Believers in giants and monsters

Press, 7 August 1976, Page 15

Believers in giants and monsters

The Loch Ness Story. By Nicholas Witchell. Penguin. 156 pp. Maps and Photographs. N.Z. price $2-55. There are Giants in the Earth. By Michael Grumley. Sidgwick and Jackson. 149 pp. Index. N.Z. price $7.95. (Reviewed by Naylor Hillary) In a manner not intended by the author, “The Loch Ness Story” is a most timely book. When it was written, late last year, Mr Witchell believed that photographic evidence to prove the existence of large creatures in Loch Ness was about to be revealed. His book was intended to describe the history of monster-hunting in the loch up to the point of success. But that evidence received scant support from the scientific community. Now, since the book appeared, a new American expedition has arrived at Drumnadrochit on the western shore of the loch, a favourite spot for monster sightings. The expedition is attempting to ensnare the monster, once and for ail, in a web of sophisticated underwater cameras and echo-sounders. Even by the time this review appears, Mr Witchell’s faith in the monster may have been proved right. Perhaps that would be a pity. “Nessie” is a great standby for Scottish tourist agencies and for the town of Inverness, to say nothing of newspapers in search of sensational stories in the “silly season” when news is short. Indeed, that was how the creature ever came to the attention of the world in the 1930 s after years, perhaps centuries, in which local residents had accepted the existence of something large and unpleasant in the loch, without the rest of the world taking much notice. Whatever the success of this year's lavish monster hunt, Mr Witchell’s book will have a place. It brings together the best authenticated sightings on land and in the loch, the most

reliable testimonies of the most reputable witnesses, and some of the most plausible photographs. Much delightful detail of the cult of “Nessie” is also included, even while the author is careful to discount obvious hoaxes and unreliable sightings. Mr Witchell is a believer, but one so sensible that his persuasive pen is hard to resist. “Nessie” has been preached against as a distraction from the observance of the Sabbath; she has been insured with Lloyds in anticipation of capture; during World War 11 the Italian Air Force claimed to have bombed her, and a Royal Navy captain told his superiors he had rammed her when he arrived late in the southern end of the loch. Questions have been asked about her in Parliament; during the Depression “monster watchers” were employed as a form of unemployment relief. The weight of evidence is enormous. Between 1963 and 1972 the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau accepted 200 eyewitnesss accounts after pruning out all those which seemed doubtful. The Encyclopaedia Britannica reports that “Nessie” is in the top ten subjects on which readers ask for information. What the monster, or monsters, really are, Mr Witchell leaves open. He seems to favour the idea of a colony of prehistoric creatures, resembling giant newts, which have adapted themselves to the changing conditions of the loch and kept their species in being. One hopes he is right, but will conclusive “proof” of Nessie be any more wonderful than the present cult of speculation and uncertainty? Finding the giant newt might even be an anticlimax. Mr Grumley’s book involves rather more breathless speculation — and rather less information — than the pursuit of “Nessie”. The giants of the title are large men, or humanoid animals, which have been reported in

the Himalayas, the jungles of South America, and the forests of western Canada and the Pacific coast of the United States. The author has a veneer of anthropological evidence, drawn from the discovery of the remains of Giantopithecus in southern China in 1956, and from the expeditions of the Leakey family in East Africa, to support his claims. Creatures larger than men, but of humanesque form, do seeem to have lived once. Genesis refers to them and in characters like King Kong they have a place in folk myths, But reliable evidence for such species surviving today is tenuous. In 1900 reports from the Himalayas told of large footprints and huge, hairy men. “Abominable snowman” seems to have been an unforunate translation from Tibet about 1921. The Latin American creature is reported as early as the 17th century when a Spanish expedition claimed to have fought with 14 giants near the borders of what are now' Panama and Colombia. Mr Grumbley wants to believe in the Himalayan and South American giants, but his evidence is not very convincing. The Bigfoot of the Pacific north-west he does accept, along with the films which are reputed to have been taken of the creature. Indeed, he records sightings as far away as Florida and New York State, suggesting that somehow a very large mammal has survived in the reduced wild spaces of modern America without a specimen, alive or dead, coming into human hands. That seems unlikely, but readers may want to keep an open mind. To explain all the evidence otherwise requires that a large number of people have been mistaken, or have deliberately told lies for no very good reason. America remains a land of novelty and surprise. Perhaps Bigfoot, or Sasquatch, will prove finally to be a local biological novelty.