This Day in the History of Hoaxes: August 1

August 1, 1956: I, Libertine Revealed
In the 1950s, bestseller lists were partially based on the number of requests for a title at stores. Nighttime deejay Jean Shepherd hatched a plan to throw a wrench in this system by having his listeners descend on bookstores en masse and ask for a non-existent book titled I, Libertine. Requests for the title eventually made their way to publisher Ian Ballantine who (once he figured out what was going on), decided to publish I, Libertine as an actual book. A month before the book's release, the Wall Street Journal revealed the hoax, and the resulting publicity helped boost its sales. More…

This Day in History

Posted on Fri Aug 01, 2014


Comments

I found two published books of Vic And Sade scripts from 1972 and 1976. It appears there weren't any before that, which would mean Shepherd expected the bookseller to find him some original scripts, not a realistic expectation to me. Kind of a funny story, but also an illustration that Shepherd needed to lighten the hell up.
Posted by Brian  on  Fri Aug 01, 2014  at  08:42 AM
Shepherd was an amazing character and many of his old radio shows are hilarious. This is one of several sites dedicated to him.
http://www.flicklives.com/
Posted by Doug  on  Sun Aug 10, 2014  at  01:04 PM
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