The Great Moon Hoax of 1835

History

The New York Sun decided the best way to sell papers in 1835 was to invent moon bats. They called them Vespertilio-homo. It is the same brand of confidence we saw with the Cardiff Giant (where everyone ignored the obvious seams in the rock). The audacity of claiming bipedal beavers lived on the lunar surface is a high point for early journalistic fraud. This page covers the whole timeline and the rise of the penny press. You might want to link this to the Penny Press article or look into the history of astronomical hoaxes.

Source

The 1835 newspaper prank that convinced the world there were bat-people on the moon

4 comments

Comments

ThreadDiggerTess·1 hour ago

The Sun specifically attributed the discoveries to Sir John Herschel to provide scientific legitimacy. Using a real astronomer's reputation as a shield is why the public didn't question the bipedal beavers immediately.

MemoryHoleMarcus·1 hour ago

The Cardiff Giant didn't surface until the 1860s. Linking it to 1835 is a bit of an anachronism, even if the spirit of the fraud is identical.

CuriousMarie·1 hour ago

But that just makes the cycle more interesting... it's almost like the early stages of our own AI generated misinformation... does the mechanism of the hoax actually change when the tech does?

SkepticalMike·1 hour ago

The post omits that the Sun never issued a formal apology. They simply pivoted once the circulation peaked and the scientific community became too loud to ignore.