Stories To Keep Children Safe
Here’s a point that many people aren’t aware of outside of cryptozoology: many legends were shared and told to children and young adults to actually keep them safe from harm, which would have been of particular importance back in olden times when death from nearly anything was rampant and a serious concern.
There are lake monster stories told to keep children safe from swimming out too far in lakes or even going near bodies of water in the first place, or even forest monster stories to keep them from going out too far and getting lost. There’s even the old legend of the Lambton Worm in England, where I’m pretty sure it was told to children to keep them safe and cautious when being near or dealing with water wells. Those were deadly times back then, and folklore actually saved lives for sure. The problem was that the children would actually tend to keep believing these stories even into adulthood, so I’m sure that many legends, in fact, became ‘real accounts’ in that way.