08/06/2026
In the summer of 1937, artist and puppeteer Tony Sarg orchestrated a famous nationwide media hoax on Nantucket, Massachusetts. He had local fishermen report sea monster sightings and planted giant, fabricated footprints in the sand.
Stories started appearing in the local papers of Nantucket carrying photographs of giant footprints found on a local beach. Rumors quickly began to circulate reporting that, at last, one of the elusive creatures had come ashore. Copies of the photographs were even sent for scientific analysis, though Dr. W. Reid Blair, director of the New York Zoological Society, was skeptical.
“No marine mammal could have left the tracks as they do not move so much on their flippers as they do on their second joint and on their bellies. Evidence of their passage would be seen on the beach only in a slight indentation. As for a land mammal, there is nothing on Nantucket Island that could leave such large tracks“.
Multiple fisherman went around town claiming they had seen a “green sea monster which reared its head several times off his starboard bow before turning seawards. More sighting got picked up by the news wires and ran in papers throughout the country.
A local scientific society launched an investigation and concluded that the creature might be a previously unknown species, scoliophis atlanticus (Atlantic hu**ed snake).
The prank culminated when a 75-foot "sea serpent" washed ashore, which turned out to be a giant inflatable balloon. The whole thing had been an elaborate publicity stunt by the puppeteer Tony Sarg, hoping to get Nantucket in the news. Sarg was an American puppeteer, illustrator, designer, and painter. He is famous for creating balloons for the Macy department store parades and many illustrations for magazines. He owned a store in Nantucket, the Tony Sarg’s Curiosity Shop.
The monster made another appearance a few months later, floating above the streets of Manhattan, when it participated in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. I'll share some photos from that another day.