Author: Alex Boese
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2002
Language: English
Pages: 266
ISBN/UPC (if available): 0143029908
Description
This book is a collection of some of the most engaging and remarkable pranks and hoaxes of the last 300 years. The book contains nearly 100 stories of trickery, gullibility and idiocy, described in detail, and a further 150 short anecdotes of strange-but-not-true incidents, phenomena and events.
Step right up and enter The Museum of Hoaxes where you can: Marvel at such curiosities as Bigfoot, the Cardiff Giant and the Jackalope…Wonder at the mystery of crop circles, the impact of the War of the Worlds radio broadcast and Sydney’s bizarre iceberg…See the Cottingsley fairies, the Stone Age Tasaday tribe and Snowball the monster cat with your own eyes…Or learn from famous hoaxers such as Edgar Allan Poe, PT Barnun and Mark Twain.
Would these hoaxes fool you?
Take the Gullibility Test and find out.
Formatted along the lines of the Darwin Awards books, The Museum of Hoaxes is a collection of some of the most engaging and remarkable pranks and hoaxes of the last 300 years. The book contains nearly 100 stories of trickery, gullibility and idiocy, described in detail, and a further 150 short anecdotes of strange-but-not-true incidents, phenomena and events. It also includes short profiles of famous perpetrators and con artists, an examination of the development and evolution of April fool’s Day, and black and white illustrations throughout.
Contents
Acknowledgements
The Gullibility Test (Questions)
Introduction
CHAPTER ONE: BEFORE 1700
Female Popes and Vegetable Lambs
CHAPTER TWO: THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
Rabbit Babies and Lying Stones
CHAPTER THREE: 1800-1868
Lunar Bison and Solar Armor
CHAPTER FOUR: 1869-1913
Stone Giants and Antlered Rabbits
CHAPTER FIVE: 1914-1949
New Jersey Martians and Van Gogh’s Ear
CHAPTER SIX: 1950-1976
Naked Animals and Swiss Spaghetti Trees
CHAPTER SEVEN: 1977-1989
Australian Icebergs and Cockroach Pills
CHAPTER EIGHT: 1990-1999
Crop Circles and Cross-Dressing Ken
CHAPTER NINE: AFTER 2000
Bonsai Kittens and Monster Cats
AFTERWORD
THE GULLIBILITY TEST (ANSWERS)
ENDNOTE
SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING
HOAXES BY CATEGORY
INDEX OF STORY TITLES