April Fools Day - 1950
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: News reports from April Fool’s Day, 1950.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900 |…

April Fools Day - 1959
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1959.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1960
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Items in the news from April Fool’s Day, 1960.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 |…

April Fools Day - 1965
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1965.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1969
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1965.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1971
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1971.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1972
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1972.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1973
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1973.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1974
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1974.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1975
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Notable hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1975.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900…

April Fools Day - 1976
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoaxes. Summary: Hoaxes perpetrated on April Fool’s Day, 1976.April Fool’s Day Content in the Museum of HoaxesTop 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes—The Origin of April Fool’s Day—April Fool’s Hoaxes by Year1698 | 1708 | 1844 | 1860 | 1866 | 1878 | 1888 | 1900 |…

Black Like Me
Type: Impostor. Summary: In 1959, a white man posed as a black man in the American Deep South for six weeks. The result was the bestselling book “Black Like Me.” Posted by: Elliot Feldman Black Like MeIn 1959, John Howard Griffin was a white native Texan novelist and journalist with…

Brassiere Brigade
Type: Financial Scam. Summary: Female employees of the phone company stole thousands of dollars from their employer by hiding coin rolls in their bras. In September 1950, police in Miami, Florida accidentally discovered a crime ring that had been stealing thousands of dollars from the local phone company for years.…

Caltech Sweepstakes Caper
Type: College Prank. Summary: In 1975 Caltech students flooded a McDonald’s sweepstakes with millions of entries. Caltech is known for producing world-class scientists and engineers. But a few of its students have also demonstrated a flair for the law, as a highly controversial 1975 prank that turned on the legalistic…

Captain Crunch
Type: Hacker. Summary: In the early seventies, a group of hackers called “phone phreaks” emerged, earning notoriety by creating high-tech ways to beat the costs of long distance calls. “Cap’n Crunch” was the most notorious of them all. Posted by: Elliot Feldman blue box John Draper is one of Silicon…

Disappearance of David Lang
Type: Hoax. Summary: A popular legend claims that in 1880 a Tennessee farmer vanished into thin air before a crowd of witnesses. This legend was actually invented by a mystery-novel writer in 1953. The Story David Lang was said to be a farmer who lived near Gallatin, Tennessee. On September…

Great Monkey Hoax
Type: Hoax. Summary: In 1953 the police found the body of an extraterrestrial lying on a Georgia highway. HOAX HAIKUKilled an alien; I bet I could get famous; with a shaven chimp. (by Dave)Submit a haiku The Austell Alien, still preserved in the Georgia Crime Lab.It was a hot night…

Great Rose Bowl Hoax
Type: College Prank. Summary: Caltech students succeeded in altering the University of Washington’s halftime flip-card routine during the 1961 Rose Bowl in order to read “CALTECH”.Table of Contents The mechanics of the prank The Plan Unfolds Acclaim and Criticism Not the first… or the last References The Rose Bowl, January…

Instant Color TV
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoax. Summary: In 1962 Swedish television viewers were told they could receive color reception by placing a nylon stocking over the screen. Instant Color TV is listed at #3 in the Museum’s list of the Top 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes of All Time. INSTANT COLOR…

Kick A Puppy Today
Type: Misanthropic merchandise. Summary: In 1963 an entrepreneur encouraged would-be pranksters to express their antisocial tendencies. Hollis and friends model his “protest-dappled” sweatshirts. May, 1963. In 1963 an entrepreneur conceived of a way to promote antisocial tendencies and profit from it. Charlie Hollis, a 37-year-old copywriter and Brooklyn College sophomore,…

Kidnapping of Nicole Riche
Type: Publicity Stunt. Summary: A French actress disappeared under mysterious circumstances. She later claimed she had been kidnapped by “Puritans” who lectured her about her immoral life. Nicole RicheAt 3 a.m. on the morning of Saturday, April 1, 1950 the 22-year-old French actress Nicole Riche (no relation to Nicole Richie)…

Miss Perfect Profile
Type: Publicity Stunt. Summary: The head of a modeling agency invented phony titles to promote his models. Newspapers and magazines like to print pictures of attractive young women, especially if the pictures are vaguely newsworthy. For instance, if the woman has just been awarded a title such as “Miss Congeniality,”…

Naked Came The Stranger
Newsday columnist Mike McGrady was convinced that standards of literary and artistic taste were plummeting rapidly in the United States, driven down by a relentless flood of media sensationalism that catered to the lowest common denominator. So he decided to design an experiment to test the depths of the American…

Olympic Underwear Relay
Type: Sports Prank. Summary: At the 1956 Olympics in Australia, a prankster carrying a pair of flaming underwear briefly took the place of the official torch bearer. Route of the 1956 Olympic torch relay, from Cairns to Melbourne. In 1956 runners bore the Olympic flame across Australia, on a path…

Paul Is Dead
Type: Part rumor, part hoax. Summary: In 1969 the possibility that Paul McCartney had died years ago in a car crash and been replaced by a double became one of the most hotly debated questions around the world. HOAX HAIKUSo many fake clues The three, the hand, the flowers Paul…

Pierre Brassau - Monkey Artist
Type: Art Hoax. Summary: The paintings of the avant-garde artist Pierre Brassau were revealed to be the work of a monkey. Peter the Chimp, aka “Pierre Brassau,” at work. In 1964 four paintings by a previously unknown avant-garde French artist named Pierre Brassau were exhibited at an art show in…

Principality of Outer Baldonia
Type: Fictitious Country. Summary: The Principality of Outer Baldonia started as a practical joke among friends on a fishing trip and it became a country. Posted by: Elliot Feldman Russell Arundel was an executive with the Pepsi-Cola Company. He was also a well-known eccentric. In 1948, he purchased the four-acre…

Report From Iron Mountain
Type: Conspiracy hoax. Summary: A book alleged to provide evidence of the American government’s plan to maintain a perpetual state of war. Front cover of Report From Iron Mountain. In 1967 the war in Vietnam was escalating and race riots were breaking out in many major U.S. cities. Popular distrust…

Society for Indecency to Naked Animals
Type: Hoax. Summary: A satirical organization campaigned to clothe animals. HOAX HAIKUG. Clifford Prout says A nude horse is a rude horse. Put pants on Fido!!! (by AB)Submit a haiku SINA Newsletter. G. Clifford Prout was a man with a mission, and that mission was to put clothes on all…

Stone Age Tasaday
Type: Anthropological Hoax. Summary: A primitive, stone-age tribe found living in a rain forest in the Philippines was later alleged to be an elaborate fake. Table of Contents The Tasaday As A Real Tribe The Tasaday As A Fake Tribe The Revenge of the Tasaday Making Sense of the Tasaday…

Subways Are For Sleeping
Advertisement for Subways Are For Sleeping that ran in the New York Herald-Tribune. In 1961 an advertisement appeared in the New York Herald-Tribune for a Broadway play titled “Subways Are For Sleeping.” The play had not been doing very well at the box office. Nevertheless, judging by the ad, it…

Swiss Spaghetti Harvest
Type: April Fool’s Day Hoax. Summary: In 1957 the British news show Panorama convinced many of its viewers that spaghetti grows on trees. The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest is listed at #1 in the Museum’s list of the Top 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes of All Time. SPAGHETTI HARVEST HAIKUThere’s nothing…

The Third Eye
Type: Phony Tibetan monk. Summary: The son of a British plumber claimed to be a lama from a wealthy Tibetan family. Tuesday Lobsang Rampa The Third Eye, published in 1956 and authored by Tuesday Lobsang Rampa, purported to be Rampa’s autobiographical tale of his study and mastery of Tibetan Buddhism.…

Virginia City Camel Race
Type: Hoax that became real. Summary: Virginia City, Nevada hosts an annual camel race that began as a hoax. In 1959 Bob Richards, the editor of the Nevada-based Territorial Enterprise, announced that a camel race would be held that year down the main street of Virginia City. He challenged other…

Walt Disney Frozen
Type: Urban Legend. Summary: According to rumor, Walt Disney’s cryogenically preserved body is kept in a tank under Disneyland’s Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Posted by: Elliot Feldman Walt Disney Walt Disney died on December 15, 1966, but a rumor has long persisted that his body was cryogenically frozen and…