18 Shark Against Man 



bom sharks can begin their Hves in relative tranquillity, one of many 

 such nurseries that have been found all over the world and that are used 

 by various species of sharks. 



No Brown shark has ever been convicted of attacking a bather. An 

 increase in the number of Brown sharks in New York waters would have 

 had no direct connection with the New Jersey attacks. The indication, 

 however, that more Brown sharks than usual were around in 1916 did 

 raise the question of whether a population explosion in indigenous sharks 

 somehow had brought about the appearance of a dangerous stranger, such 

 as a Great White shark. 



Besides the "shark year" theory, there was some speculation that 

 hunger had driven sharks closer to shore. Because of unexplained short- 

 ages of normal food at sea, the sharks were said to be prowling the coasts, 

 seeking new prey: and five times— or so the theory went— that had 

 been man. This theory, of course, did not square with the assumption 

 that a single shark had been responsible for all five attacks. But, even 

 though human remains had been found in the Great White shark caught 

 on July 14th, this was not irrefutable proof that the Great White had 

 been the only one of its kind— or the only large and potentially dangerous 

 shark— in New Jersey waters during that particular summer. 



On a hot August afternoon in 1960, 44 summers after the New Jersey 

 shark attacks of 1916, John Brodeur, a 24-year-old accountant, and Jean 

 Filoramo, his 22-year-old fiancee, walked hand in hand into the surf ofi^ 

 a beach at Sea Girt, New Jersey, barely 2 miles from Spring Lake, where 

 Charles Bruder had been killed by a shark so long before. 



In waist-deep water, John and Jean waited for a breaker that would 

 carry them to shore. A glistening, frothing breaker bore down on them. 

 Brodeur let it pass; he wanted a bigger one. As the breaker rolled past 

 him, he thought he saw something black within it. He wondered idly 

 for a moment what that something was. 



Then, something— ?^«? black soTnething— struck him from behind 

 and seized his right leg. Brodeur kicked his left leg at the thing that was 

 clamping an ever-tightening grip about his other leg. His left leg struck 

 something hard and coarse. He twisted about and hit a black body with 

 his left hand So rough was the surface of what he hit that it badly cut two 

 of his fingers. The sea around him was red and he saw, floating to the 

 surface, bits of red flesh torn from his leg. 



Submerged by the next breaker. Brodeur lost consciousness. Miss 

 Filoramo pulled him to the surface and screamed for help. Three men 

 dashed into the surf and helped her carry him to the beach. Norman 

 Porter, a former Marine major, ran to where Brodeur was being placed 

 on the beach, grabbed a leather belt from a lifeguard, and wrapped it 

 around Brodeur's thigh as a tourniquet. 



