On July 8, 1877, J.H. McNeil and other men at a saltworks near Monument Point, on the north shore of the Great Salt Lake, said a huge animal came toward the shore bellowing. They described a crocodile-like body and a horse-like head, and McNeil put its length at about 75 feet. The men fled into the hills and hid overnight; in the morning they found boulders overturned along the shore.
McNeil signed an affidavit and the story ran in the Corinne Record and other Utah papers, though the Deseret News advised taking it 'with a few grains of salt'. Some suggested a buffalo in the lake. Other Great Salt Lake tales include porpoise-like animals reported in the 1840s, which gave Antelope Island its early name of Porpoise Island, and a 1903 story of a winged 'salt dragon' with bullet-proof salt-crusted skin.
What witnesses report
- A long body like a crocodile
- A head like a horse's
- A loud bellow from the water
Famous cases
- 1877The Monument Point sighting
Monument Point, Great Salt Lake, UtahOn July 8, 1877, saltworks foreman J.H. McNeil and his men said a 75-foot animal with a crocodile's body and a horse's head came bellowing toward the shore at Monument Point. They fled to the hills for the night and found overturned boulders on the beach the next morning. McNeil signed an affidavit.
- 1903The salt dragon story
Stansbury Island, Great Salt Lake, UtahIn 1903 a story went around that two hunters near Stansbury Island had been chased by a huge winged creature, at home in the air, on the beach and in the brine, whose salt-crusted skin turned their musket balls. Park rangers still tell it.
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