The Great Moon Hoax of 1835 – Today in History.

Beginning August 25, 1835, and continuing for five more issues, the New York Sun published a series of six articles by “scientist” “Dr. Andrew Grant” claiming a colleague had found life on the moon using a powerful new telescope. The life forms apparently included unicorns, beaver-like animals with two legs, birds resembling storks, and human-ish creatures with furry bat wings. According to the articles, the moon also featured rivers, abundant plants, and precious stones of great size.

None of these things are true, of course. Dr. Grant wasn’t a real person, the journal the articles cited as the source of their information hadn’t published in over a year, and the paper intended the whole thing to be satire. The only part of the Great Moon Hoax with any truth was that the astronomer who supposedly saw these things in his telescope was a real person with an observatory. Despite the transparent nonsense of the whole series of articles, however, they fooled huge numbers of people. Circulation of the paper rose considerably.

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Lessons of the Great Moon Hoax

I’m not sure what lessons there are here, but I suppose a couple at minimum. One would be that sensationalism sells, especially if presented plausibly and given a veneer of respectability. Another is that when possible, check your sources and investigate their accuracy. Finally, while people who claim you can never trust the media are unnecessarily paranoid, I always tell my students to remember that the news media is a business. It will print or broadcast what it thinks will draw in readers and viewers, and we should always keep that in mind. Again, don’t dismiss a news story just because you wish it wasn’t true, but investigate the sources for accuracy.

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