A Neglected Anniversary
Type: Journalistic Hoax. Summary: Text of an article detailing a false history of the bathtub. What follows is the complete text of Henry L. Mencken’s article “A Neglected Anniversary,” published in the New York Evening Mail on December 28, 1917. The article presents a false history of the bathtub. Details…

Captain Midnight
Type: Hacker. Summary: In 1986 a tech-savvy hacker interrupted a cable channel broadcast with his own transmission. Posted by: Elliot Feldman On April 27, 1986, late night HBO subscribers watching the movie “The Falcon and the Snowman” were surprised by a sudden interruption of service. A color bar test pattern…

Death of Titan Leeds
Type: Hoax. Summary: A (fake) astrologer predicted the death of his rival. Poor Richard’s Almanac. Poor Richard’s Almanac was a yearly almanac written by a hen-pecked, poverty-stricken scholar named Richard Saunders. It first appeared in 1733, offering a collection of wit, poetry, as well as some prophecies. In its first…

Enigmatical Prophecies
Type: Hoax. Summary: A (fake) astrologer made ambiguous prophecies that inevitably came true. Poor, henpecked Richard Saunders was the apparent author of an annual American almanac, Poor Richard’s Almanac. But the real author was Benjamin Franklin. In 1736 Franklin put the credibility of his pseudonym on the line by making…

Fake News Comedy Shows
Type: Satire. Summary: A brief history of “fake news” comedy shows. Posted by: Elliot Feldman Before Jon Stewart While “The Daily Show” hits its targets more often than not, the line between “fake news” and real news seems to be blurring a bit in recent months. Show host Jon Stewart’s…

Flemish Secession Hoax
Type: Television News Hoax. Summary: In 2006, on a Belgian TV station news broadcast, it was announced that Flanders, the Dutch-speaking half of the country, had seceded from the country. Thirty minutes into the news bulletin, only after the station’s phonelines were swamped, it was revealed to be a hoax.…

George Washington Petrified
Type: Newspaper hoax. Summary: An article widely reprinted around the time of the first centennial of the United States alleged that the remains of George Washington had become petrified. In early 1877, an article appeared in many American newspapers alleging that the remains of General George Washington had been discovered…

History of the Bathtub
Type: Hoax. Summary: A widely circulated tale claimed that Americans were initially reluctant to use bathtubs when they were introduced during the mid-nineteenth century. On December 28, 1917 the journalist Henry L. Mencken published an article in the New York Evening Mail titled “A Neglected Anniversary.” It described the curious…

Jack Kelley
Type: Rogue Reporter. Summary: In 2004, it was uncovered that Jack Kelley, one of USA Today’s most respected reporters, a five-time Pulitzer Prize nominee, had been fabricating major news stories at least since 1991. Posted by: Elliot Feldman In 2004 it was uncovered that Jack Kelley, one of USA Today’s…

Joseph Mulhattan
Type: Media Hoaxer. Summary: During the late nineteenth century, Mulhattan was widely known for his love of hoaxing newspapers. Joseph MulhattanDuring the 1870s and 1880s Joseph Mulhattan was perhaps the most famous hoaxer in America. He was a traveling salesman, not a reporter, but he was notorious for repeatedly succeeding…

Killer Hawk of Chicago
Type: Hoax that is not a hoax. Summary: As Chicagoans excitedly followed reports of a hawk loose in the downtown area, newspapers began to suspect they may have been hoaxed. “The pirate of the air perched on the roof of the Art institute just after he had killed and was…

Locals - 19th Century Newspaper Hoaxes
The creation of the penny press during the 1830s completely changed the character of the news business. The older six-penny papers had confined themselves to business and political news, but the penny papers discovered that there was a huge market for local news: stories about neighborhood crimes, police reports, social…

Melancholy Reflections
Type: Exposé of a journalistic hoax. Summary: Text of an article in which H.L. Mencken admitted inventing a false history of the bathtub. What follows is the complete text of Henry L. Mencken’s article “Melancholy Reflections,” published in the Chicago Tribune on May 23, 1926. In the article, Mencken admits…

Miscegenation Hoax
Type: Political “dirty trick” campaign. Summary: The origin of the word ‘miscegenation’ from a nineteenth-century hoax. Shortly before Christmas, 1863 a 72-page pamphlet appeared for sale on newsstands in New York City. It cost a quarter and was titled “Miscegenation: The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to…

New York Evening Graphic and Composographs
Type: Inventing the News. Summary: The story of publisher Bernarr MacFadden and The New York Evening Graphic, America’s first tabloid. Posted by: Elliot Feldman Although publisher Bernarr MacFadden’s newspaper, The New York Evening Graphic, only lasted a few years, its impact on mass media is still felt today, for better…

Paulding County Hyena
On February 6, 1858 readers of the Cleveland Plain Dealer read the following shocking news: A HYENA LOOSE IN PAULDING COUNTY. — On Wednesday morning last, between three and four o’clock, a striped hyena broke loose from his cage in the barn of Mr. Eli Watson, a few miles west…

Paul Krassner and The Realist
Type: Hoaxer. Summary: In the sixties, Paul Krassner was one of the original Yippies. His magazine “The Realist” was known for perpetuating political hoaxes. Posted by: Elliot Feldman In 1958, at the height of the Cold War, Paul Krassner began publishing his magazine “The Realist.” It was deep leftist political…

Petrified Man
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: A newspaper article published in 1862 described the discovery of a petrified human body. The following news report appeared in the Territorial Enterprise, Virginia City, Nevada’s leading newspaper, on October 4, 1862: A petrified man was found some time ago in the mountains south of Gravelly…

Press Your Luck Scandal
Type: Beating the System. Summary: A contestant became a big winner on a game show by realizing that the computerized game sequence was not random. Posted by: Elliot Feldman Michael Larson plays Press Your LuckOn May 19, 1984, Michael Larson, an unemployed ice cream truck driver from Lebanon, Ohio, won…

Railways and Revolvers in Georgia
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: A London newspaper provoked trans-Atlantic controversy when it reported that a series of brutal killings had occurred on a Georgia train. American society has long had a reputation for violence. Therefore, when in 1856 the London Times received a letter from an Englishman living in America…

Sibuxiang Beast
Type: Advertising Hoax. Summary: Chinese advertisement warning TV viewers to beware of the Sibuxiang Beast is mistaken as a real warning and causes mass panic. On the evening of September 19, 1994 a stark warning was repeatedly broadcast to TV viewers in Taiyuan, a city in northern China. A message…

Silence Dogood
Type: False Identity. Summary: Sixteen-year-old Benjamin Franklin pretended to be a middle-aged widow named Silence Dogood. View the Discussion Page for this topic. In 1722 a series of letters appeared in the New-England Courant written by a middle-aged widow named Silence Dogood. The letters poked fun at various aspects of…

Solar Armor
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: An article published in 1874 described a man who invented “solar armor,” which caused him to freeze to death in the middle of a Nevada desert during the Summer. As anyone who has ever been to Nevada during the summer knows, its deserts can become scorchingly…

Space Cadets
Type: Reality TV hoax. Summary: In 2005, the British television show “Space Cadets” pulled off the most expensive and elaborate hoax in English television history. Posted by: Elliot Feldman In 2005, all of Britain was talking about a new Channel 4 reality series, “Space Cadets.” The show’s alleged concept: twelve…

Traveling Stones of Pahranagat Valley
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: In 1867 Nevada journalist Dan De Quille described some stones with a curious property—whenever separated from each other they spontaneously moved back together. On October 26, 1867 a story appeared in Nevada’s Territorial Enterprise newspaper describing some unusual stones recently found in the Pahranagat Valley of…

Trial of Polly Baker
Type: Literary Hoax. Summary: The story of a woman tried for giving birth to five children out of wedlock provoked widespread popular outrage during the eighteenth century. In 1747 the text of a speech delivered by a woman, Polly Baker, accused by British magistrates in a court in Colonial America…

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…

Weekly World News
Type: Parody. Summary: The life and death of satirical tabloid “The Weekly World News.” Posted by: Elliot Feldman The Death of the Weekly World News “The Weekly World News” was launched almost as an afterthought. It was a news-of-the-weird offshoot of “The National Enquirer.” In 1979, when The Enquirer and…

Winsted Wild Man
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: Reports of a wild man loose in Winsted, Connecticut fanned mass hysteria. In August of 1895 New York City papers received a wire story about a naked, hairy man that was terrorizing townspeople in Winsted, Connecticut. Intrigued, the papers sent reporters up to Winsted to find…

Witch Trial at Mount Holly
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: In 1730 an American newspaper printed a detailed account of a fictitious witch trial. On October 22, 1730 an article appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette describing a witch trial that had recently been held in Mount Holly near Burlington, New Jersey. (To read the full text…

Witch Trial at Mount Holly - Text
Type: Media Hoax. Summary: The complete text of a 1730 newspaper article describing a witch trial that supposedly occurred in New Jersey. What follows is the complete text of the “Witch Trial at Mount Holly” hoax, believed to have been written by Benjamin Franklin. It was published in the Pennsylvania…