Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeart Radio, Hey Brainstuff Lauren bog obam here. On August five, the newspaper The Sun ran the first in a series of articles describing scientific findings from the Moon, reprinted from the Edinburgh Journal of Science and recounted by one doctor Andrew Grant, a colleague of the famous astronomer Sir John Herschel. This series featured some of the most popular articles in the New York newspaper ever printed and had people clamoring for the
breaking scientific information of the day. The one problem with this the articles were completely fake. Grant didn't exist, and the findings printed had no basis in scientific fact. The articles purported to describe the flora and fauna of the Moon, as well as the beings that lived there and the temples that they resided in. Here's a quick and fanciful
excerpt about those beings. The average four feet in height, were covered except on the face, was short and glossy copper colored hair, and had wings composed of a thin membrane without hair, lying snugly on their backs. The articles reported on the moon being's way of life, how their societies worked, and what they looked like the telescope that allegedly saw these wondrous things was located at an observatory
at the Cape of Good Hope. These stories on the life of the moon captured the imagination of people from one end of the u S to the other. Newspapers couldn't print them fast enough. Artists set out to recreate the images spoken of in the articles. People believed this, and why wouldn't they? Would you expect to encounter unlabeled satire in your newspaper of choice? Furthermore, who would perpetrate
such a thing? And why well? Follow the money? Richard Adam's Lock was the name of the man behind the hoax, and he was an editor at the Sun. Lock meticulously went about his work of trying to make people believe the stories, dropping items in the pay for beforehand at establishing the unquestionable scientific reputation of the names involved Sir John Herschel, for example. Then he released the articles, where
they only grew an absurdity. The Sun's papers flew off the shelf, getting reprinted all over the country and the world, with people believing Locke's fanciful satire. He claimed for a while that he hadn't intended for anyone to believe the tales, and that when he wanted to go public, the owner of the paper refused to allow him. It would be many years before these ridiculous moon findings were able to
be debunked in the press. Edgar Allan Poe claimed that the Great Moon Hoax plagiarized a satire he had written just a few weeks earlier about a man who had made its way to the Moon via hot air balloon. Today the world sees this phenomenon continue on the internet. How many times do you see in April fools Day article get repackaged by an outlet that didn't do its due diligence, and then you find that secondary source on your Facebook feed shared a million times with everyone believing
it as fact. For the article that this episode is based on how Stuff Works. Spoken by email with Tracy Duncan, editor of Club Jade, the popular pop culture news site dedicated to Star Wars, she said, there's no way your standard news outlet is going to knowingly report a hoax is fact. These days, people are far too willing to disbelieve and discredit outlets for far less than that. And on the other side of the scale, There are still people out there who will fall for stories from the Onion.
So whether you find that there are temples on the Moon or some long canceled show has been revived for another season, be sure to double check the original source. People are liable to believe anything as long as it looks official enough. Today's episode is based on the article Ridiculous History the Great Moon Hoax of thirty five on how stuff works dot Com, written by Brian Young. Brain Stuff is production of I Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff Works dot com um and is produced by
Tyler Clay. For more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. H