Shark Attacks of 1916 (Documentary)

the terror struck in mid-summer 1916 a series of shark attacks that sparked hysteria at a New Jersey beach resort as more people fell victim panic swept the nation frightened citizens struck back and thousands went hunting for sharks as we go in search of history we'll learn why on the eve of World War one the government found itself in a different kind of conflict defending Americans against shark attack 1916 for most of us a day at the beach is a chance to relax and enjoy the surf over the years Americans have been drawn to the sand and sea by the millions until a movie called jaws made us wonder if it really was safe to go back in the water but long before Hollywood sharks were the subject of myths and legends for thousands of years Mariners have told tales of horrifying attacks on fishermen and shipwrecked sailors some scholars even believe that the biblical story of Jonah and the Whale may be based on an encounter with a great white shark people probably notice sharks when they first started sailing and since people were not always as ecologically correct as they are today they would throw stuff overboard and in the process of throwing stuff overboard they would attract sharks on the occasion where some person fell overboard it was not beyond the possibilities that the person would be attacked by sharks and it probably were talking probably within you know 2,000 years that people have been aware that some sharks which worship followers were potentially dangerous but for most of history little was known about sharks they were part of a menagerie of mysterious sea monsters whose fanciful forms embellished maps and books in some early prints sharks were even portrayed with legs it's only in the past century that scientists have begun to understand these creatures their evolution and their roles as the oceans supreme predators sharks are apex predators for the most part there are about 350 different kinds of sharks but the ones that we know best are large prey predators when they can they will take warm-blooded prey and quite often they eat fishes or anything else they can catch and sharks can catch almost anything including people attacks have occurred all around the world including the southeastern and Gulf coasts of the United States and the coast of California those who are attacked face grave danger because sharks are designed to kill all shark teeth are replaceable in that it's like kind of like an escalator for each row of teeth the teeth move up from in back of the other ones to replace teeth that are lost some of them are serrated the teeth of the white shark are very finely serrated so much so that if you take a white shark tooth of fresh one and just pass it along your finger it will cut you the way a razor blade does it's that sharp still in spite of the Sharks varied diet and formidable weapons attacks on humans are relatively rare and they are almost always isolated incidents a series of attacks by a single shark as in the movie Jaws is almost unheard of until the late 19th century the chances of an attack on a swimmer were even more slim than they are today Americans frequently came to the shore to cool off but few ever ventured into the sea nonetheless the Sharks notorious reputation was firmly established in the early 1890s there were reports of shark attacks along the east coast of the United States but none was ever substantiated they certainly didn't frighten the prominent New York ship owner named Herman Ulrich's who was in the habit of swimming out to greet his ships as they approached the harbor he scoffed at friends who warned him that the practice was dangerous and offered a $500 reward to anyone who could provide evidence of a shark attack on the Atlantic coast north of Cape Hatteras no one ever came forward to claim it by the first decades of the 20th century ocean swimming was becoming more popular and beaches were a fashionable place to spend the summer among the most popular resorts were the towns along the New Jersey Shore they were easy to get to just a short train ride away from big cities like New York and Philadelphia this leisure time was something that developed late in the Victorian period so now everybody had free time and those that could afford it even a minimum amount could come down on the other hand there was some extremely wealthy people who built tremendous homes along the Jersey Shore some of which still stand a lot would come to spend the day and I probably eat someplace and and go to the amusements and a lot to do sunbathing of course on the beach they spend all day there with the umbrellas and that sort of thing get real sunburned but it was cooler and then there were different things along the boardwalk concessions you go in and out of those and I remember as a teenager going to Ellen they had the big bands there and dancing people would promenade on the boardwalks and they would wear long gowns and they're their finest outfits that would look a little out of place today because they looked so uncomfortable for the weather but that was the that was the atmosphere back then in 1916 or even in the late 1800s new jersey really attracted everyone and anyone including the riffraff but mainly the politicians the the wealthy even politicians the extent of presidents seven presidents resided in Elberon and Long Branch the summer White House was in Asbury Park in 1916 even before he became President Woodrow Wilson maintained a summer home called shadow lawn on the Jersey Shore his Treasury Secretary William McAdoo also had a summer home I the New Jersey beaches attracted people and their money it was in the interest of the town leaders to make sure the beach resorts were regarded as safe when swimming became a major source of business for the Shore area they had to watch out for the safety of the swimming team and almost every beach had an area with poles and ropes within which the babies should remain if anyone gave any thought of the risk of shark attacks their fears were put to rest by scientists who published a research paper on sharks behavior in April 1916 in it they declared that there was no scientific proof that an unprovoked shark attack had ever occurred along the East Coast in the report dr. Frederick Lucas the director of the American Museum of Natural History maintained that a shark's jaws were not even powerful enough to bite through a human leg bone three months later as a summer heat wave swept the eastern seaboard people flocked to the beaches in record numbers one of the thousands drawn to the shore was a young man named Charles Vansant when he stepped off the train on July first in the seaside town of Beach Haven he was looking for a little relaxation and a chance to beat the heat of Philadelphia what happened to Charles Vansant would present the scientists with chilling evidence that their report had been wrong and would throw the beaches of New Jersey into a panic in 1916 Beach Haven was one of the most fashionable resort towns on the Jersey Shore it was a popular summer destination for well-to-do residents of Philadelphia who could reach it in only two hours by the new express train service Saturday July 1st was another in a series of scorching days in a summer of heat waves that afternoon Charles Vansant a 24 year old stockbroker from Philadelphia had just arrived in Beach Haven with his parents and two sisters he hurried down to the beach to enjoy a stroll and a swim with his dog it was the custom back then for a young man of his age especially to jump into the ocean for a nice swim into surf before dinner and that's exactly what he did but Van Sant's swim in the surf would soon turn into a life-and-death struggle he was in shallow water only 15 yards off shore when suddenly he heard warning cries from people on the beach from their vantage point they could see a large fin heading straight for him Vansant quickly made his way through the surf but in just a few seconds the shark struck [Music] Van Sant's cries for help brought a quick response from the lifeguard who dashed into the water and dragged the injured man to shore [Music] but Van Sant's thigh and leg were torn open and he was losing blood too quickly his femoral artery was severed it was actually spurting blood and into the air they put him on the hotel managers desk at the angle side and he died within two hours one man was dead and the killer was still at large this was the first fatal shark attack ever recorded in the eastern United States but initial press coverage was subdued the Philadelphia papers of course took notice of the tragic death of a hometown boy but in the New York Times the incident was covered in a small article buried on page 28 they did not even mention the word shark in the story they said a fish attacked and killed a Philadelphia person many people were skeptical about the attack some were unwilling to believe that a shark had been involved any concerns about safety on the beaches were quickly dispelled the attack was called a fluke a freak occurrence there was nothing to worry about but just five days later it would happen again this time 45 miles up the coast an area filled with Victorian houses and vacation cottages and a grand hotel the Essex and Sussex Charles Bruder was a young Swiss immigrant working as a bellboy in the hotel in his free time he'd like to head to the beach on July 6th he went swimming with some of his friends he swam beyond his friends beyond the lifelines and all of a sudden the lifeguards on shore thought that a red canoe had capsized because there was a wide strip of red water they suddenly saw a man trying to keep afloat they launched the lifeguard vote they were yards away from when he said a shark bit me bit my legs off and he could not keep afloat they pulled him toward the boat and they actually felt and reported that he was lighter than they expected his reduced weight apparently was secondary to the fact that both of his legs were missing below the knees the lifeguards rode as quickly as they could but brooder died in the bottom of their boat before they could reach the shore this time the public reaction was different panic began to set in the headlines were more frightening and in the New York Times this story of the second death was front-page news my grandfather told us about it as soon as we got there because he wanted to give us every precaution he wasn't at all sure that we should he could go to the beach but my parents decided that we would go down to see what was going on and and we did but we were never allowed to go on the water unless we were with a parent an adult what made matters sensationally worse was the fact that which were Wilson had his secretary of the Treasury staying at the hotel where this bellboy was staying at that exact time over the next few days as news of the second attack began to spread beachgoers fled in terror merchants and politicians called for immediate action at stake were lives and millions of dollars in lost revenue some shore towns promptly set up armed patrols a few also installed anti shark nets of steel mesh to protect bathers or at least make them feel safer when the first shark attacked a swimmer I think the reaction was what was an unfortunate accident and nobody not overly excited about it north or south of where the event took place but as more shark attacks took place the lifeguards were more on the alert people were forewarned that there are sharks along the coast I think that that people upon the first or second of the attacks began to get in a crowd sense hysterical and began to believe that the waters were infested with man-eating sharks and there were a lot of attempts made to hunt for them to shoot them to blow them up to somehow rid the water of sharks and every expert was interviewed on what are we supposed to do about this as officials tried to the public advertisements in local papers invited people to return to the beaches reassuring them that it was still safe to go back in the water but bathers remained on edge in one case beach goers ignored a swimmers cries for help fearing that she was struggling with a shark in fact she was only suffering from a cramp she drowned while they watched many people turn from the beaches to waters that were guaranteed to be shark free local pools and even fountains provided safe havens for swimmers a postcard mailed from Asbury Park on July 8 sums up the reaction the beach is patrolled by boats since a scare of a shark biting off the legs of a man the other morning since then a great many bathers are rather scarce in spite of the precautions and reassurances Somers seemed to have ended early in the beach resorts of the Jersey Shore no one was venturing into the sea in the aftermath of two fatal shark attacks the beaches of the Jersey Shore were beginning to look deserted but inland away from the sea people were still heading into the water after all the rivers and streams were free of sharks weren't they one place that still seemed safe for swimmer's was the quiet little town of Matawan 11 miles from the ocean in 1916 Matawan was far removed from the fashionable beach resorts of Spring Lake and Beach Haven and it had so far escaped the hysteria sparked by the shark attacks at those short owls Matawan who was like many small towns in Jersey and it had its Main Street with the stores the sort of a village had two factories and the people that lived in town are all very friendly and many of them were related and neighbors always helped each other so it was a nice place to be Matawan Creek is a muddy tidal river that meanders down to the sea on the morning of July 12th nearly a week after the second shark attack a retired fishing captain named Thomas Cottrell was walking across the trolly drawbridge on the outskirts of town suddenly he caught a glimpse of something moving up river through the creek he could hardly believe his eyes but looking closer he was certain he knew what it was a large gray shark perhaps eight feet long Cottrell hurried back to town to alert his neighbors but no one bothered to check out his story much less do anything a shark in Matawan Creek no one believed him even after the first two attacks no one believed that a shark could actually enter the creek and make its way up toward that narrow body inland body of water meanwhile as the day grew hotter 11-year old Lester Stillwell and four of his friends headed out to their favorite section of Matawan Creek the water was muddy but it was cool and they swam here nearly every day that day they were playing in a shallow part of the creek when one of them felt something brush up against his leg he would later say it felt like sandpaper suddenly several of the boys saw a thin racing through the water toward Lester then they watched in horror helpless as something seized their friend and dragged him under terrified the boys scrambled from the water and raced to town Lester's fate alerted by the boys rescuers rushed to the creek one of the first to arrive was Stanley Fischer a 24-year old tailor Stanley Fischer never came back Stanley Dovan where the boy said their friend had gone down and came up with a partially dismembered body of Lester Stillwell but as he made his way to shore he too was attacked Stanley Fischer died on the operating table the fourth victim of the shark attacks local residents were stunned nothing like this had ever happened here before the whole town was upset you know naturally and then it was someone they knew you know local boy and then the other one who went so naturally they were very upset about it so we went down where it had happened and everyone was excited about I can still see admittedly us riding down to the critical waiting to get there you know and all these people walking alongside of the cars and you're easing your way along now and wondering you know what you're going to see well you didn't see anything the only water there was nothing to see because the shark had moved but only a few hundred yards downstream where another group of boys was playing in the wrong place at the wrong time when word reached them about the attacks on Stillwell and Fisher they began clamoring out of the creek but as the last boy 12 year-old Joseph Dunn was climbing the ladder to shore he was struck from behind Joseph was lucky he lost his leg to the shark but not his life [Music] meanwhile the entire town of Matawan quickly mobilized and launched a massive counter-attack but the enemy would prove elusive they used every weapon at their disposal fighting this unfamiliar adversary local hardware stores quickly sold every bullet and every stick of dynamite crowds of spectators gathered along the banks of Matawan Creek to watch as preparations were made to blast the waterway [Music] the shark attacks were becoming a very big story the press had a field day taking advantage of every photo opportunity and even creating a few but despite the best efforts of the courageous citizens of Matawan the shark got away today the creek as much as it was more than 80 years ago it still draws those who seek its tranquility or its tragic past it's extraordinary that in a tidal Creek no more than 40 feet wide brackish murky high tides and low tides that a shark capable of doing what it did actually occurred this very spot it's a peaceful spot and that it's quiet there's a lot of solitude here but you can still feel the tragedy the awe of the attacks and you can almost see all the panicked townspeople coming down and the on their faces to find it two of their citizens were brutally attacked and then to find that another boy was maimed just 400 feet away and women you can see women the mothers running up and down the Creek yelling to have their other children jump out of the water the shark a shark the shark got Lester a shark that's Stanley the to shark attacks on the New Jersey Shore had been thought of as isolated incidents but with three more in Matawan Creek the situation was getting out of control they'd been in frequent attacks one every two years one every five years one every 20 years and suddenly bang bang bang there were five attacks in a ten day period and this made suddenly made everybody start thinking about sharks all of a sudden in a very different way reaction in the press was beginning to escalate the headlines were huge the coverage more sensational and no wonder the grisly attacks made for gripping stories as news of the attacks spread out-of-town press joined the fray and descended upon Matawan we had many newspapers and reporters coming looking you know to see what the town was like and looking for this shark not very often do you have sharks coming up a small creek killing people just think of something like that happening in a small town there had been quiet nothing ever you know happened like that before and all of a sudden that was very upsetting after the Matawan attacks obviously sharks killing people in New Jersey was the story that was eclipsing all national news World War one was secondary even the London Times was talking about man-eating sharks invading the shores of the US in 1916 there was no shortage of big news stories the war in Europe was entering its third year a million Allied and German troops were fighting to a bloody stalemate at the Battle of Verdun the Germans were conducting unrestricted submarine warfare in the North Atlantic and their u-boats were off the coast of the United States threatening commercial vessels and creating havoc and busy be claimed at the same time poncho via was raiding American towns and South Texas the US government sent troops under General Pershing to chase him back into Mexico but for a few weeks it was the New Jersey maneater that grabbed the headlines panic quickly swept the country and sharks became the focus of national attention there were wild rumors like the bizarre story that sharks were venomous everyone was worried about the danger of attack sharks were even featured in editorial cartoons they were the metaphor of the moment and this was the biggest story of the summer even President Woodrow Wilson became involved New Jersey was his home state and the summer White House was just a few minutes from where the second shark attack took place Wilson called his cabinet into an emergency meeting and demanded action at his side with secretary of the Treasury William McAdoo another summer resident of New Jersey after the Matawan attack all focus all national focus was on the Jersey Shore you had people losing their lives you had a declining a quickly declining Jersey Shore economy and Woodrow Wilson as a former New Jersey Governor was going to do everything he could call the cabinet meeting to send a federal agent to New Jersey and got the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Coast Guard involved to do everything they could to catch the shark to catch all sharks and to safeguard everyone from possible attacks many Jersey Shore communities offered a bounty for anyone who could kill the man-eating shark or sharks hundreds of fishermen set out to collect the rewards up and down the entire mid-atlantic coast it was open season on sharks everybody with a boat it seemed went shark hunting they killed thousands of sharks using guns harpoons even small cannons well they did almost everything they could think of to attempt to slow this down they were obviously afraid that this was the end of the world that Matawan Creek or of the home jersey coast was going to be shark-infested and that nobody would be able nobody would be safe in the water against on July 14th one of the shark hunters a New Yorker named Michael slicer was fishing in Raritan Bay just four miles northwest of the mouth of Matawan Creek he caught a shark known to be a maneater a great point when the shark stomach was opened it contained 15 pounds of human remains in various states of decay including an 11-inch fragment assumed to be Charles brooders chin bone this was surely the killer they'd been looking for those remains in that great white cotton rotten Bay were positively identified as human by the director of the American Museum of Natural History Frederick Lucas Lucas was the scientist who had declared just a month earlier that sharks were incapable of biting through a human leg now he was forced to admit that the report had been wrong slicer attacked the dermis by trade within 24 hours he had that stuffed and prepared and put it on display at the Bronx Home News newspaper office thousands of people lined up to see the Jersey maneater many people did not know what a shark looked like at that time some people were claiming that it was actually a porpoise because the shark's jaws were actually supposed to be on its side and not in the front of its mouth at Christ's by that time there were some pictures of sharks and so I became aware of what a shark looked but I didn't really have an understanding of the tremendous dimensions of a shark and that was kind of scary when I realized how large they were they had caught a killer but was a single shark responsible for all of the attacks some experts believe there had to be more than one maneater I'm not really convinced that they had caught the killer shark nor my convinced from reading many of the contemporaneous reports that the bones in this shark had anything at all to do with any of the attacks whether or not the killer shark had been eliminated there were no more attacks off the New Jersey coast that summer but for merchants and hotel owners it was already too late they had lost millions of dollars in summer revenues and the goodwill and confidence of vacationers the summer was virtually lost they were believe it or not thirty mares from Jersey Shore who are trying to get to the director of the American Museum of Natural History to say this was not a shark perpetrated incident there are no real threats by sharks toward people swimming in the water he obviously couldn't abide by that even in August of 1916 this story was attempted to be pushed to the back reaches of people's consciousness people tried to forget about it immediately 1917 no one spoke about shark attacks so years and years had passed by and people why would they want to sensationalize or advertise the fact that there were five attacks and eleven days in the Jersey Shore the hunt was over swimmers gradually returned to the beaches the New Jersey shark attacks would soon be forgotten but questions remained why have they occurred in the first place what forces drew man-eating sharks to the Jersey Shore why did man-eating sharks suddenly begin attacking the citizens of New Jersey in 1916 apparently for the first time ever in these waters that summer with its record high temperatures there were certainly more people at the beaches but there were also reliable reports of increased numbers of sharks farther offshore sailors and fishermen said they had cited schools of sharks in places where they had never seen any before what drew the sharks to the Jersey Shore there was no shortage of explanations offered by New Jersey residents and fishermen but most of them were based on guesswork not science one theory held that sea battles off Europe and driven sharks westward toward the north eastern shores of the United States others said that sharks in the North Atlantic had acquired a taste for human flesh from the 15,000 sailors who had died at sea since the beginning of the war but there was no increase in shark attacks elsewhere on the eastern seaboard only in New Jersey a few scientists noted a temporary change in the Gulf Stream which might have accounted for increased numbers of sharks in new areas but perhaps there was a simpler explanation with more people in the water the Sharks may simply have had more targets that summer and in July of 1916 there was a heat wave that spread from from North Carolina all the way to Maine and therefore there were even more people in the water than would normally have been in the water during the month of July 1916 now a lot of people in the water will attract sharks the mechanics of a shark attack or the the stimulation for shark attack has never been really known we don't know whether sharks are hungry whether they're territorial whether they feel threatened whether they are just examining this object which happens a consist of feet remember that that sharks have no way of testing something except by biting and the shark probably doesn't think I'm just gonna nibble on this thing and see if it's tasty and then if it is I'll candidate Tarte goes in and bites it and says oh well not edible swims away but deciding something is not edible could result in the death of that non edible creature whatever caused the attacks in 1960 the big question that remained was could it happen again could man-eating sharks returned to invade New Jersey's beaches and rivers and terrorize swimmers it would take nearly half a century to answer that question in 1960 the Sharks came back to the Jersey Shore John Brodeur was visiting his fiance in Sea Girt New Jersey that summer he was a newcomer to the Jersey Shore unaware of what had happened there in 1916 I didn't know anything about this never heard of shark attacks in New Jersey I enjoyed the ocean I was 24 years old and I came down weekends doing that that summer I saw wave and I thought to myself gee I should have taken that wave it looked good and I turned around and watched the wave going to the shore and as I turned back I saw to the right some big black object in the in the wave and I said to myself well it's he or a person or a log in the way and as soon as I planted my foot firmly in the sand I was hit with such tremendous force that I I can't even equate it to anything it was so strong I looked down and the the water turned red almost instantly it's a flesh floating up towards the surface I screamed but no words were coming out blood was draining that fast Oh Brody was rushed to the hospital where emergency surgery was performed on his leg which had been nearly severed the attending doctor said it appeared to be guillotined in the end Broder's leg had to be amputated once again patrols were called out to guard the beaches this time men flew in helicopters and carried machine guns the US Navy provided one of its blimps which flew up and down the coast looking for the shark the old fears resurfaced people who recalled the events of 1916 shared their memories of that summer and braced themselves for the hysteria but this time only one more attack occurred and no one was killed the shark was never caught but the summer was saved and the panic of 1916 was once again forgotten even John brewer was able to put the fear and the trauma behind him it's like the wind I go body surfing I look around but I I do go in I'm not gonna let one incident to prevent me from enjoying the ocean I have to enjoy beachgoers tend to share brooders attitude in all likelihood the fictional book and movie Jaws frightened more people out of the ocean than real shark attacks ever did most people still believe it won't happen to them I don't think they realize there are sharks out there because they probably feel the same way I did back in 1960 there has been no recorded attacks that I know of since 1960 since my attack and what they're out there are the Sharks still out there are there more man-eaters lurking just below the waves shark fishermen Bruce Miller can't predict another shark attack but he does know there are plenty of sharks as the captain of the fishing boat mirages out of Point Pleasant New Jersey he heads to see every weekend looking for them captain Miller knows what beachgoers may not want to hear there are lots of sharks out there big ones swimming just off our shores I started shark fishing back in 1974 73 in that area my glad I see mako sharks tiger sharks a lot of blue sharks dusky shark sandbar sharks hammerheads I've bought in the years I've been shark fishing of I guess over a thousand could be a little bit less than that besides that most of the sharks off Jersey or anywhere from 30 pounds to a couple thousand if you run into a white shark a white shark could could go 15:44 along should people be worried I wouldn't say they should be worried it's not really a lot of sharks that come into the beach but they there have been shark sightings and there are there are a lot of sharks offshore you can find them but for those who can recall the events of 1916 sharks are still something to worry about I really never forgot about those sharks because when I was in Florida years later on my friends food in the everybody's and swimming from their vote in the Everglades and having my hostess say there are sharks in this water i scampered right back up the last race with sharks so it really apparently made an impression on me but I really never forgot over the past 80 years there have been hundreds of shark attacks in the United States occurring with some regularity off the Carolinas in Florida as well as in the Gulf of Mexico great whites attack surfers off California but not since 1916 as the United States seems so many attacks in one area over a period of less than two weeks the sequence of attacks the viciousness the frequency the scientific irony involved it's it's unparalleled really I doubt we'll see it again but you never know I don't think that this gonna be and I could be proven wrong I mean tomorrow of charts could cruise the beaches of New Jersey or Coney Island or Florida or somewhere else and start eating people by the Dozen it's possible but not the slightest bit probable others might disagree with so many swimmers and so many sharks in the water close encounters seem inevitable but could an invasion of man-eaters happen again as it did in 1916 that question still lingers as we go in search on the history [Music] you

Channel: DocSpot

Views: 858,415

Rating: 4.6897507 out of 5

Keywords: Shark, Sharks, Shark Attack, Shark Attacks, Death, Life, Survival, 1916, History, America, New Jersey, Ocean, Beach, Fish, Ocean Life, Sea Animals, Sea Life, Animals, Animal Attack

Id: 6_4ROpsT1Wc

Length: 41min 56sec (2516 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 09 2017