Bring On Cleveland’s Bessies?
Posted by: Loren Coleman on January 27th, 2007
There are lots of teams with cryptid names, and they are being joined by a new one: The Lake Erie Monsters, a minor league hockey team. Here’s the straight media spin on the new hockey team’s name:
Gilbert Unafraid of Monsters, Region’s Latest Hockey Team: Cavs Owner Confident of Minor-League Success
By George M. Thomas, The Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio
Jan. 26–CLEVELAND — Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert will turn a Northeast Ohio myth into reality when the Lake Erie Monsters, the area’s new American Hockey League franchise, debuts at Quicken Loans Arena in October.
Flanked by officials from the AHL and the Colorado Avalanche — the National Hockey League team that will feed the team players — and complete with a man-made chill and mist, Gilbert revealed the team’s logo and colors Thursday.
The logo features a monster’s head with menacing eyes skimming just above the water’s surface. People have reported seeing such a Loch Ness-type creature in the lake’s waters over the years. It’s the type of symbol perfect for selling jerseys, T-shirts and replica pucks.George M. Thomas
Humm, cough, cough, hey, owner Dan Gilbert and investigative reporter George Thomas, you overlooked a small but significant detail: the name of the local lake monster is “Bessie.” I guess the person who picked out that “Lake Erie Monsters” moniker didn’t realize that the real local name for the lake cryptids of Lake Erie is Bessie. Can you imagine how this team’s new rivals are going to react when they find this out? Will catcalls and handheld signs of “Hey, it’s the Bessies” be heard and seen soon on the Quicken Loans Arena ice rink, as well as on the new team’s road trips?
But then Cleveland won’t be the first location that has fiddled around, fiddled around, fiddled around with names of cryptids. Minor league hockey also has it’s Lowell Lock Monsters in Massachusetts. I’ve always wondered about the wisdom in teaching kids that Louie the Mascot (an obvious bipedal Lake Monster) is a “Lock” Monster, versus the correct spelling, “Loch Monster.” I guess someone along the way thought it was cute to have a play on words with the old history of “locks” in Lowell. Today, Lowell, sadly is a ghost of its former self, as it was once a giant mill town. In the 1850s, Lowell was the second largest city in New England, with nearly six miles of canals - the largest power canal system in the world - running her factories. The memory of the locks there, I guess, live on in the name, Lowell Lock Monsters.
Of course, the NHL’s New Jersey Devils team makes good use of their mascot, the “NJ Devil.” Ooops, the local cryptid is called the “Jersey Devil.”
Meanwhile, out West, you have the British Columbian “Duffers League” in hockey that has a championship team called the Sasquatch, who have jerseys with a Sasquatch footprint across the front. Middle-aged guys playing like Bigfoot in hockey outfits. Okay, that sounds like fun.
Minor league baseball use to have the Champs, but they recently changed their name to the Vermont Lake Monsters. They did keep Champ, nevertheless, as their mascot.
The NHL’s Colorado team (that happen to be the parent team of the “Bessies,” oops, I mean “Lake Erie Monsters”) formerly had as their mascot “Howler.” It’s a sad story of cryptid misbehavior. “Howler the Yeti” was the mascot of the Colorado Avalanche hockey team, but he was fired by the team after he assaulted a fan. They still retain (what they call) a “Yeti footprint” on their sleeves and on their Zephyr Colorado Avalanche Shootout Fitted Hats. Unfortunately, this alternate logo for the team shows a four-toed, not a five-toed, track. Still, it, no doubt, results in a lot of sales to cryptozoology fans. (Yes, I have one of their caps.)
Thank goodness, let’s hope we will never find a team named the Ozark Howlers. After all, the Howler of the Ozarks is a hoax.
Meanwhile, the former home of the Cleveland Browns can now proclaim pride in their own hometown “Bessies.”
- Similar Phenomena:
OK, but would you want to be a macho hocky player on a team called the “Bessies”?
Of course it could make your guys tougher - sort of like a “Boy Named Sue” as sung by Johnny Cash. At least they aren’t called the Grays.
They should start a team in Mongolia just so they can name it “The Mongolian Death Worms”. THAT would be a cool team name.
Even though they don’t play like they’re around, the Cleveland Browns are still a team in the N.F.L. The first time I heard the name Bessie, was in Cryptozoology A-Z. A teenager from Cleveland in the 1980’s, we referred to L.E.M. or the Lake Erie Monster.
Mongolian Death Worms would be a cool name for a team.
Well whatever is seen in the great lakes has allegedly been reported to tear deer and mules apart, so I’d give them the benefit of the doubt.
The logos are really cool for most of the cryptid teams. I like Colorado’s footprint, but being a Wings fan, I can’t really own any merchandise from “that” team. Cool logo though!
I always thought the Philadelphia Philies baseball team sounded like a bunch of female horses. Shouldn’t they be called the Stallions?
Cool, always wanted a jersey from the Lowell Lock Monsters, but never got one. I like the Lake Erie Monsters better!
Of course, if you want to be pedantic you could argue that the true full name is “South Bay Bessie”. It came from a name the monster contest in the 80s to promote tourism.
I think it was just the Lake Erie Monster for quite a long time before that.
Chris
Can the Chickasaw Chupacabras (Or some such alliteration) be far off?
Where can I purchase some lake monster paraphernalia?
As much as I hate to admit it Loren, we are currently the home of the Browns, as the team came back in 1999 and their god-ugly stadium has been an eye-sore on our lake front ever since.