Great hoaxes might not make the world spin, but they sure spice up the roller‑coaster of history. Whether we’re talking about a German Army impostor or a mischievous bathtub story, the turn of the twentieth century was a hotbed for cheeky chaps and chapettes who loved to take the mickey out of gullible crowds. So without further ado, here are some of the best hoaxes from 1900 to 1929:
Great Hoaxes of the Early Twentieth Century
10 The Worcester Aeroplane Hoax
At the dawn of aviation, any whiff of a successful flight could send journalists scrambling for an exclusive. Enter Wallace Tillinghast, a Massachusetts manufacturing vice‑president who claimed to have built a revolutionary monoplane in December 1909. He boasted a 120 mph top speed, a 72‑foot wingspan and the ability to carry three passengers – a bold claim when the Wright brothers had only just taken to the skies a few years earlier.
The Boston Herald ran a story that Tillinghast had completed a 300‑mile test flight, even surviving an alleged engine failure at 4,000 feet. Yet when reporters demanded proof, Tillinghast cited fears of theft and refused to reveal the aircraft. He promised a public demonstration in February, but the month passed without a sighting. Eventually the New England Aero Club declared the whole affair a sham, stating that Tillinghast had never even sat in a plane.
9 The Captain of Köpenick
In October 1906, Wilhelm Voigt, an unemployed cobbler from Germany, bought a captain’s uniform from a thrift shop and strutted into a squad of grenadiers. Commanding them like a true officer, he marched the troops to the town hall of Köpenick, arrested the mayor and treasurer on fabricated embezzlement charges, and walked away with 4,000 marks.
Voigt was captured nine days later and sentenced to four years, but public sympathy turned him into a folk hero. Kaiser Wilhelm pardoned him after only two years, cementing his place as a cultural symbol of military absurdity.
8 The Dreadnought Hoax
On 7 February 1910, a self‑styled “Prince of Abyssinia” and his entourage were greeted aboard HMS Dreadnought, the Royal Navy’s pride and joy. The crew stood at attention, and the supposed prince toured the battleship with obvious admiration.
The next day the ship’s commander learned that the “prince” was actually a group of upper‑class pranksters, including future Bloomsbury Group members, who had painted their faces black, donned authentic robes, and forged a telegram to gain access. The hoax exposed both naval protocol and the gullibility of the press.
7 The Case of the Midwife Toad
Austrian scientist Paul Kammerer championed Lamarckian inheritance – the idea that acquired traits could be passed to offspring. To prove his point, he forced the “midwife toad,” which normally mates on land and lacks the webbed‑foot bumps of its aquatic relatives, to breed in water.
Kammerer announced that the toads’ offspring sprouted the expected black, scaly marks, claiming a triumph for Lamarckism. However, Dr. G.K. Noble of the American Museum of Natural History discovered the marks were merely ink injected into the skin, exposing Kammerer’s fraud. The scandal drove Kammerer to suicide shortly thereafter.
6 The Disumbrationist School of Art
In 1924, Paul Jordan Smith, a U.S. author frustrated by critics, painted a whimsical canvas titled “Yes We Have No Bananas.” He then concocted a fictitious Russian persona, Pavel Jerdanowitch, and submitted the work to New York’s Exhibition of the Independents.
The piece was praised, and the invented Jerdanowitch was hailed as the founder of a new “Disumbrationist” movement. Smith wrote an elaborate biography for his alter ego, enjoying the art world’s credulity for three years before revealing the prank in the Los Angeles Times, denouncing contemporary abstract art as “poppycock.”
5 Sober Sue
In 1907, Broadway’s Hammerstein Victorian Theatre advertised a mysterious “Sober Sue” who would appear during intermission and promised a $1,000 reward to anyone who could make her laugh.
Comedians from across the nation flocked to the theatre, delivering joke after joke, yet Sue never cracked a smile. The mystery was later solved: she suffered from facial paralysis, and the whole stunt was a clever ruse to lure top comedians onto the stage for free.
4 The Mysterious Glozel Finds
Seventeen‑year‑old French farmer Émile Fradin claimed to have uncovered an underground chamber on his property in 1924, revealing a trove of glass bricks, human bones, hermaphrodite idols and a ceramic tablet bearing an unknown script dubbed “Glozellian.”
Initial excitement gave way to controversy: some experts declared the artifacts fakes, while others argued they were genuine Neolithic relics. The debate persisted for decades, with carbon dating in the 1980s showing the items spanned from the 13th to the 20th century. Fradin lived to 103, steadfastly insisting the finds were authentic.
3 The BBC Radio Panic
On 16 January 1926, the BBC interrupted a regular broadcast with a “special announcement” describing a massive riot in London: looted galleries, a destroyed Savoy Hotel, Parliament under mortar fire, and Big Ben toppled.
Listeners panicked, fled their homes, and called authorities, unaware that the segment was actually a comedy sketch from Father Ronald Knox’s series “Broadcasting the Barricades.” The fictional leader “Mr Popplebury” and the fabricated chaos were meant as satire, not a real news bulletin.
2 The Strange Bequest of Francis Douce
Antiquarian Francis Douce, who served as Keeper of Records at the British Museum, stipulated in his 1834 will that a box of unfinished papers be sealed for 66 years before opening. When the box was finally unsealed on 1 January 1900, curators expected a treasure trove.
Instead, they found only a handful of scrap notes and torn book covers – essentially nothing of scholarly value. The box was later transferred to Oxford’s Bodleian Library, where the modest contents helped scholars locate some of Douce’s more obscure pieces.
1 The Cradle of the Deep
Joan Lowell’s 1929 autobiography, The Cradle of the Deep, claimed she spent her childhood aboard her father’s schooner, living a life of shark‑cutting anatomy lessons, whale‑harpooning, strip‑poker with the crew, and a dramatic shipwreck rescued by three clinging kittens.
Investigative journalists soon uncovered that Lowell had actually grown up in Berkeley, California, and her seafaring adventures were largely fictional. She later admitted the book was roughly eighty percent true, conceding that a bit of creative embellishment was necessary to keep the story interesting.