Lake Monster Sidebar
by Skylaire Alfvegren
“Me and my family took one of those helicopter trips to the Grand Canyon from Vegas when we were there in May 2001. We were on our way to the canyon and we were flying over Lake Mead. Me and my mom were gazing out the window when I saw something in the water. I nudged my mom so that she could see it also and we both stared. It was a long creature (it had to be at least 50 feet long) and what appeared to be the head was above water. The rest of the body came above the water and then went below. The creature had a white tint to it, and at first I thought it was a boat pulling a skier or something like that. Then all of a sudden it disappeared under the water so I knew it could not have been a boat. Me and my mom both observed this. There were no boats or anything near it. It was truly amazing.”
--anonymous
In 1911, the Elko Free Press reported that while fishing east of Elko, a reliable and sober pair of hunters watched something looping down Humboldt River. At first glance it looked to be a flock of wild ducks. Upon closer inspection, it became apparent that “it was a huge serpent, swimming on the surface of the water, with its heads held high.” They declared its reptilian, black body to be at least 30 feet long, as thick “as a man’s leg,” and ending with a fish-like tail. The beast had four heads, “shaped something like a dog’s head,” which scanned the river banks for prey. It submerged itself and hid as soon as one of the men spoke.
Some Nevadan water monsters apparently enjoy leaving the water to sight-see. A letter written by Rueben Strathers to the Esmerelda Union on October 3, 1868, claimed he and a friend had killed a monster on Mount Brawley near Aurora, about 15 miles southwest of Walker Lake. The beast’s head was “not unlike that of the crocodile, with fore-feet near the neck, [a] tail of enormous length, which lay perfectly quiet. It was “ covered with scales” that glimmered in the sun. They estimated the carcass to be 56 feet long, too massive to mount above the mantle.
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