WINMX Assorted Textfiles/Ebooks.tar/Text - History - The Great Moon Hoax Of 1835.txt

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                         The Great Moon Hoax of 1835

By R. J. Brown
Editor-in-Chief

Every History of American journalistic hoaxing properly begins with the
celebrated moon hoax which "made" the New York Sun of Benjamin Day. It
consisted of a series of articles, allegedly reprinted from the nonexistent
Edinburgh Journal of Science, relating to the discovery of life on the moon
by Sir John Herschel, eminent British astronomer, who some time before had
gone to the Cape of Good Hope to try out a new type of powerful telescope.

The first installment of the moon hoax appeared in the August 25, 1835
edition of the New York Sun on page two, under the heading "Celestial
Discoveries." The brief passage read in part as follows: "We have just
learnt (sic) from an eminent publisher in this city that Sir John Herschel
at the Cape of Good Hope, has made some astronomical discoveries of the most
wonderful description, by means of an immense telescope of an entirely new
principle."

As a mater of fact, Herschel had gone to South Africa in January, 1834, and
set up an observatory at Cape Town. Three columns of the first page of the
Sun contained a story credited to the Edinburgh Journal of Science. (That
publication had suspended some time before.) There was a great deal of
matter about the importance of Herschel╒s impending announcement of his
discoveries.

On August 25, the Sun ran four columns describing what Sir John had been
able to see, looking at the moon through his telescope.

So fascinating were the descriptions of trees and vegetation, oceans and
beaches, bison and goats, cranes and pelicans that the whole town was
talking even before the fourth installment appeared on August 28, 1835, with
the master revelation of all: the discovery of furry, winged men resembling
bats. The narration was printed as follows:

     "We counted three parties of these creatures, of twelve, nine and
     fifteen in each, walking erect towards a small wood... Certainly
     they were like human beings, for their wings had now disappeared
     and their attitude in walking was both erect and dignified...
     About half of the first party had passed beyond our canvas; but of
     all the others we had perfectly distinct and deliberate view. They
     averaged four feet in height, were covered, except on the face,
     with short and glossy copper-colored hair, and had wings composed
     of a thin membrane, without hair, lying snugly upon their backs
     from the top of the shoulders to the calves of their legs.

     The face, which was of a yellowish color, was an improvement upon
     that of the large orangutan... so much so that but for their long
     wings they would look as well on a parade ground as some of the
     old cockney militia. The hair of the head was a darker color than
     that of the body, closely curled but apparently not woolly, and
     arranged in two circles over the temples of the forehead. Their
     feet could only be seen as they were alternately lifted in
     walking; but from what we could see of them in so transient a view
     they appeared thin and very protuberant at the heel...We could
     perceive that their wings possessed great expansion and were
     similar in structure of those of the bat, being a semitransparent
     membrane expanded in curvilinear divisions by means of straight
     radii, united at the back by dorsal integuments. But what
     astonished us most was the circumstance of this membrane being
     continued from the shoulders to the legs, united all the way down,
     though gradually decreasing in width. The wings seemed completely
     under the command of volition, for those of the creatures whom we
     saw bathing in the water spread them instantly to their full
     width, waved them as ducks do theirs to shake off the water, and
     then as instantly closed them again in a compact form.

The Sun reached a circulation of 15,000 daily on the first of the stories.
When the discovery of men on the moon appeared Day was able to announce that
the Sun possessed the largest circulation of any newspaper in the world:
19,360.

Later stories told of the Temple of the Moon, constructed of sapphire, with
a roof of yellow resembling gold. There were pillars seventy feet high and
six feet thick supporting the roof of the temple. More man-bats were
discovered and readers of the Sun were awaiting more astounding details, but
the Sun told them the telescope had, unfortunately, been left facing the
east and the Sun's rays, concentrated through the lenses, burned a hole "15
feet in circumference" entirely through the reflecting chamber, putting the
observatory out of commission.

Rival editors were frantic; many of them pretended to have access to the
original articles and began reprinting the Sun's series. It was not until
the Journal of Commerce sought permission to publish the series in pamphlet
form, however, that Richard Adams Locke, confessed authorship. Some
authorities think that a French scientist, Nicollet, in this country at the
time, wrote them.

Before Locke's confession a committee of scientists from Yale University
hastened to New York to inspect the original articles; it was shunted from
editorial office to print shop and back again until it tired and returned to
New Haven. Edgar Allan Poe explained that he stopped work on the second part
of The Strange Adventures of Hans Pfaall because he had felt he had been
outdone. So many writers have perpetuated the legend that Harriet Martineau
in her Retrospect of Western Travel said a Springfield, Massachusetts,
missionary society resolved to send missionaries to the moon to convert and
civilize the bat men.

After a number of his competitors, humiliated because they had "lifted" the
series and passed it off as their own, upbraided Day, the Sun of September
16, 1835, admitted the hoax. When the hoax was exposed people were generally
amused. It did not seem to lessen interest in the Sun, which never lost its
increased circulation.