Want to create an interactive transcript for this episode?
Podcast: Your History Your Story
Episode: S6 Ep01 July 1916: A Creek, A Shark and A Hero
Description: It was a hot July day in 1916 and eleven year old Lester Stillwell, along with a group of other boys, decided to go down to the Matawan Creek to swim, splash around and cool off.Â
Some people in the small NJ shore town of Matawan had already heard of two recent fatal shark attacks on ocean bathers in Beach Haven & Spring Lake, but no one worried about a shark in the Matawan Creek, as it was one and a half miles inland from the Raritan Bay and the Atlantic Ocean.Â
However, much to the horror of his friends, young Lester wa...