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The famous “Surgeon’s photo” of the Loch Ness monster, purportedly taken by Robert Kenneth Wilson in 1934 during a fishing trip north with his friend, Maurice Chambers. It is by far the most famous photo of Nessie, and helped to skyrocket the cryptid’s popularity after being sold to the Daily Mail in 1934 after popular sightings of Nessie in 1933. After Chambers passed away in 1994, personal papers revealed that the photograph was a hoax, having been taken by hunter and filmmaker Marmaduke Arundel Wetherell, having been a sculpture of wood and plastic made by sculptor Christian Spurling that was attached to a toy submarine. Spurling corroborated the story at the age of 90 in 1993, with the group deciding to have Wilson be the one to put the photo forth to lend credibility to the story as he was a physician. In spite of its proven falsehood, the Surgeon’s photo is still what many first think of when they hear of the Loch Ness monster -- and could you blame them? The hoax went on for over 60 years, only definitively ruled out because of testimony by its producers. The lighting allows the centered figure to remain obscure, yet establishes an iconic silhouette that many recognize. There is no scale to be given by anything surrounding the subject, so we cannot gauge size, creating more ambiguity. While color photography did exist in the form of Autochrome, it was rare, and thus understandable that Wilson, just going on a fishing trip, would not have it on his person, with the black and white coloring further obscuring detail and amassing any seams on the sculpture into a single silhouette.

A Dive Into Famous Folklore Monsters, or Cryptids, Their Origins, And If They Really Exist or Not

Scott Ernsberger, Staff Reporter
June 22, 2021
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