A folklorist and folklore historian, Dr Simon Young turns up where old fairy and sea-creature stories need a second look. For the Wollaton Park gnomes of 1979, he found the tape transcript and published it. In 2017 he appealed through the Nottingham Post for the witnesses, by then in their forties, offering absolute anonymity. No one came forward. In 2022 he edited The Wollaton Gnomes: A Nottingham Fairy Mystery, which gives no single verdict. Writing in the journal Shima in 2025, he judged the Deerness Mermaid of 1887 likely an unusual seal, while admitting no known seal fits.
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Pro earlyFolklorist who researched the case for the journal Shima and a 2025 book
Pro earlyFolklore historian who published the tape transcript and edited the 2022 book
Pro earlyfolklore researcher, editor of The Wollaton Gnomes: A Nottingham Fairy Mystery