The whole thing had been an elaborate publicity stunt by the puppeteer Tony Sarg (pictured in the centre of the last picture below), hoping to get Nantucket in the news and no doubt drum up a bit of business for the shop he had in town, Tony Sarg’s Curiosity Shop. The installation was a great success and stayed for several weeks on the beach before it made its way down to New York City to star in Macy's famous Thanksgiving Day Parade. Sarg had made his name (earning him the accolade, "father of modern puppetry") orchestrating similar inflatable installations for Macy's over the preceding decade, as well as at the 1933 Chicago World's Fair. Unfortunately for Sarg, his economic fortunes began to decline toward the end of the decade as other puppeteers began to compete more competitively. He ended up going into bankruptcy in 1939 and died 3 years later due to complications arising from surgery on a ruptured appendix.