The 24th of July issue of The Tribune featured a front page story "Myths of the Pioneers" that debunked a half dozen or so of the Beehive State's favorite faith-promoting rumors. Among those cherished notions torpedoed by The Tribune was the existence of the Bear Lake Monster.

In 1863 Joseph Rich of Bear Valley was the first to claim sighting the beast. The Tribune stated that Rich later boasted of foisting "a first class lie." Monday's article conclusively declared that there is "probably" nothing to the stories.

Will Bagley, my brother, would disagree. There are lots to the stories. Following his stint as a history columnist for this paper, where, no matter how an article began it always somehow found a way to include something about The Bear Lake Monster, Will went on to become a "monsterologist."

Relying on the historical record, Will is absolutely certain that the creature reportedly seen by dozens in Bear Lake is, "between 6 and 90 feet long, has a head resembling a horse or a snake, is either green or brown or shiny, and it is definitely either scaly or hairy." Many of these eyewitnesses were men and women of standing in the community and Will admits to having no reason to doubt their descriptions.

Will regularly gives lectures on the history and evidence regarding the existence of the monster. An article he wrote on the subject was even recently translated into Portuguese. His audiences are appreciative and interested. Following the presentation, thoughtful debates often break out. Is the Bear Lake Monster really a surviving ice age Pleistocene giant beaver? Or is it a stranded plesiosaur from the Jurassic? (The once popular theory that an underground tunnel connects Bear Lake to Loch Ness has fallen into disrepute and is no longer given serious consideration.)

My favorite theory about how the monster got to be where it is occurred to me while pulling crawdads out of East Canyon Reservoir with my boys. The folks at Wildlife Resources are emphatic that the crustaceans be killed before one leaves the lake where they are caught. Why? They don't want crawdads introduced into lakes where they're not. My boys were willing to risk my getting a $1,000 fine so that they could have a new pet at home, even if I wasn't.

So someone brought a fingerling monster to Bear Lake and slipped it in when no one was looking.

Here's the clincher. A recent story on the BBC reported dozens of people in Sweden saw a lake creature that had a long body like a serpent and a head like a horse.

A number of the pioneers who settled Bear Lake were Swedes.

You put two and two together.

Pat Bagley is The Tribune's editorial cartoonist.