In the Fall of 1969 a rumor swept around the world alleging that Paul McCartney, singer and bassist for the Beatles, was dead. In fact, that he had died three years ago on November 9, 1966 in a fiery car crash while heading home from the EMI recording studios. Supposedly the surviving band members, fearful of the effect his death might have on their careers, secretly replaced him with a double named William Campbell (an orphan who had won a Paul McCartney lookalike contest in Edinburgh). However, they also planted clues in their later albums to let fans know the truth, that Paul was dead. More >>>

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 cultural morass. He would commission the writing of a novel lacking in any redeeming features: no plot or character development, no social insight, and definitely no verbal skill. It would possess only one feature that could possibly hold a reader's attention: lots of kinky sex scenes. In fact, it would have a minimum of two sex scenes per chapter. If the book was a success, McGrady reasoned, it would prove that the American public completely lacked all standards of taste. More >>>

Chariots of the Gods?, written by Erich von Däniken, was first published in 1968. It became an international bestseller. The thesis of the book is that ancient human civilizations had contact with visitors from outer space. These "ancient astronauts" were supposedly responsible for many of the great architectural feats of history, such as the Egyptian pyramids, the Nazca lines of Peru, and the statues on Easter Island.

Mainstream archaeologists dismiss von Däniken's argument as pseudoscience. A charitable view of von Däniken would credit him with really believing all the arguments he makes. A more cynical view paints him as a knowing hoaxer. For instance, one of his central arguments is that it would have been impossible for past civilizations to build monuments such as the pyramids. But von Daniken refuses to consider contradictory evidence. In fact, many theories adequately explain how these monuments could have been built by early civilizations with the technology of the time.

Von Däniken also invents facts. In a follow-up book, The Gold of the Gods, he described visiting the "Caves of Gold" located beneath the jungles of Ecuador, where the treasure of the Incas is supposedly hidden. Here he saw a vast library of metal books containing the writings of the ancient astronauts. However, von Däniken was not willing to disclose the location of these Caves of Gold. There is no evidence they exist outside of his imagination.

In 1968 Carlos Castaneda, a graduate student in anthropology at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), published The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge. It described his encounters with Don Juan Matus, a Yaqui shaman from Mexico. Don Juan supposedly trained Castaneda in ancient forms of knowledge, such as how to use drugs to communicate with animals (or even to become an animal). Castaneda's book became a bestseller and was an important influence on the New Age movement. Castaneda was awarded a doctorate by UCLA in 1972.

Castaneda insisted Don Juan was a real person, but this is widely doubted by scholars. Skeptics point to the fact that Castaneda never describes Don Juan speaking in his native language, nor does Don Juan use local names to describe any plants or animals. Castaneda never showed his field notes to anyone. And many of the experiences Castaneda describes, such as hiking for days through the Sonoran desert in the middle of the summer, border on the impossible.

Castaneda also falsified details of his own biography. Castaneda claimed he was born in Brazil in 1935, but an investigation by Time magazine revealed he was actually born in Peru in 1925.

October 20, 1967: Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin travelled on horseback into the Six Rivers National Forest of northern California, carrying with them a 16mm camera, determined to get some footage of Bigfoot. Near Bluff Creek they spotted what appeared to be a female Bigfoot (shown in the thumbnail) striding along a riverbank. Patterson managed to record 952 frames of film before the creature disappeared into the forest. The footage he took remains, by far, the most famous evidence of Bigfoot's existence. But rumors abound that Patterson and Gimlin were either victims of a hoax, or perpetrators of one. One theory is that the creature filmed by Patterson/Gimlin was the creation of John Chambers, lead make-up artist on the Planet of the Apes (filmed in 1967). More recently, a man named Bob Heironimus has come forward who claims he was hired by Gimlin to wear an ape suit and pretend to be Bigfoot for their film. More >>>

In 1967 the war in Vietnam was escalating and race riots were breaking out in many major U.S. cities. Popular distrust of the federal government was growing. It was in this context that on October 16 a book appeared titled Report From Iron Mountain on the Possibility and Desirability of Peace. It was published by Dial Press, a division of Simon & Schuster.

Leonard C. Lewin, a New York freelance writer, wrote the introduction to the book. He explained that the report had been compiled by 15 experts known as the Special Study Group (SSG) who had been brought together by the U.S. government. The SSG had first met in 1963 at a secret "underground nuclear hideout" called Iron Mountain. They had then held periodic meetings during the next two and a half years to discuss the problems that would confront the United States if it entered into a period of permanent peace. According to Lewin, one of the experts ("John Doe") who was identified as a professor of social science at a 'large Middle Western University,' had decided to release the report to the public.

The report, in language full of think-tank jargon, documented the conclusions of the Special Study Group concerning whether peace was possible, given the economic condition of the world. The SSG decided that peace "would almost certainly not be in the best interest of stable society." War, they argued, was simply too important a part of the world economy, and therefore it was necessary to continue a state of war indefinitely... More >>>

In 1964 four paintings by a previously unknown avant-garde French artist named Pierre Brassau were exhibited at an art show in Goteborg, Sweden. Art critics from Swedish papers praised the works. For instance, Rolf Anderberg of the morning Posten wrote: "Brassau paints with powerful strokes, but also with clear determination. His brush strokes twist with furious fastidiousness. Pierre is an artist who performs with the delicacy of a ballet dancer."

However, one critic panned Brassau's work, suggesting that "Only an ape could have done this."

As it turned out, the latter critic was correct. Pierre Brassau was, in fact, an ape. Specifically, he was a four-year-old West African chimpanzee named Peter from Sweden's Boras zoo. More >>>

Yetta Bronstein, a 48-year-old Bronx housewife, ran for President in 1964 and again in 1968 as the candidate for the Best Party. Her slogans were "Vote for Yetta and watch things get better" and "Put a mother in the White House."

Her proposals included national bingo, self-fluoridation, placing a suggestion box on the White House fence, and printing a nude picture of Jane Fonda on postage stamps "to ease the post office deficit and also give a little pleasure for six cents to those who can't afford Playboy magazine."

She promised she would staff her cabinet with "people who have failed in life and learned to live with it." More >>>

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, printed up stickers that bore messages such as LOATHE THY NEIGHBOR and KICK A PUPPY TODAY. He then placed an ad for his misanthropic product in the Village Voice: More >>>

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 appeared that the play was a critical success. The names of seven well-known theater critics appeared in the ad, and accompanying their names were the rave reviews they had given the play.

The ad would have appeared in all the leading New York City papers, but an editor at one paper noticed something puzzling about it before he gave the okay to publish it. Small pictures of the theatre critics accompanied their quotations. However, the picture of Richard Watts showed a black man, and the editor knew that Richard Watts, the theater critic, was white... More >>>