The Mugwump (also: Old Tessie and Monster of Lake Temiscamingue) is a lake monster which has been alleged to live in Lake Timiskaming, on the border of the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec.
Terminology The name "mugwump" comes from an Algonquin word, the exact meaning of which is unclear. In a 1979 communication on the creature, New Liskeard mayor Jack Dent reported that the name translated to "fearless sturgeon" in English. The word had already been used many years prior, when Puritan missionary John Eliot took it to mean "duke" or "centurion" in translating the Bible into Anishinàbemiwin in 1661. The Vermont American, a newspaper published in Middlebury, Vermont, indicated it meant "leader" in 1828. In the 1880s the term became a political label for the "Mugwumps", Republican Party politicians in the United States who switched parties during the 1884 presidential election to support Grover Cleveland. Charles Anderson Dana, editor of the New York Sun newspaper, popularised the term in this context, deriving it from the Algonquin word mugumquomp or mugquomp, meaning "important person" or "war leader". Though Dana meant to make a sarcastic jab at the former Republicans who did not support their own candidate, the term was appropriated by the men it had originally been used to mock and became both popular and widespread, to the point that it is still used from time to time in the 21st century. The term also occurs in the 1959 William S. Burroughs novel Naked Lunch and in the 1962 Roald Dahl children's book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, both times to describe fantastical creatures. It remains unknown which elements of political and cultural history, if any, influenced the naming of the creature which Dent documented, referencing "a very old Indian legend", in 1979. Another cryptid dubbed "Mugwump" allegedly resides in a marsh in Ventura, Iowa.
Description
Anatomy When interviewed in 1995, a witness recalled the Mugwump as having a round head and nose like an animal. Two ice fishers alleged to have seen a black, glistening head through their fishing hole in 1982; they noted that it had protruding eyes, one of which was trained on them and gave the impression it was sizing the men up. Another ice fisherman reported that he'd seen the creature completely out of the water one winter night, that it had a head similar to that of a dinosaur, and that it was long enough to curl around a number of fishing huts at once. A married couple which claimed to have witnessed the Mugwump swimming in 1978 reported that it had a humped back and no fins. Chuck Coull, the first human to have his encounter with the Mugwump documented and published, claimed the animal looked like a human-sized sturgeon. The creature is popularly depicted as having the body of a serpent and the head of a horse. Jack Dent claimed in 1979 that a descendant of Chief Wabi (aka "Big Wabi") had informed him of the creature which lived in the lake. According to Dent's source:
... the mugwump was reputed to be the length of four Indian braves. Putting the average height of a brave at about five feet ... the mugwump was probably over 20 feet long. Others have reported on the creature's size differently, with more conservative estimates putting it at the size of a human and a 1978 account putting it at a minimum length of 15 feet (4.6 m), and other stories suggesting its scales alone were the size of a saucer. Lake Timiskaming, which is a widening of the Ottawa River with an average depth of 36 metres (118 ft) and maximum depth of 220 metres (720 ft), has been described as a natural habitat for a creature of such a size by enthusiasts. Other lake monsters in the region have been described as being similar to whales and large eels, often with a horse- or dog-like head and measuring between 15 metres (49 ft) and 30 metres (98 ft) long.
Behaviour
On one occasion when the animal was spotted outside of water, a snake-like trail was allegedly found in the snow nearby. No other lake monsters in Ontario have been reported to move about on dry land, leading to conjecture that the animal sighted crawling on the land might represent a different animal than the Mugwump. The exact population of the Mugwump is also disputed. Although often referred to as a singular creature, it was suggested in a 1982 interview with Kate Ardtree that there were multiple Mugwumps living in Lake Timiskaming. Regular sightings of the Mugwump in summer months gave rise to the idea that the creature spawns in July and August.
Explanations The most common explanation for the Mugwump is that it is a large sturgeon. While sturgeon are already large fish, the refraction of light through still or calm water can cause the size of objects to appear distorted, giving them the appearance of being much larger than in reality. As the creature is most often sighted during calm conditions and almost never seen outside of the water, it is possible that many Mugwump sightings are actually misidentifications of large fish. Other suggestions have included descendants of prehistoric animals such as the nautiloid Orthoceras, the plesiosaur Elasmosaurus, the whale Basilosaurus, and the early amphibian Ichthyostega; groups of otters swimming in single-file lines; logs floating just below the surface of the water, also known as "dead heads"; and waves created in the wakes of motorboats or during small earthquakes.
History The earliest reports of the creature for which there is documented evidence came in the 1970s, but reports of the Mugwump are said to go back much further. Chief Wabi, aka "Big Wabi", was a resident of Murray City (present-day Notre-Dame-du-Nord) on the Quebec side of Lake Timiskaming in the late-19th century and early-20th century. According to former Mayor of New Liskeard Jack Dent, a descendant of Chief Wabi recounted his nation's encounters with the Mugwump going back generations. In an 1879 canoe voyage along the Ottawa River and across Lake Timiskaming, the voyageur Sha-Ka-Nash described how his Anishinaabe guides made offerings of tobacco at sites like Devil's Rock to an otherworldy creature living in the lake:
… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.
