![]() When Americans embraced it, they took their first step into the world of sharks. ![]() Ocean swimming was a relatively new form of entertainment in 1916. The New Jersey shark attacks sent a message to people in the United States. (Watch: " Attack of the Mystery Shar k: Is a Bull or Great White Shark the Culprit?") There’s some debate if a bull shark was responsible for the deaths in Matawan Creek because they are known to inhabit fresh and brackish waters however, Burgess says the evidence points to the young great white. The ocean is still wildĪttacks attributed to a single shark are extremely uncommon.īurgess says he knows of only a handful of other examples, such as a series of attacks off the Red Sea resort Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt in 2010, when one tourist was killed and three gravely injured by an oceanic whitetip. In an AugNew York Times editorial, “Let Us Do Justice to the Sharks,” included in Close to Shore, the editors wrote, “To this day, there is nothing that will so quickly set a crowd of swimmers scurrying for our beaches as the sight of a shark’s fin in the offing … that sharks can properly be called dangerous, in this part of the world, is apparently untrue.”īurgess says as the bites continued, it eventually became obvious that sharks were attacking. “At least one school of thought at the time was this was all stuff of rumors and fabrications.” “There were all kinds of misconceptions,” Burgess says. Scientists had a loose grasp on shark behavior. Some suggested it was a massive sea turtle, or a school of sea turtles that snapped at Bruder and Vansant, says George Burgess, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research and curator for the International Shark Attack File. Photograph by David Doubilet, Nat Geo Image Collection The toothy maw of a great white shark has populated the nightmares of many a beachgoer. Reports of American shark attacks were often dismissed as fisherman’s tales. Many-though not all-scientists of the day believed sharks were harmless. Oelrichs later repeated this stunt on his yacht. But the fish swam away, possibly frightened by the splash. Some partygoers screamed and covered their eyes. He was so sure that once, when he hosted a party at his seaside home, he jumped in the water with a shark to settle a $250 bet with his guests, according to an 1891 Pittsburg Dispatch article. He was so sure that in 1891, Oelrichs offered $500 ($12,000 in today’s dollars) to anyone who could prove him wrong. Millionaire and athlete Hermann Oelrichs was sure that no shark had ever bitten a human. ![]() The White House agreed to give federal aid to “drive away all the ferocious man-eating sharks which have been making prey of bathers,” according to a Jarticle in the Philadelphia Inquirer.Įventually, an eight-foot juvenile great white shark was pulled from the New Jersey waters. On the day Stilwell’s body was found, President Woodrow Wilson called a Cabinet meeting. They tossed sticks of dynamite into the creek. That night, some of the local men fought back. Dunn’s brother and a local sea captain pulled him to safety. Thirty minutes later, a shark bit 14-year-old Joseph Dunn’s leg. When Watson Fisher, a tailor, went into the creek to look for Stilwell, he was attacked as well. But it took the New Jersey attacks more than a century ago to remind humans just where they are on the food chain. This new attitude brought us Jaws and Sharknado, and it’s seen in the response to real-life shark attacks. But after the attacks in New Jersey in 1916, what were once thought to be frightening-looking yet essentially benign animals became man-eating predators. People knew sharks ate the flesh of other ocean creatures, but there was dispute over whether they would-or could-bring down a human. Some had been dismissive of the newspaper reports that said sharks had killed swimmers on the coast, because Americans at this time were fairly certain … sharks didn't bite people. They thought Stilwell, who was epileptic, had drowned. Naked and covered in mud, the terrified boys ran down Main Street screaming that there was a shark in the water.īut people were skeptical. The following week, 10-year-old Lester Stilwell was swimming in Matawan Creek (also in New Jersey) with his friends when he was eaten alive. Beachgoers gathered around his legless remains. Several men had pulled his maimed body from the water.įive days later, bellhop Charles Bruder, 27, was killed during an afternoon swim along the Jersey Shore. In the twilight of July 1, 1916, 25-year-old Charles Vansant bled to death in a beachfront hotel in New Jersey.
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