Water Monster · Mississippi River Park, Tennessee · 1877
TN-1877ID case-ddee77eb1dAdded to map Oct 9, 2026
- Creature
- Water Monster
- When
- Dec 9, 1877to the day
- Where
- Mississippi River Park, Tennesseeto approximate level
- Reports
- 4 documents1 independent
The account
Witnesses report seeing a sixty-five-foot snake-like creature with a pelican bill and black mane attacking a produce boat on the Mississippi River.
Trace the source trail → every document, in time order, and how they connect
We map claims, not creatures: this is what the sources say, not proof. How a case is built
Details
- Creature
- Water Monster
- Where
- Mississippi River Park, Downtown, Memphis, Shelby County, West Tennessee, Tennessee, 38103, United States
mapped to approximate level · from the report's own words, generalized to a larger area - When
- Dec 9, 1877
- Account
- Not first-hand (retold or reported by someone else)
- Backed by
- 1 independent source (4 documents; copies and reprints are not confirmations)
- Added to map
- Oct 9, 2026
- Case id
- case-ddee77eb1d
Place lookups use data © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), via Nominatim. All credits
Source trail (3)
Down the rabbit hole → 4 documents, and how they connect
Every link goes to where we found the account. The earliest we found is marked; it is the earliest found, not necessarily the original.
- Image 2 of Public ledger (Memphis, Tenn.), December 28, 1877
Newspaper · 1877-12-28
Earliest found, not necessarily the original. - Image 1 of Wood County reporter (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.), January 10, 1878
Newspaper · 1878-01-10 - Image 5 of Iowa County democrat (Mineral Point, Wis.), January 11, 1878
Newspaper · 1878-01-11
Further reading
- The Great New England Sea Serpent, J. P. O'Neill (1999)
Account of the 1817 Gloucester sightings and later reports.
Borrow on Internet Archive - On the Track of Unknown Animals, Bernard Heuvelmans (1959)
The founding work of cryptozoology.
Borrow on Internet Archive - Cryptozoology A to Z, Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark (1999)
Encyclopedia of reported creatures.
Borrow on Internet Archive - Abominable Science!, Daniel Loxton and Donald Prothero (2013)
Skeptical history of the Yeti, Nessie and others.
Borrow on Internet Archive
Books we have not reproduced: borrow them free at archive.org. Listing a book is not an endorsement of its claims.