And it can be very difficult to prove that something did NOT happen.

The problem is, there’s very little evidence either way. We’d love to help Hillary, Adam, and the unsatisfied masses. Winarz’s wording summons the frustration of many Chicagoans about the ongoing lack of a satisfying answer.Ĭan we please get a final ruling on whether or not one young George Lawson was actually attacked by a shark, in Lake Michigan in 1955? Curious City got two very similar questions, one from Adam Kovac of Chicago, and another from Hilary Winiarz of Hawthorn Woods.

The story persists in various mythbusting columns, and while most experts think the story is probably an urban legend, Chicagoans keep bringing it up. It sounds impossible, right? Sharks live in the oceans, and while you sometimes hear of them in brackish rivers, Lake Michigan is nearly 2,000 navigational miles from the nearest ocean. The Global Shark Attack File, a listing of every documented shark attack in recent history, compiled by the non-profit Shark Research Institute, lists a shark attack in Lake Michigan in 1955. It’s the kind of “fact” that makes you blink and wonder if you read it correctly.

Great white shark lake michigan