AI Summary
5 min readThe Lake Monster That Almost Ate Corinne
On a summer day in 1977, Sandra Mansi was vacationing on the shores of Lake Champlain with her fiancé and two kids. The water was calm, the sun was out, and her children were playing at the water's edge when something caught her eye about 150 feet offshore. A long, dark shape emerged from the water—a grayish neck, a rounded back, a serpent-like head that rose slowly and looked around. It stayed visible long enough for Mansi to walk back to her car, grab her Kodak Instamatic camera, and snap a single photograph before the creature sank back beneath the surface. She kept the photo in a drawer for three years before finally showing anyone. When scientists at the University of Arizona ran it through every digital enhancement tool available in 1980, they found no evidence of tampering. Whatever was in that photo was actually there.
That photograph became the most famous piece of evidence for Champ, the beloved lake monster of Lake Champlain. And as co-host Corinne explains on this episode of Two Girls One Ghost, Champ is not just a cryptid—it's practically a member of the Vermont community.
The Ancient Lake and Its Possible Inhabitants
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:00) **Episode Start & Banter** - Corinne and Sabrina open with birthday wishes, ads, and general banter about cards and the podcast schedule.
- 2 (05:19) **The 1977 Mansi Photograph** - Corinne introduces the episode's topic by describing the most famous piece of photographic evidence for Champ.
- 3 (08:50) **Champ vs. Nessie & Episode Roadmap** - Corinne compares the beloved, almost pet-like status of Champ to the more feared Loch Ness Monster and outlines the topics to be covered.
- 4 (11:17) **The Ancient Lake: Geography & Geology** - Corinne explains the unique and ancient geological history of Lake Champlain, setting the stage for a possible prehistoric creature.
- 5 (22:58) **The Champlain Sea Theory** - Corinne presents the leading theory for Champ's existence: a marine creature trapped from the Champlain Sea that evolved to survive in freshwater.
- 6 (24:36) **Early Sightings: Indigenous Legends & Captain Crumb** - Corinne moves from ancient history to the first documented sightings, beginning with Indigenous oral traditions and a dubious 1819 account.
- 7 (27:33) **The Summer of 1873: A Flurry of Activity** - Corinne covers a summer with multiple high-profile sightings, including one from a steamship that nearly capsized.
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Show Notes
It’s Corinne’s birthday, so we’re celebrating the only way that feels right, by diving into one of her favorite cryptids. Meet Champ, the legendary Lake Champlain monster. We dig into eyewitness accounts, famous photographs, underwater sounds, Indigenous legends, and the incredible geology that transformed Lake Champlain into the perfect hiding place for something ancient. Could Champ be an undiscovered species, a relic from the Jurassic period, or something stranger? Grab your binoculars and keep your hands out of the water.
Watch the video version here.
Have ghost stories of your own? E-mail them to us at [email protected]
New Episodes are released every Thursday and Sunday at 12am PST/3am EST (the witching hour, of course). Corinne and Sabrina hand select a couple of paranormal encounters from our inbox to read in each episode, from demons, to cryptids, to aliens, to creepy kids... the list goes on and on. If you have a story of your own that you'd like us to share on an upcoming episode, we invite you to email them to us!
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Edited and produced by Jaimi Ryan. Original music by Arms Akimbo!
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