What Was the Great Moon Hoax of 1835?

In the early 1800s, a set of newspaper articles had people across America believing a civilization had been found on the moon. Learn how it happened in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://history.howstuffworks.com/historical-events/ridiculous-history-the-great-moon-hoax-1835.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
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

(00:23):
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

(00:46):
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

(01:10):
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

(01:31):
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,

(01:52):
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

(02:12):
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

(02:35):
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

(02:56):
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

(03:16):
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.

(03:39):
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

(04:01):
Tyler Clay. For more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit the
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