Classic Crypto Evidence: The Surgeon's Photo

reply to post by RoboKy

I'm astounded that anyone would want to go over old ground but okay.

For years skeptics were sure that the photo was somehow a hoax. But no rigorous studies of the image were conducted until 1984 when Stewart Campbell analyzed the photo in a 1984 article in the British Journal of Photography. Campbell concluded that the object in the water could only have been two or three feet long, at most, and that it probably was an otter or a marine bird. He suggested it was likely that Wilson knew this to be the case.
But as it turned out, Campbell was wrong. The object in the water was not a form of marine life. It was a toy submarine outfitted with a sea-serpent head. This was revealed in 1994 when Christian Spurling, before his death at the age of 90, confessed to his involvement in a plot to create the famous Surgeon's Photo, a plot that involved both Marmaduke Wetherell and Colonel Wilson.
According to Spurling, he had been approached by Wetherell (his stepfather) who wanted him to make a convincing serpent model. Spurling did this, and this model was then photographed in Loch Ness. The picture was then given to Wilson, whose job it was to serve as a credible front-man for the hoax.
Apparently Wetherell's motive was revenge, since he was still smarting from his humiliation over the hippo-foot tracks. "We'll give them their monster," his son later remembered him saying.
In the original version of the image (bottom) the diminutive size of the Nessie model in relationship to the Loch can be seen. (The dark band along the top of the picture is the opposite side of the Loch.) The image given to the media was cropped to hide this perspective, making the "monster" appear larger than it actually was.
Martin, D. & Boyd, A. (1999). Nessie: The Surgeon's Photograph Exposed. Thorne Printing.

SOURCE

As far as I'm aware this is the accepted story behind the picture. I've never heard anyone try to dispute it, especially after investiagtors made their own Nessie model and came up with virtually the same picture.

I'm not out to knock you I just can't understand why you want to go over this again. However, if I did offend you please accept my apologise.

Mod Edit: Added External source tags.

[edit on 20-8-2009 by Gemwolf]

reply to post by Mintwithahole.


Thank you very much for the apology and I thank you even more for presenting your evidence. This is the sole purpose of this thread. I wanted an intellectual debate about the photos, and you have provided.

Now for my retort.

Spurling's story has many problems with it, some examples of which I listed in my third post(feel free to read them over, I'm lazy and dont feel like reposting them ). Do these conclusively prove that the photos show an unknown animal? No, but they do point to the dubiousness of Spurling's "deathbed confession". Also, why would no one else come forward and admit to the Hoax before their deaths, especially Wetherell himself? Wouldnt taking the secret to his grave render the whole endeavor pointless? I find it hard to believe that he would depend on another co-conspirator to reveal the secret long after his death.

I will not debate the fact that the uncropped photo does point to a desire to hide the apparent size of the photo's subject. As I said in my final comments, there are defiantly issues that still remain with the photos. Is a hoax/misidentification out of the question? Absolutely not, but I feel very strongly that Spurling's account is itself a hoax and since the mainstream hoax view depends heavily on his account, it destroys a lot of the hoax theory's credibility.

reply to post by RoboKy


I've been to Loch Ness five times, once I was there for nearly six weeks back in 1994. There's no doubting there's something large swimming around in the depths but I think the long necked description of the beast is an error brought on by the early sightings and folklore. When I was there, I always camped just south of Drumnadrochit, I used to sit on a stone wall, binoculars in hand-video on a tripod next to me, watching the water for over ten hours a day. Yes, I was obsessed with it after reading Tim Dinsdales account of his sighting. One of the locals said I was looking in the wrong place and should concentrate my search down at Fort Augustus. This seemed strange as this is where all the holiday boats are moared. He said the creature was attracted to the boats! Needless to say I saw nothing but then a year or so ago I found this vid on youtube.

www.youtube.com...

Incidentally, I've had two sightings- a single hump just off sure just south of Drumnadrochit at 6.30am in the morning back in 1994, and a huge disturbance with something black in it's centre in mid water near Foyers which had hundreds of witnesses but as far as I'm aware has never been reported by anyone. Makes me wonder if the evidence for the creature might not be far greater than what is accepted because most of the sightings never get reported!

reply to post by RoboKy

I went back to your third post and read the five points you raised. None of them really disprove the hoax theory which is now widely accepted, and is even mentioned by The Loch Ness Monster museum at Drumnadrochit. The one issue that is worth mentioning is the toy submarine you mentioned. You say that no toy antique magazines feature such a submarine! However, when I watched a documentary on the Loch Ness monster I seem to remember that those who re-enacted the making of the model had an original model toy submarine which they showed on camera. It might not appear in any antique magazine or book but then again something which by it's very design is going to spend most of its time in water Isn't going to survive very long. A quick search on google found ones going back to the 1950s.
www.gasolinealleyantiques.com...

www.buzzboats.com...

Could I ask you what you think about the sightings of the monster on land? Instances like the Spicers famous sighting. . .

There is a story in today's english sun newspaper about Nessie appearing in Google Earth.

Not the most top notch of papers I know, but here is the story.

www.thesun.co.uk...

And here are the co-ordinates:

Latitude 57°12'52.13"N, Longitude 4°34'14.16"W.
A hoax - you decide!

What has always bothered me about this Nessie photo is the size of the water swells compared to the size of the creature. The water swells look much too big for the creature to be anything but toy sized. At least that is how I am seeing it.