The 1916 Jersey Shore Shark Attacks (Part 2)

Hey, weirdos. I'm Alina. I'm Ash. And this is Morbid. Morbidito. And guess what? What's up, girl? You better keep your eyes peeled on Friday the 13th. For various reasons. Because it's a spooky day, one. And two, because if you're on our Instagram, which like, where are you? Where are you? Actually, to be honest, I understand if you're not on Instagram at all. Well, yeah, that is. If you're not on Instagram, maybe you don't need to go back on it. That is understandable. Good for you for getting off of it. But if you're on our Instagram or want to, we're going to be announcing something on Friday the 13th, which is tomorrow when this comes out. Yep. So it's going to be pretty cool. everybody. And if you're not on Instagram, don't worry. We'll be announcing it on the pod too. Just not on Friday the 13th because we don't have an episode out that day. It'll be Monday. Whatever date that is. Jinx. What is it? 13th. 16th? Yep. Yep. Monday the 16th we will announce it on the pod. So, you know, you're going to hear it. Yoddy yoddy. You're going to hear it. You're going to see it. You're going to feel it. You're going to sense it. All the things. Yeah. It's going to be awesome. It's going to be fucking ready. I'm excited for this announcement. I am very excited for it as well. Can we put trumpets when we announce on the potty-otty? Announcement. Just put that. That's what we'll do. Like you said, I won't be doing that. Like he's just staring at us like, are you two all right? Has something gone awry? We're kind of silly today. I'm not sure why. Is it Friday? Oh, it's because we have a new setup in this room. Well, almost. Well, it's definitely new. We're working on it. Everything is everywhere right now. And maybe that's why our energy is so cray cray. Yeah, we're moving everything around in the room. That stack over there, there's just a stack of bins with a bag on top of it and half a couch. I'm like, damn, that's precarious as fuck. We're just, you know. Do we have workers insurance? I think we do. I don't know. Who knows? We could be sure. We could be sure. Don't let that fall in your head. It's going to be great. All right. Are we back to talk about shark attacks? We are. And this second one somehow gets even more wild. Okay. Like there's already been two shark attacks. I'm not sure how you outdo that. I can definitely outdo it. I can outdo it. I believe in you. I'm not saying I don't. So I said last time that we were going to be moving on to a crick. Oh, yeah. A crick. A shark is in a crick. Isn't a crick a pretty shallow body? Yeah. Wait, is it the same shark? Yeah. No. Yeah. No. I think it is. What even is a crick at the end of the day? It's like a shallow body of water. But does it connect to the ocean? Well, obviously. No. It doesn't. No, the shark. The shark ubered real quick into the nearest crick. I worked that out on my own, okay? Get out of here. This bitch has been making fun of me today. Um, I think you have been making fun of me. I've been making fun of you too. Actually. I have been making fun of you too. But you didn't. Look at her trying to round up the listeners right now against. against one of us. I'm not. I am absolutely not. I'm absolutely not. You're like, she's been making fun of me. She's hurting my feelings. I made fun of you for a tiny minute today. It wasn't that much. What was I going to Google? What is a crick? Leave me alone. What is a crick? Can I say something when people say, leave me alone. I fucking hate that. Yeah. I mean, I don't like it's never like a good thing when someone says that. It just has that energy. Leave me alone. No. Anyways, I don't really come across people saying that that often. I was going to say, do you hear that in your everyday life? Yeah. It just says a stream, brook, or minor tributary of water. Yeah. Which like a minor tributary? That tells you how little it is. Yeah. Like a stream or a brook? An inlet? Yeah. This is little. A similar word is fjord. A fjord. I love. I love a fjord. I love the word fjords. I love the Conan song that he sings about fjords. Well, this one is called the Matawan Creek attacks. Okay. So now, you know, remember, they had kind of like gone into high gear after all those last attacks. They, you know, people were patrolling. Yes. Trying to stay out of the water. Now, with the shark problem seemingly under control for a minute. Quote unquote. At least. Visitors to the Jersey Shore. I just said Jersey Shore. Jersey Shore flocked to the beaches in record numbers, all eager to get in the water and enjoy the summer. And for those who were still not entirely comfortable getting back into the ocean, there were plenty of local rivers and creeks. Creeks! Where the chances of an encounter with a shark were, like, non-existent. Right? Right? Yeah. You're fine in a creek. Right? Should be. I thought so. Yeah, you should be. I've never been in a creek. Now, in Matawan, New Jersey, a small village about 30 miles from Spring Lake, the tourism industry was much smaller, and so was their capacity to serve, like, a lot of people. But the village was happy for the business, and the visitors were happy for the opportunity to finally get into a body of water without a fear of a shark attack. Right. In fact, there are only a handful of sharks that can travel between saltwater and freshwater, and only one of them, the bull shark, is large enough and suitably aggressive enough to attack and kill a human. They're like some of the most aggressive. They're gnarly. I remember learning about them on shark week. On shark week. Shark. That being said, other sharks, including the great white shark, can pass between freshwater and saltwater temporarily. Oh. But they can't linger very long without being significantly harmed. It's not good for them. I didn't even know that they could temporarily do that. Yeah, they can do that. But because of this, the bathers and residents in Matawan had every reason to believe that they were safe that summer where they were. Even now, so many years later, it's really not well understood how this shark came to find itself in the waters of Matawan Creek that year. Because this is literally a great white. Like, what the fuck? How did it even fit in the creek? That's the thing. The most likely theory is that it had been exploring the coast and followed an inlet into the creek like accidentally i literally just said inlet yeah but once it got into the eight foot body of water eight feet guys that's just like a pool yeah it became confused and couldn't find its way back out that's actually really sad it is sad that's the thing that this is sad of course people are dying here it's horrific there's sadness on both sides but this is an animal it's it doesn't have like like this animal is not killing people because it's like fuck you right i'm gonna eat you because i'm mad it's desperate hungry scared and like flipping out like just doesn't know where it is where it's supposed to go doesn't have its family doesn't have anything out it's one could say that this great white had the most massive crash and it's valid this shark did have a crash to be clear it's funny that they should to say the shark is having a crash out it's obviously not funny what happened no like i'm not laughing at what happened i think if there's there's neurons firing you guys guys we have to explain everything we say sometimes the girlies who get it get it that's it the girlies who have crashed out i'll get it we we crash out on the weekly we've all been where the shark is yeah at one part in our life that was me earlier this week mikey was legit afraid of me we all were like you you were afraid here's something you didn't know like he just ripped off his headphones can confirm i don't even know what was wrong with me i think it was the lunar eclipse she was scary i just i think at one point i was like i'm gonna kill you all no you literally said that at one point and then we're all just like no you said i'm not you said i'm gonna kill everybody and we were like not us they're right and you literally go i said everybody and we were all like i don't feel safe i'm not marked safe i don't know i was i was pissed so see anyways but i get it yeah i was probably hungry we've all been there yeah that's the thing yeah it's exactly it's crashing i need to be clear that like this it's it is when you look at this like obviously the sensational part of it and the horrifying part of it is that like people kids Like human beings were terrorized, traumatized, murdered, like murdered, not murdered, killed, eaten, like harmed in irreparable ways. But also you have to look on the other side that like this animal, it's really sad what happened. Yeah. It was so turned around. Yeah. It just made me really sad. It does make me really sad. Because I don't think there's malicious intent on this animal's part. I think it was literal desperation. And just evolution. That's just what it is. So again, he got confused. He couldn't find his way out. And under those circumstances, that shark wouldn't have just been hungry. It would have also been really frightened, like really scared, extremely agitated. And all those things together makes for a dangerous situation. It does. And again, it's not eating. It doesn't have food. Animals have to eat. We all do. And it's like, to them, this is just meals arriving. Like that's right. That's all it is. It's not being like, wow, a human, I'm going to hurt it. Yeah. So on the morning of July 11th, while bathers clogged the beaches of resorts in Ashbury Park and Spring Lake, 14 year old Rennie Cartan, a Matawan local, opted for, you know, the muddier waters of Matawan Creek. As they had done so many summers before that, Rennie and two friends ran down to the old swimming hole. They stripped off all their clothes. They reached the dock and they dove into the cloudy waters. They were splashing, stirring up the water, doing all the things that you do when you're 14 jumping in a muddy creek. Fourteen. Yeah. Oh my bitch, I would do that right now. Rennie had barely poked his head up from below the water when all of a sudden the ordinarily cool waters of the creek felt warmer. Huh. There was considerable temperature difference. The sensation was not like anything that he had really experienced before and he couldn't put his finger on it. But something was wrong. Yeah. Then the cloudy water suddenly looked crimson around him. And suddenly, Rennie's nervous system went into overdrive, sending waves of burning pain through his torso. So he didn't even feel the initial bite. That's what happens. That's actually crazy. And that's what they talk about, that painless torture. That it's like you don't feel that initial bite the way that you think you probably would feel. And that's the thing that's so fascinating here, like with these specific episodes, is like I said it when I came into work this morning. I couldn't stop thinking about that heartbeat thing from part one. No. How they hear your heartbeat and they're just designed to feel that way. It's also insane that our human bodies take such good care of us that when a shark rips through your fucking torso, you are designed not to feel it initially. Yeah, to go into shock. Right. Like it's nuts. Even when you break a bone sometimes, like when I broke my pelvis, I don't remember what that felt like. Yeah. And your body was like, no, you don't need to feel this. I knew it was bad. And like, I literally couldn't move. But I didn't, it didn't hurt. Yeah. Like it was, it's a very weird sensation. Yeah. It's so, that's why, like when I, when I did autopsies, I remember like every single day when we would do one, I was like, damn, our bodies are crazy. They are. Like when you see how complex and wild and delicate, but also crazy strong these systems are it's you'll never stop thinking about it no it's crazy won't like when i had the when i had my twins i lost like a ton of blood yep and i went in like my body was basically just shutting into shock so my kidneys just shut off like they were just like bye and the doctor was explaining to us that like oh your brain thinks that you're dying and so it's being like hey let's conserve of energy so that you die slower. Like, let's not... So that you don't, like, die right away. Maybe we can get you help before you die. Like, that's... It's just, like, those kind of things. You're just like, why does it know that? Like, a perfectly run system. It's science, man. Truly. Science is so cool. Fucking love science. So it was only when he saw something large and dark moving in the water beneath him that Renny started putting the pieces together and he swam as fast as he could to shore because he wasn being held onto right now He scrambled out of the water in a panic And once he's out of the water, of course, he's like, what the fuck? Like he's looking around like, are there pieces of me missing? Like what's going on? And that's when Rennie and the other boys could see the large scrapes and cuts across his chest. And blood was streaming down his chest and stomach. but they were huge like lacerations. And despite his panicked state, Rennie explained that something in the water had hit him and cut him. But his friends who hadn't seen anything below the surface, they were not sure. They were like, what? Do you mean something just went by and cut you? Like what? To them, it looked like he may have brushed up against something that was jagged, like a jagged branch or something. And his friends were like, are you just exaggerating? Like, are you messing with us? Did you get a cut? Now you're like smearing it all over yourself. And given what happened the next day, it's more than likely that what Rennie experienced was an exploratory bump by a shark. So it just like bumped its teeth into him? Basically, it's something that a shark does to assess the size and threat level of potential prey. They don't do it with their mouth. That's an exploratory bite. But a bump is just with their skin. But their skin is so rough and abrasive, it can cut or tear human skin. Wow. Which is why he was bleeding so much. it like bumped across him because he saw the big shape like he saw the shark. Once they determined their friend was no longer in danger the rest of the boys jumped back into the creek. Oh fuck. And Rennie is being like no like protesting being like you got to get back out of the water. In the end the other boys went out and they stayed in the water while Rennie went the fuck home. Yeah. He's like nope. Fortunately everyone did make it out of the creek that day with all of their limbs intact. Is the shark just like lingering in the creek though? Yeah, but in others, we're not going to be so fortunate in that creek. So the next morning, retired sea captain Thomas Cottrell set out for his usual walk along the creek. He had done this every morning for years. Yeah. And he had heard the story about Rennie's brush with some unknown sea creature the day before. And that morning he stopped and he kind of just like lingered on the edge of the creek. He's looking at the water and he's like, you know, I just wanted to see if anything unusual was in there. There was a storm that we had talked about in part one the previous days that had kind of stirred up the sea and the water a little bit. And it was still hazy in there, but then he could see what appeared to be a large gray shape moving under the surface. And having been out to sea more times than he could count, he's a retired sea captain, he immediately recognized that shape as a shark. And he said, a big one. And he said, how the fuck is it in the creek? Exactly. By his estimation, he said it looked to be about nine or ten feet long. Damn. And it was just swimming casually in the creek. Like it belonged in the creek. That's so sad because you know it was like, what the fuck am I doing here? How do I get out of here? Yeah. now once the surprise had passed uh thomas turned and head back towards town walking as fast as he could because he wanted to beat the shark into town because it was traveling in the same direction oh damn they're just like walking they're just having a walk together a walk off it's a walk It's a walk-off. David Bowie showed up and said, it's a walk-off. Now, unfortunately, when he reached the town constable, who also served as the town's barber, because it's 1916. Iconic. The normally very respected Thomas Cottrell was quickly dismissed by people. And his story about a shark in the creek, which is a crazy story. Yeah, but maybe go check. It was laughed off by all the men who had gathered around town that day. Right. After all, everyone knew sharks swam in the open ocean and no one could think of any having ever gone into fresh water of a creek. Yeah. Much less one that was barely eight feet deep. Despite their dismissal, Cottrell persisted and moved all around the town telling everyone he could, warning them away from the creek. He was like, I don't give a fuck if you don't believe me. I'm letting you all know because I can't have this on my head. So that afternoon, Bill Stilwell and his sons, 16-year-old Russell and 11-year-old Lester, were hard at work at the local basket factory, which was one of Matawan's biggest employers. When the factory boss rang the bell, signaling that it was the end of the shift for the afternoon, Russell and Lester, the two boys, both made a break to the door, and they wanted to run right to the creek because it was an intense summer. It was really hot that time. Neither, now the boys or their father, neither of them had heard, you know, any of the warnings from Thomas that day because they were at work. And even if they had, they might have dismissed him too as like what the fuck. Right. Now at the center of town, Lester joined up with a group of other boys and they all walked together down Dock Road towards the creek. They all did the same thing. They all like, you know, ripped off all their factory uniforms and just jumped into the creek. And by the time they had jumped in the creek, Captain Cottrell had already made his way through town and was now heading further down the waterway to warn others. Which like, Thomas Cottrell Just the fact that like everyone's lolling at him and he's like, I'm going to keep spreading my word. He's still going. He's like, I don't want people in this water. So with no idea of the danger that was lurking near literal feet from them, the boys were wrestling. They're playing in the water, jumping, diving, you know, jumping off that dock at the end of the water. And the water is murky, remember. And they're getting out and keep repeatedly jumping in, which is churning the water up, creating a huge commotion. And they had only been in the water for like 15 or 20 minutes when one of them, Charlie Van Brunt, saw what he described as, quote, the biggest blackest fish I had ever seen. That's not a fish, baby. And it was swimming swiftly below the surface in Lester's direction. Oh. Just seconds later, they all heard Lester shriek as the shark grabbed him as it burst from beneath the surface. its teeth and underside you could they said they could see its belly because it rolled after it got him because sharks will do that they'll literally like a crocodile almost will roll to like trap you and to like drown you essentially yeah now and so he's pulling lester under lesser resurfaces a second or two later but the shark still had him by the arm and was whipping its head back and forth jerking this like 11 year old back and forth. The shark went under a second time taking Lester with it. And this time it's huge tail. They said it was huge. It whacked one of the other boys in the face and it knocked him several feet back into like some pylons. Like literally sent him flying. Then just as suddenly as it all started, it was over. But Lester was gone. Nowhere to be seen. a large bloom of blood on the surface of the water was the only thing left and they freak the fuck out and all five of them scrambled out of the water and they just ran screaming into town for help none of them even got dressed that's how scared they were they are literally naked running into town like covered in their friend's blood screaming can you imagine this that's like a horror movie. So they're smeared with mud, grass, streaks of blood. They're running into town screaming shark to anyone who will listen. And when Rennie Cartan had told his story about being cut by something big in the water, most people didn't really believe him. Right. Just like Thomas. And when, you know, when Thomas raved about the shark in the creek, everyone was like, yeah, I don't know about that. But this time it was different. This was clearly not a prank. These boys were genuinely terrified, genuinely traumatized, and screaming about how a shark had not just bit their friend, but had eaten Lester Stilwell. Oh my God. So the constable gathered up a group of, you know, able-bodied men of the day, and they all hurried down to the creek, hoping they would reach him, maybe find him and help him. But at this point, they figured that the boy had just drowned. Yeah. Now back in town, all the boys continued telling their story. though at this time it's weird because so like some of the town was believing of them and obviously ran down to the creek but some people are still like are you sure that's what you saw like are you sure he didn't just round like you know like did something bad happen but finally when they reached the business of stanley fisher who is a fucking real one oh thank goodness they found an adult who was willing to listen to them the fact that it took them a minute yeah is crazy fisher had grown up the son of a sea captain and he had spent more than a little time on the water. This episode is brought to you by sea captains. Sea captains, you know, men of the sea, which my father is. Yeah. And my grandfather. So men of the sea. Let's go. But yeah, so he had spent a lot of time in the water. He knew what sharks were capable of. Operating under the assumption that the boys were telling the truth, he followed them. And he ended up closing his shop for the day and changed into a bathing suit to rush down to the creek because he was like, I'm getting this kid. I'm like, don't get in that water, brother. So as the most experienced on the water, Stanley Fisher took command immediately when he got to the creek. He started assigning each of the men tasks to do. He was just like, let's go, girls. For his part, he climbed into a rowboat with another man. And after crafting a net out of chicken wire and stones, they started dragging the water for Lester's body. Oh, wow. By then, And many other locals had gathered at the shore and they were all calling for Lester. It was like a whole scene. After an hour of searching the shoreline and dragging the water, the men still didn't find anything. And Fisher suggested the boy's body may have sunk to the bottom where the nets weren't reaching. The only way they would know for sure was to dive down and look. And like, why would you get in the water and do that? And, you know, obviously it's super muddy. It's super silty in there. So it's like you're not going to see anything. Right. But having accepted that there was no other way, Stanley Fisher and a few other men left the boats and started diving to the bottom of the creek, just trying to find Lester's body. Oh, my God. Which, like, wow. Just of their own volition, too. Yeah. And they just wanted to bring this boy's body out of the water. They didn't want to leave him. Now, for the next half hour or so, Stanley Fisher repeatedly dove and resurfaced, determined to find Lester's body. as one by one other men gave up the search and begged him to abandon it too. Finally in the late afternoon he resurfaced and shouted I've got it. Wow. And the whole shore like applauded and cheered. So intending to help two men rode out to where he was while another man George Berlew dove into the water and began swimming towards Stanley. Now George hadn't made it more than 10 or so feet when he suddenly stopped swimming. Oh God. The water around him started churning and swirling and he was like something big was moving under the surface. And it just like stunned him. He just stopped where he was. George then looked up towards Stanley Fisher just in time to hear him cry out. He's got me. He got. Oh my God. He's literally. In the middle of search and rescue. Yep. And he's got Lester's body. Yeah. Like he's got Lester's body and now he's being. Which you wonder if the shark was going to go back to. and that's why he ended up going after Fisher. Ding, ding, ding. Now, though it was hard to see from their position on the shore, it looked like the shark had grabbed Stanley by the leg and was dragging him back and forth in the water as he was trying to pull himself out of its mouth. George later said, I never saw the entire fish, but from the tremendous upheaval of the huge tail that thrashed above the water, it had to be a big one. Yeah. From the shore, everyone watched in horror as Stanley Fisher fought this large shark, beating it in the head, kicking it as hard as he could as this great white shark dragged him under at least four more times. He resurfaced four times. Just beating the shark. The men in the rowboat made it out to Stanley just in time to see him get dragged under a fourth time. And the sharks, they said this is when they could also see the shark's white belly again because it was rolling trying to pull him deeper. But remember, it can't even go that deep. Right. Yeah. Meanwhile, George was paralyzed with fear. I mean, this was his friend. Like, Stanley's his friend. And he's just standing there, staring at him being mangled by a wild animal. He said later, I don't know how I ever even got to the shore, but I remember the awful fear that the shark was right behind me and had slated me for his next victim. When the men in the boat saw Fisher go down for the fourth time, they assumed that was it. Yeah. But to everyone's incredible surprise, Stanley managed to free himself from the shark jaws resurfaced a few seconds later and he was still carrying the remains of Lester still will under his arm Holy shit. Stanley swam while holding Lester's body towards the shore, but it was clear to everyone he was clearly, like, exhausted and mortally wounded. On the shore, several men grabbed oars and started slapping the water to make as much noise as possible to try to distract the shark. Well, and at least they're doing it from, like, different places. They're trying to, like, pull the shark towards them. Right. To get him to the shore. He had managed to get within about 10 feet of the shore. When his body was violently yanked back, causing him to cry out, this time, the shark had grabbed Lester's body, not Stanley's, and had pulled it from Stanley's grasp. and then he just disappeared with it because he the shark fully thought like yeah he was like my thing yeah that's why i'm fighting you and in an incredible display of courage stanley fisher did not hesitate to dive back at the shark to try to get lester's body out of its mouth stanley unfortunately when he resurfaced a few moments later lester's remains were nowhere to be seen and stanley had to get that i mean thankfully stanley's getting onto the shore but he didn't have lester's body which must have been so infuriating and what happened to him so so much emphasis had been placed on the retrieval of lester's body obviously that no one was thinking like you they kind of and they were watching his like incredible battle with the shark right that like initially no one really thought like oh wait we should look at how stanley is so he's fully out of the creek, and the Matawan Journal reported that there was a crowd of 200 or 300 people present at the time, and the sight of Mr. Fisher being brought ashore was sickening, to state it mildly. In fact, it was only when Fisher attempted to climb up the embankment that he and everyone else saw that half of his thigh was missing, and when he lifted his leg to inspect it, he quietly said, oh my god, before falling back into the water. Now, a group of men managed to carry him from the creek to the home of Dr. George Reynolds. They had tied a rope tightly above the wound to try to slow the bleeding. Smart. Unfortunately, like the doctors on the beaches in Spring Lake and Ashbury Park, though, Reynolds hadn't seen any wound like this before. And he said it stretched 18 inches from just below his hip to just above his knee. Oh. The flesh around the edge of the wound was ragged. It was shredded. the femur. It's not like you're going to stitch that back up. And the femur had been scratched by the teeth of the shark. Oh! Like there was a deep gouge in the femur bone. Holy shit, dude. Dr. Reynolds did his best to dress it while Fisher, still fully conscious, still fully conscious Yeah, let that sink in. Told the man about how he'd seen the shark feeding on Lester's body and he had tried to retrieve the remains and it dropped the boy and grabbed his leg when he tried to do that. Oh, wow. Now, as a small-town doctor, Reynolds didn't have even a fraction of the supplies that they would have needed to treat Stanley's wound. He needed surgery at this point. But he did the best he could with what he had. And while he worked, he instructed the men to fashion a stretcher from whatever they could find in the house. If Stanley Fisher was going to make it, he needed to get to a hospital now. And the closest one was about 10 miles away. Oh, fuck. With Fisher's wound packed and wrapped, they carefully put him on a stretcher and brought him down to the train station, where all they could do was sit and wait for the train. Oh my God. Which was scheduled to arrive at 5.06. Oh my God. If everything went according to plan, they would make it to the hospital by 7.45. Wait, so this was literally, you have to think of this. This was literally before ambulances. Uh-huh. When was the first ambulance? Yeah, when was the first ambulance? That's inconceivable. Like they had to get on a train. They had to wait for the train. the first civilian ambulance service started in 1865 in cincinnati ohio it's essentially what this is but modern equipped ambulances weren't until the 1960s damn that's actually crazy to think about wow and especially here it's like a seaside town a little resort town it's like and also when i'm saying the first civilian ambulance that was horse-drawn. Yeah. And then they moved to in 1899, so like not too long. Not that far off from where we are. From where we are, that was the first motorized ambulance. And then 1960s, finally, like modern ambulance. That's wild. So they're waiting for the train to get Stanley to the hospital. We're not done with this afternoon, just so you know. Okay. We're not done. Like that craziness that just happened, take a quick little breath in. We're not done. Okay. While several of the townspeople waited with Stanley Fisher at the train station, word started spreading about these attacks, but not fast enough. Less than a mile down the creek from the Wyckoff dock where the attacks on Stilwell and Fisher occurred, 12-year-old Joseph Dunn and his 14-year-old brother Michael were swimming in the creek by the brickyards with a friend, Jerry Hauerhan. During the year, they lived in New York City, but that summer they were staying at the Jersey Shore with their mother in Cliffwood, just outside of Matawan. Now, that afternoon was so hot, like I had said, and they were all eager to get into the creek. None had heard about Rennie Carton's encounter with the shark the day before, and they hadn't heard about the attacks that had happened a fucking mile down the creek a half hour earlier yet, because it just hadn't got to them yet. So they were just looking for a place to cool off. Right. Hadn't heard about anything. Now they race through town down to the brick docks where again they jump right into the creek. Had they looked up the creek a ways they might have seen a large dark shape moving slowly in that direction or maybe they would have caught sight of a fin break the surface of the water maybe giving them some kind of warning. Yeah. But you're not looking for it. They're not going out to the creek expecting a great white shark. No. But again And their minds are just, it's summer, I'm having fun, I'm cooling off. Later, it would seem strange to everyone that the boys would have willingly jumped in the water right after a vicious attack, less than a mile away. But Captain Cottrell and the group of small boats still hadn't made it that far down the creek, so there was just no way for them to know. Now, they had been in the water about a half hour, splashing, wrestling, when a man comes racing towards the shore shouting a warning about sharks and urging them, get out of the water. Now, Jerry and Michael were the first to hear the warning, and they were like, fuck that. They swam right to the ladder, pulled themselves out of the creek. Joseph had gone swimming to the middle of the creek and couldn't hear what they were shouting. Still, he could tell that something was wrong, so he started swimming towards the dock. He later recalled. Okay. He later recalled. I was about 10 feet from shore and looked down and saw something dark. I did not see him the first time he hit me. Then he turned around and got my leg. Now, this is a half hour. This is about an hour out of what happened down the creek, by the way. We're already on another one. So listen, sharky, you're not hungry anymore. As Joseph desperately tried to pull himself in the direction of the shore, the shark pulled in the opposite direction, determined to drag him under. Had it not been for the shallowness of the water, it's pretty likely that he would have met the same fate as Lester. But because of the shallowness, the shark was not able to move quickly and swiftly, and it struggled to turn around. That's how shallow this was. He said later, suddenly I felt a tug, like a big pair of scissors pulling at my leg and bringing me under. At that point, Joseph began screaming in terror. He said, not from pain, just terror. but the and he said that honestly the biggest thing on my mind was i'm going to be dragged underwater and drown yeah he said it seemed the fish was trying to get my whole leg inside its mouth i thought he would kill me i thought he was going to swallow me now as luck would have it just as joseph was struggling with the shark a local man named jacob lefferts was motoring slowly towards them in his boat without hesitation this man dove into the water fully clothed and started swimming towards the shark and Joseph. I'm like, who are all these people? Yeah, heroes. This is wild. From the other direction, Michael Dunn had dove back into the creek and was swimming towards his brother to help as well. Wow. That's a sibling right there. Yeah, it is. Like, damn. They both reached him around the same time and together began pulling Joseph and kicking the shark's head. Unfortunately, the shark was determined to hold on to its prey, though, and its jaws remained clamped around Joseph's leg. Finally, after a long tug of war, the shark let go enough for Michael and Jacob to get Joseph out of his mouth and to shore. But not before the shark grabbed a hold of his leg one last time. By then, they were able to stand up in the water. And the shark was putting itself, honestly, at great risk of drowning at this point. He was literally coming onto the shore with them. Holy shit. That's how scary this is. Yeah, it's terrifying. By that time, Captain Cottrell had arrived in his own motorboat, and after doing their best to slow the bleeding from Joseph's mangled leg, they lowered him into the boat and quickly made their way back up the creek in the direction of the hospital. Now, in the end, luck was on Joseph Dunn's side. The men managed to get the boy to St. Peter's University Hospital in New Brunswick, and he was rushed into surgery, and the surgeons did manage to save his life. but he had considerable mangling and scarring on his leg and he had a permanent disability because of it. Now, unfortunately, that same luck was not on the side of Stanley Fisher, which breaks my fucking, that man, he's a hero, gave everything. Although the men in Matawan managed to get him onto the train, he bled to death a short time later on the train. That's a lot of blood loss. Long before he was able to get proper medical care. That's so sad. Now, in the span of an afternoon. The shark in Matawan Creek had killed two people and had gravely injured another, all in full view of like hundreds of people. And within like a couple hours. Yeah. In the wake of the attacks, two things happened. First, there were several people around town likely seeking attention in their time in the spotlight who claimed to have had interactions with the shark. 13-year-old Ernest Dunham, for example, claimed that he had also jumped into the creek to search for Lester's body when the shark quote-unquote nipped him. Yeah, where's your bite, bud? Considering that brushing up against the shark had caused severe abrasions on Rennie Cartan's chest, a nip or exploratory bite would have been devastating. You would have seen it. 100%. Now, the second and more important outcome was that the entire town and surrounding areas became consumed in a panic over the quote-unquote man-eating shark that had invaded the Jersey shore and was picking off residents at an alarming rate at this point. In an effort to find the animal and kill it, hundreds of people descended on Matawan Creek, dragging the water with large nets and using dynamite to kill whatever was in the creek. That's terrible because there's other things there too. It's like most of the story you're like, wow, the humanity here, people are diving into the water, saving each other, doing what they can, going all out. And then they do things like throw dynamite in a creek. And I said, wow, we can't, we really can't, we can't always get the, the about a thousand, you know, we can't. Yeah, I'm also like, damn, don't go swimming to that creek again. Yeah, like, damn. And throughout the night, armed men patrolled the creek in boats, periodically tossing in sticks of dynamite. Okay. Like, we could, we could just get him out of the creek. Yeah, you don't have to dynamite about it. Now, at the same time, New Jersey Governor James Fielder put out a statement urging the towns along the coast to adopt the same safety measures taken in Ashbury Park. That's the other thing. I'm like, how about safety measures? Yeah, like maybe do that. Like you go to like the Cape now and there's a ton of signage like, don't go in the water, high shark time. Now, the state could not afford to mount a serious effort to keep the sharks away from the coast, so that would have made more sense. Fielder's statement also makes the natural assumption that the attacks were not the actions of a single shark, but simply the behavior of sharks in general. The governor said, It is very evident from the widely scattered points at which attacks are being made that the entire coastline is being frequented by schools of sharks. Yeah. In simple terms, as far as the governor and the public were concerned, it was inconceivable that so much carnage could have been caused by one single shark. But he was right. They're not right. Now by the following day the search efforts started paying off On the morning of July 14th two local men were patrolling the banks of the creek when they saw the remains of Lester Stillwell rise to the surface Oh, it makes me happy that at least he was found, you know? According to the press, quote, great jagged wounds in the abdomen and breast showed where the shark's teeth had closed over the 12-year-old boy's body. The recovery of his remains renewed the efforts of locals to catch the shark, which was by then being described as somewhere between 12 and 15 feet. Within a few hours, the creek was once again packed with men in boats carrying rifles, harpoons, and dynamite. Despite how unlikely it was for a shark to have made its way into the creek in the first place, the panic at Matawan was so much that people were starting to see sharks everywhere. According to an article in the New York Times, there was well-corroborated testimony indicating that there was at least four in the stream within two miles of where it enters Raritan Bay. And to that point, it was generally understood that sharks couldn't live in fresh water. But the experts had also informed the public that sharks didn't attack people. So the growing consensus was that the experts were wrong about sharks. Yeah. There's more to learn about sharks. Yeah. In fact, in Manhattan, several people reported seeing two large sharks in the Hudson River. Evidence that the panic had clearly reached beyond the borders of New Jersey and was stretching out into other places. In reality, the dramatic increase in sightings could be explained. It was a combination of hysteria, mistaken identity, and fabrication. But at least some of the sightings were definitely genuine. And simply the result, and I don't think we think of it like this, the result of people having gone looking for something that had always been there. Yeah. But they just didn't notice it before. Yep. The northeastern coast of the United States, we know this now, has a large and diverse population of sharks. Yep. That if you were to go looking for it, it really wouldn't be that difficult to find. Yeah. You can find sharks around. You can. Especially now. So the fact that people were seeing them in that moment only came as a surprise because most people had no idea they were there in the first place. more importantly than their mere presence were the assumed implications of their discovery mainly that the sharks possessed an immediate and extreme danger to humans only if you get in the water though right like it's one of those things that i'm like yeah sure don't go in the water right like as jaws says i mean stay out of the water now the story of the man-eating shark finally came to an end on the evening of july 14th after countless sharks have been pulled from the waters around the shores of New York and New Jersey. But they were just like keeping them out? Yeah. Among them was a seven and a half foot great white caught near Raritan Bay about five miles from Matawan by New York taxidermist Michael Schleiser. According to Schleiser, which is a hard name to say, Michael, he had been dragging his net behind the boat when he turned and saw, quote, a big bifurcated tail flash out of the water. Michael attempted to haul the shark on board, but the weight of it and its constant thrashing caused the stern of the boat to sink and raise the bow into the air. Well, maybe you're not supposed to catch that shark. Yeah, you're not supposed to put this giant shark on your boat, I don't think. Now, by the time he made it to the rear of the boat, he saw, quote, the shark rising out of the net and onto the stern, snapping its great jaws. With all the weight on the back of the boat, gravity went to work, pulling everything towards the shark, not only putting Michael in danger of being bitten, but also threatening to sink the entire ship. In fact, it seemed to Michael that the shark was actually doing everything it could to reach him and his sailing partner at the time. I mean, I think it's probably just protecting itself. Yeah, I think so. Thinking quickly, he grabbed one of the now broken oars of the boat and began beating the shark in the head, striking it on its snout, its gills, and anywhere else he thought could damage it. How about you just let it go? Exactly. All while the shark is continuing to snap its teeth. finally the shark took one last leap onto the boat trying to grab them both but missed giving both the opportunity to strike the final blows and ultimately killing him the fuck are you doing killing a shark that's in the water yeah just leave alone you're not supposed to be in there if they're there that's where they live and we don't that's like somebody walking into your house and beating you over the head like just don't you live there you're allowed to be there exactly that's how i feel i'm sorry i really do feel it's not my that the water is not my home like it's It's obviously tragic and like the shark shouldn't have been in the creek and like that's awful that that happened. But sometimes those things happen in nature. Well, it's like when like a bear will attack or something when somebody's like out in the woods and they'll like euthanize the bear. It's not the bear's fault. Yeah, you can see that like, yeah, this shit happened. Somebody died. Like that's huge. And it's tragic. It's tragic. But it's hard to swallow that we're just going to kill a wild thing for acting like a wild thing. For acting like a wild thing in their own habitat. habitat that's the thing that pisses me off and water especially is the thing that i'm like that is theirs man that's theirs i can't i can't sit here by no means did anyone deserve to lose their life absolutely not do something that they should have lost their life like you should obviously like honestly i want everybody to be able to go swimming in the water but it's not ours right and i just can't like it's it's a double-edged sword it really is because obviously you want to keep people safe and this was horrific and tragic but to yank a yank a like go looking for it and yank it onto the boat and beat the shit out of it that just doesn't feel right to me it's supposed to be where it is but again we're also in 1916 yeah we didn't have all the knowledge educated we don't know how enough about sharks at this time but really sad but from this point of view i'm like you guys are really being assholes yeah and it's like uh it's just it's all sad it's The whole thing is sad. Now, after resting and regaining their composure, they managed to push the shark and the net back into the water, riding the boat and allowing them to haul it back to the docks. When asked about this experience, he said it was, quote, the hardest fight for life I've ever had. Now, by the time, and again, I should say, too, if I'm on a boat and a shark is trying to get on the boat and eat me, yeah, I'm probably going to beat it with an oar to get it out of my boat. But he was trying to catch the shark so you wouldn't be in that position. That's the thing. It's not like it just jumped on your boat out of nowhere. Sharks don't just jump on boats. Yeah, like you're going to defend yourself, obviously. You're not, like I'm not telling anyone, well, well, accept your fate and go into its... No, of course not. But like the likelihood of the shark just jumping on the boat, being like, I'm going to eat you. No. It's like you pulled them onto the boat. There's plenty of food in where you are for the shark to eat. Now that by the time Michael and his partner had made it back to shore, many others had returned with various kinds of sharks. That makes me so sad. All convinced they'd caught the so-called man-eater. As a result, everyone seemed pretty skeptical that this New York taxidermist, an amateur hunter, had caught the shark that was responsible for the deaths of Van Zandt, Bruder, Stillwell, and Fisher. But when they cut the shark open and revealed the contents of its stomach, they discovered, quote, two bones, one 11 inches long and the other a small fragment. When they were examined by the medical examiner, it was determined that, quote, the long bone appears to be the shin bone of a boy. Oh. By the time they finished the examination, they also discovered roughly 15 pounds of suspicious fleshy material that was later determined to be human remains. So this was the shark that had died. After the remains were removed from the shark's stomach and sent to a pathologist, Michael Schleicher took the shark's body back to his shop in Harlem, New York, where it was stuffed and mounted. Now, although they could never say for sure whether his shark was the one shark that was responsible for all the attacks. Right. There was evidence to support that it was. Yeah. And aside from the human remains found in its stomach, it had been caught roughly in the same area where the attacks had occurred. And it matched the descriptions of the shark in the attacks. And more importantly, after he had caught the shark off of Raritan Bay, the attack stopped. Yes. And there was no other additional sightings in Matawan Creek. Now, prior to the 1916 attacks, it was widely believed that, with a few notable exceptions, sharks were pretty shy creatures that didn't attack humans. Maybe that's why in the wake of the attack, so many people still refused to believe it was a shark at all and insisted still that it was like sea turtles or orca whales, which like valid. These stories aside, the 1916 attacks prompted experts to reconsider what they thought they knew, and they emerged with a new theory about sharks that suggested, while they do generally stay not interested in humans as a source of food, like they're not out here trying to eat us, they're not hunting us. They still pose a danger, and even their curiosity can result in harm, like with Rennie. Yeah. Like even just bumping against you to see what you are, that can still hurt you. in the case of the jersey shore attacks john nichols a curator of the museum of natural history offered what was the most plausible explanation he said it is very certain that they do not ordinarily attack bathers but if one of them got lost his way and got out of the gulf stream where he could no longer find the green turtles to which he was accustomed he would forget about or he would forge about and might seek to make man his staple diet yeah although he may have been wrong about some of the specifics. His theory is more or less accurate. Yeah. At least by standards now. And having been thrown off course, this animal would have gone looking for food and not found what it's used to eating. So it's turning to mammals, of course. Right. If something's moving in the water, by the time it had found itself trapped in Matawan Creek, it was not only hungry, but it was terrified. That's so sad. And that would have explained the extremely aggressive and territorial behavior. Add to all of that the facts we now know about shark behavior, including its feeding patterns and the distress behaviors it associates with food, and all the attacks in New Jersey, suddenly have a very rational, still terrifying explanation. Still terrifying. But at least a rational explanation of he was hungry and lost. I mean, it makes perfect sense. And without a food source. Right. Like, eating tiny fish is not going to do it for a giant great white shark. He's hearing the heartbeat. So he knows that it's something that he's. Yeah. He knows it's a mammal. You know, like he's experienced at least something similar to. So he's like, well, this will work. Oh, but that's a really, really terrible case. That's the summer of blood. Wow. And it is indeed. Yeah. That's, that's a horrific summer. A horrific summer and a fascinating and very tragic case on all ends. Yeah. Yeah. damn all right well let me find a uh a fun fact oh here's a good animal fact for you oh here we go a group of bunnies is called a fluffle yeah it's called a fluffle yeah it is a lot of people call them a herd but parts of northern canada canada parts of northern canada call them a fluffle no they are a fluffle and that's from good housekeeping yeah they're a fluffle a fluffle forever a fluff one thing about dolores is she bullies bunnies yeah i think that's like dogs right it is right Right. We have bunnies. So did Blanche and Sydney. Yeah. We have bunnies that live under our porch and she will not leave them alone. I'm like, don't let them live. They just love a bunny moment. That's a fluffle. They love it. All right, guys. Well, we hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep it weird. But that's so weird that you, like, kill a shark. I don't like that. I understand that this was a tragic story, but you don't have to go and kill a shark. Don't go killing sharks. It's really sad. Come on. But keep it so weird that you have a fluffle. yeah Thank you. Thank you.