The American Museum Journal 



Volume XVI OCTOBER, 1916 Number 6 



Sharks — Man-eaters and Others 



WITH SUGGESTIONS THAT AMERICANS TURN TO ECONOMIC ACCOUNT 

 SOME OF THE SMALLER SPECIES OF THE ATLANTIC COAST 



By HUGH M. SMITH 



Unite:! Stales Commissioner of Fisheries 



The unprecedented attacks by sharks on human beings along the middle Atlantic coast 

 of the United States in the summer of 1916, resulting in the death of four bathers, produced 

 a profound sensation and materially interfered with the attendance at seaside resorts, while 

 leading to an astonishing amount of newspaper discussion in the course of which the public 

 was regaled with more fiction and also more facts about sharks in general than ever before in 

 our history. Several departments of the federal government became involved in the matter, 

 various individuals and committees offered rewards for the capture of "man-eating" sharks, 

 and a bill was introduced in Congress appropriating money for the purpose of enabling the 

 Department of Commerce to cooperate in the extermination of man-eating sharks on the New 

 Jersey coast. 



The Bureau of Fisheries was incessantly importuned to explain why sharks were behaving 

 as they were, and to take action that would prevent further attacks. There was some criti- 

 cism of our inability to cope with the situation, although obviously there was little that 

 could be done. The culprits were never identified. It was not known whether one individual 

 shark of a species common to the region was running amuck ; whether representatives of several 

 local species had been forced to attack human beings because of certain undetermined bio- 

 logical or physical conditions; or whether there was an advent of a shark or sharks from distant 

 waters with feeding habits different from those of the domestic species, which in no former 

 years had exhibited any man-eating tendency and were dangerous only when they themselves 

 were attacked. 



There were no attacks reported after the middle of July and the scare subsided ; but out 

 of all the excitement and discussion there has arisen a keen lay interest in sharks — their kinds, 

 habits, size, distribution, and economic value; and in answer to that interest there have been 

 special di.splays in museums and publication of much authentic matter in the secular and 

 scientific press. — Hugh M. Smith. 



THE term "man-eater" is applied the name "man-eater" is restricted to 



by the pubhc to almost any the white shark [Carchawdon carcharias 



shark of medium or large size, (Linnaeus)], known also as the great 



and during the recent scare any shark blue shark. The name man-eater is 



over five feet long was likely to be called justified, however, only by the large size, 



a "man-eater" and recorded as such in formidable teeth, voracity, and obvious 



the daily press. The writer saw a ability of the fish to kill and eat human 



published photograph of a "man-eater" beings; it is certainly not warranted 



shark and its proud captor; assuming by a confirmed man-eating habit. ^ While 



the height of the man to have been six _ __^_ 



feet, the shark could not have exceeded ' I" t**'^ connection it is interesting to quote the 



, . .. . T n T ^• opinion of Mr. J. T. Nichols of the American Museum 



three leet m length. In hsh literature and Mr. Robert C. Murphy of the Brooklyn Museum, 



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