.'

Bigfoot Fingerprints — A respected fingerprint technician was scheduled to present evidence during Saturday's Crypto Conference suggesting that maybe there really is an unknown Bigfoot-like primate on the loose somewhere in North America.

Sea Serpent Sighting — Sea serpent spotted by Cape Breton fisherman.

Loch Ness Monster and the Witch — A white witch plans to cast a spell that will coax the Loch Ness Monster into making an appearance again.