Meanwhile, $50,000 For Pepie
Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 4th, 2008
Bushnell may be putting out there a million dollars for a Bigfoot trail camera photograph, but there are lesser goals available.
In Minnesota, the Lake City Tourism Bureau has offered a $50,000 reward for hooking, netting or capturing on a camera a large, serpentlike creature living in the Mississippi River’s Lake Pepin below Maiden Rock.
Lake Pepin is a naturally occurring lake, and the widest naturally occurring part of the Mississippi River. It is a widening of the river on the border between Minnesota and Wisconsin. It is 21 miles long, with a surface area of about 40 square miles (100 km²) and an average depth of 18 feet (5.5 m).
Larry Nielson claims to have seen the creature, which the locals have named “Pepie.” Nielson, 52, of rural Lake City, owns the 125-passenger paddle wheeler Pearl of the Lake. He said he has seen Pepie and believes the creature deserves respect and recognition. That’s why he has taken the lead in attempting to prove Pepie lives.
Collecting the reward requires only a good photograph or a bit of fin or skin. If the photo is determined to be authentic, or if a University of Minnesota biologist can confirm the DNA came from a monster, fame and fortune will follow.
Pepie has been reported since at least 1871. “A lake monster was seen swimming on Lake Pepin” on April 28, 1871, according to the Minnesota Historical Society’s Book of Days Almanac.
Boosters say the legend of Pepie comes in part from the native Dakota people that lived in the area. They refused to travel on Lake Pepin in bark canoes because of large creatures that would come to the surface and damage their boats, according to the St. Paul Pioneer Press.
Four years ago, on a late August morning, Steve Raymond, 57, and his fishing buddy were cutting northeast across the lake to do some pan fishing near Stockholm, Wisconsin.
“Up ahead, I thought I saw a tree, but it wasn’t a tree. It was undulating. We got closer, maybe 50 to 75 yards from it, and I saw at least 20 feet of it out of the water,” Raymond recalled. “It was greenish, with a cast of yellow.”
Raymond grabbed a camera and took a snapshot, which he has since misplaced.
The lake is the birthplace of water skiing. The American Water Ski Association states that water skiing began in 1922 when Ralph Samuelson used two boards as skis and a clothesline as a tow rope on Lake Pepin in Lake City, Minnesota.
Thanks to Cryptomundian Mary McConnell for passing along word of this new reward.
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has anyone taken any serious sonar readings? I’m talking about the bottom of that lake. The Mississippi is famous for having caves all along the bottom. The last one I heard opened up in the late 19th century–maybe early 20th–near Cairo, Mississippi. It caused one of the largest earthquakes in that region, and the cave was large enough that the Mississippi river was running backwards for most of a day (filling the cave). I’m just thinking any such openings could allow the creature to hide. Except for the undulating and head/neck rising out of the water, that area is famous for the pike–which when first caught on your fishing lure seems like a log, until you almost can reach it. Then it fights. There are more fish out there than just the sturgeon. It would just be interesting to see how a creature of the size(s) described can live in such shallow waters.
I might have go down there and see if I can see something (and bring a camera of course). I personally think that this is most likely a large sturgeon. They can get very large here (I was surprised that MonsterQuest didn’t talk about them while while they were in MN and WI looking for giant freshwater fish).
In fact while divers were working on the Hudson bridge that crosses the St. Croix River ( a tributary of Mississippi ) they thought that they were swimming above some sunken logs, but then they started moving. It turns out that they were actually very large sturgeon.
So that is what I would guess people are seeing, especially since sturgeon can live for a very long time, it’s possible they are seeing the same large one and they do come to the surface and jump out of the water and even smaller ones can create very large splashes (I’ve seen them do this on fishing trips).
Still it’s an interesting contest and could be fun