Churubusco, IN
“What does it take to put a town on a map? Residents of Churubusco chorused the answer today: ‘The biggest durn turtle you’ve ever seen!’” - The Herald (Jasper, IN) March 18th, 1949
Picture this: Three men in a boat battle against a beast in the water. The monster is massive and has jaws that could crush bone. The captain of the ship is obsessed with catching the beast by any means necessary. Sounds like the plot of a Spielberg monster movie, right? Well, maybe not to that scale. These chompers were a fair bit smaller than those featured in Jaws. The monster: a giant snapping turtle named Oscar. The man: Gale Harris. The setting: a lake in the farmlands of Northeast Indiana.
In Churubusco, Indiana, also known as “Turtle Town, USA,” a large statue of a smiling turtle greets visitors as they enter the local Community Park (pictured below). On the sign outside the local government administration building, another smiling turtle; and all across the town are little turtle statues. Why is this small town in Northeast Indiana obsessed with turtles? And why do they host a week-long festival in June called, “Turtle Days?”
The answer to that began in March of 1949 on Fulk Lake, a seven-acre-wide and ninety-foot-deep body of water that sat on the farmlands owned by Gale Harris. While fishing for carp on the lake, two of Harris’ friends, Ora Blue and Charles Wilson, spotted a massive snapping turtle, which looked to be four to five hundred pounds, with a head the size of a watermelon and a body the size of a dining room table. They immediately notified Harris who then ran to his lake and saw with his own eyes a monster turtle breaking the surface. And the hunt was on!
In several statements with local papers, Harris referred to the beast as “Mr. Turtle” and “Mr. Big.” But once word spread of the monstrous resident and locals started spectating Harris’ efforts to catch it, the turtle was dubbed “Oscar” after Oscar Fulk, the original owner of the property, who also alleged seeing a large five-hundred-pound turtle in his lake fifty years prior.
Word of the “Beast of ‘Busco” spread like wildfire. Spectators and reporters from around the county, the state, and then the whole Midwest flocked to Churubusco for a chance to see Oscar, and Harris’ attempts to bring him to the surface. Thousands of people wanting to see the beast caused gridlocked traffic for miles around the town and the Harris Farm, enough that it became a safety hazard and police had to be called in from nearby Fort Wayne in order to control the crowds. The Harris Farm became a fairground for visitors, of whom Harris and his wife decided to take advantage, by charging a 25-cent entry fee and selling hot dogs and pop (soda if you’re not from the Midwest). Because of the volume of visitors, rumors also spread about the beast, including a rumor that Oscar was so large that he ate one of Harris’ cattle. Another that the Cincinnati Zoo was going to pay Harris eighteen hundred dollars for Oscar. Both of these rumors were unfounded.
Every week, newspapers reported Harris’ attempts to catch Oscar. For the first couple weeks, he used a 200-foot by 30-foot net, but the turtle kept escaping. After that, he created another contraption, combining chicken wire with his turtle fishing net. Once again, it didn’t work. After giving up on the net, he tried planting stakes at the bottom of the lake in order to create a sort of “turtle jail” that would trap the beast in one place. That plan failed, too. Succumbing to pressure from the reporters and crowds, Harris was so desperate that he even tried electrifying the lake water. Luckily, no one was injured in this crackpot strategy (although less is known about any unfortunate fish), but no turtles were found either.
In an effort to help find Oscar, The Chicago Tribune paid for Navy Surplus diving equipment, reminiscent of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, for a brave diver to use. The man selected for the job was Woodrow Rigsby, who previously worked with Harris and was a semi-experienced diver. Did they finally catch The Beast of ‘Busco? Nope. Was it an epic failure? You bet it was.
On the first dive attempt, the helmet leaked so Rigsby had to be brought up (pictured below). On the second dive attempt, the helmet leaked again. Third attempt, the suit leaked this time and had to be patched. Fourth attempt, another leak in the suit. And finally on his fifth attempt, our diver made it to the bottom of the pond without issue. Except the boots on the dive suit were so heavy that anytime Rigsby moved, he brought up silt from the bottom of the pond, making it so murky that it was impossible to see. And that was the end of that plan.
One of the more comedic methods of baiting Oscar, a female Sea Turtle — not a freshwater Snapping Turtle — was shipped in from a zoo to act as “Sex Bait.” The hunters thought surely a sea turtle will bring out the beast, but to no one’s surprise that method once again didn’t work.
Harris, adamant that Oscar was real and desperate to prove he wasn’t a liar, insisted on draining the pond into another reservoir that was blocked off by a dam, which Harris built himself. He even went so far as to get approval from the state of Indiana to do so. What could possibly go wrong with draining an entire lake in order to find a monster turtle? Everything.
Harris managed to successfully drain the pond down to twenty-five feet of water, completely changing the landscape. This resulted in the waterfront shifting and the surrounding land losing its structural integrity. People who were close to the drained lake ran the risk of falling and getting stuck in the muck. One instance of this occurred when a reporter from The Chicago Tribune fell into an exposed crevasse and had to be rescued. Even a pickup truck slid in and was lost to the muck. But in one stroke of luck, a large turtle was found! In the remnants of the lake, Harris caught a 65 pound Snapping Turtle — a large one for the region and a good find! (pictured above) But it wasn’t 500 pounds and the size of a dining room table. It was no Oscar. Also during this ordeal, Harris, ever the enterprising businessman, started selling peat moss from the bottom of the lake for three dollars a cubic yard.
But this joy was short lived, because eventually, the dam broke and all the water came flooding back in, causing Harris and the other hunters to lose multiple vehicles to the water, an image that brings to mind Pharoh’s chariots being inundated by the gelatinous Red Sea in The Ten Commandments.
After all that effort to drain the lake, Harris was still remarkably undeterred. On November 4th, 1949, he was reportedly cited for speeding on his way to get more pumping equipment in Chicago, and fined twelve dollars. Adding insult to injury, Rigsby, the diver who went into the lake to find Oscar, found his own monster turtle in nearby Blue Lake (pictured below).
Harris could hardly believe Rigsby’s luck and insisted he and the Blue Lake Turtle were phonies. Later, this turned out to be true, as Rigsby allegedly had a long-time grudge against Harris from a previous job. Since he couldn’t take the glory of finding Oscar in the Dive Suit, he wanted to make a fool of Harris by “finding” an Alligator Snapping Turtle in the neighboring lake. In actuality, Rigsby bought the turtle in Little Rock, Arkansas for fifty dollars, brought it back up to Churubusco, and pretended to find it. Oh, the lengths people will go to be petty.
By Winter of 1949, seven months after the first sighting of Oscar, the search had to be put on hold due to inclement weather and would start again next Spring. However, this didn’t stop Harris from trying at least once to saw a hole in the icy surface of the frozen lake.
By Summer of 1950, Harris finally decided to give up on the search for Oscar and he was forced to put his 120-acre land (lake included) up for auction. His land became unfarmable after the crowds of people and parked cars ruined his crops. Unfortunately, he couldn’t invest any money back into saving his farm because he exhausted all his financial resources in the quest to find Oscar. The farm was sold and The Harris Family left Churubusco to find better luck in Chicago, IL.
It’s unlikely that Oscar was a cryptid on the same scale as Bigfoot or The Loch Ness Monster. Animal experts believe that Oscar was likely an Alligator Snapping Turtle (pictured below) which had to be very old if it was the same one seen by Fulk in 1898, and likely a male based on the reported size. The species is known to inhabit rivers in the southern parts of Indiana and some say this one could’ve made its way North. However, full-grown male alligator snapping turtles are so heavy, they can’t carry their own weight outside of water. It should also be noted that the Alligator Snapper’s maximum weight is between 200-250 pounds, about half the size of Oscar’s reported weight.
If Harris and Oscar’s other witnesses were telling the truth, how could this massive turtle move its way North to an isolated pond? No one knows for sure, but in an interview with the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, Rusty Reed, an animal curator for Turtle Days, claimed:
“In the late 1800s and early 1900s, traveling salesmen from southern Indiana sometimes took young alligator snapping turtles with them when they went north. If the salesmen needed food, the turtles were a great, quick source of fresh meat. Sometimes, the salesmen would sell, give away or simply release the turtles. At some point, someone could have dropped a turtle off in Harris’ pond.”
To this day, the mystery of Oscar the Turtle remains unsolved, but the quest for the beast has gone down in Churubusco history as a legend and is not soon to be forgotten.
In this tale of Man vs. Nature, Nature was very much the winner, but so was the town! Every year since Harris tried to prove the existence of Oscar, Churubusco has hosted “Turtle Days,” a week-long Summer festival celebrating the history of the town and all things turtles, with all proceeds going to the community’s Parks Department. Events include a Miss Turtle Days Pageant and a Turtle Race where wild caught turtles are allowed to compete. However, in an effort to conserve and benefit local turtle populations, the festival website makes it clear that any vulnerable and endangered species are not permitted and should be left in their habitat. These species include Eastern Box turtles, Blanding’s turtles, and of course, Alligator Snapping turtles.
Despite the chaos of the search for Oscar, the town has proudly embraced its association with Gale Harris and Oscar, the current town mascot!
As for a more recent update, the property where Fulk Lake sits went up for sale in 2021. The buyer could very well be just as passionate as Harris in proving the existence of Oscar. They only need to shell out a hefty sum of one million dollars to purchase the famous property.
Even today, the quest to prove the existence of the Beast of ‘Busco isn’t for the faint-hearted.
Author’s Note:
Content Warning: Swearing
For my first article, I wanted to write about something close to home. As a Hoosier and a cryptid fan, I knew about Oscar the Turtle but I didn’t know the full story. While researching, I read many archived Midwestern newspaper clippings from the time period, and let me tell you, I laughed my ass off. I read through the clippings in chronological order and the story kept getting stupider and stupider. It may be the most well-documented and dumbest animal hunt in human history. Every single failure on Harris’ part reminded me of The Simpsons episode, “Cape Feare” when Sideshow Bob keeps stepping on the leaf rakes and hitting himself in the face. Harris’ quest could’ve also been the plot of an episode of Parks and Recreation. Sometimes truth really is funnier than fiction. You really can’t make this shit up.
Thank you for reading! Stay Curious!
Sources:
https://www.21alivenews.com/2021/05/25/21country-fulk-lake-home-beast-busco-up-sale/
https://www.wane.com/news/churubusco-lake-home-to-the-legendary-beast-of-busco-is-on-the-market/
https://afobackstory.wordpress.com/category/2015-2016-season/turtle-soup/
https://townofchurubusco.com
https://indianapublicmedia.org/momentofindianahistory/churubusco-turtle-days/
https://www.in.gov/dnr/fish-and-wildlife/nongame-and-endangered-wildlife/turtles-as-pets/
https://turtledaysdotcom.wordpress.com/
Archives Accessed through Newspapers.com by Ancestry:
Chicago Tribune
Southtown Star (Tinley Park, IL)
The Herald (Jasper, IN)
Franklin Evening Star
Decatur Herald and Review
Marion Leader Tribune
Alexandria Times Tribune
Muncie Evening Press
Muncie Star Press
Indianapolis News
Anderson Herald
Martinsville Daily Reporter
Man, i love all the research you did for this. All the images are greatly appreciated.