On this day in 1933, the mysterious Loch Ness Monster was sighted. The sighting may have been false or it may have not…

The legend of Loch Ness bloomed when a sighting made it into the local Scotland newspaper, the Inverness Courier. The couple who spotted the monster claimed they saw,

“an enormous animal rolling and plunging on the surface.”

The story of “Nessie” became a media phenomenon, with London newspapers sending correspondents to Scotland and a circus offering a 20,000 pound sterling reward for the capture of the mysterious monster.

A month after the sighting, interest steadily grew, especially when there was another sighting of the monster on land. In 1960, a handful of British colleges sent sonars into the lakes where sightings where reported. Each time, the sonar operators detected some type of large, moving underwater objects. In 1975, another expedition put together sonar and underwater photography in the lake Loch Ness. After brightening it up, a photo appeared to show what vaguely resembled the giant flipper of an aquatic animal.

More sonar expeditions between the 1980s and 1990s resulted in more inconclusive readings. Revelations in 1994 that announced the famous 1934 photo was a complete hoax only slightly decreased the enthusiasm of tourists and investigators for the mysterious and elusive Loch Ness monster.