SENECA LAKE BEAST CAUGHT AFTER 60 YEARS OF CHASE !

The giant "BOOT EATER" that haunted the shores of Seneca Lake in the 1940's and since thought to be extinct after its diet of Navy Boots was relocated from the Romulus and Geneva areas, resurfaced on January 1, 2002.  It was spotted offshore by a volunteer shore watcher, a Mister Sorely Misd.  Misd, who was born long after the monster was thought to have disappeared for good and all, heard a large splash and caught a quick glimpse of a dark blue form rising from the wind-swept waves of Seneca Lake.  He noted in his report book that the form seemed to have 3 stripes on what appeared to be a pullover shirt of some kind, almost like the Navy uniform shirts of olden days.  Misd reported his sighting to the park rangers and they cast out a homemade net buoyed up by emptied and corked rum bottles.  The monster actually swam up to the net and jumped in.  Although the monster was an easy catch, it had been underwater too long (that is the "ODTM" syndrome - or "One Dive Too Many") and, on reaching the dry land, the monster disintegrated into a pile of chipped gray paint.

This article was contributed by Gus Kilthau, a true friend of Sampson and a member of the Sampson Air Force.