DiscoverScroll article

The "Great Moon Hoax", also known as the "Great Moon Hoax of 1835", was a series of six articles published in The Sun (a New York newspaper), beginning on August 25, 1835, about the supposed discovery of life and civilization on the Moon.

The discoveries were falsely attributed to Sir John Herschel and his fictitious companion Andrew Grant. The story was advertised on August 21, 1835, as an upcoming feature allegedly reprinted from The Edinburgh Courant. The first in a series of six was published four days later on August 25. These articles were never retracted; however, on September 16, 1835, The Sun admitted the articles were in fact fabricated. The hoax came at a time when readers looked for entertainment as much as information from penny press newspapers, which would later change with the development of ethical journalism.

The articles described animals on the Moon, including bison, single-horned goats, mini zebras, unicorns, bipedal tail-less beavers and bat-like winged humanoids ("Vespertilio-homo") who built temples.

Authorship has subsequently been attributed to Richard Adams Locke (1800–1871), a reporter who, in August 1835, was working for The Sun. Two other men have been noted in connection with the hoax: Jean-Nicolas Nicollet, a French astronomer travelling in America at the time (though he was in Mississippi, not New York, when the Moon-hoax issues appeared), and Lewis Gaylord Clark, editor of The Knickerbocker, a literary magazine.

According to legend, The Sun's circulation increased dramatically because of the hoax and remained permanently greater than before, thereby establishing The Sun as a successful paper. Edgar Allan Poe claimed the story was a plagiarism of his earlier work "The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall", published in the Southern Literary Messenger. (He later published "The Balloon-Hoax" in the same newspaper.) The story was reprinted in the New York Transcript on September 2–5, 1835, under the headline "Lunar Discoveries, Extraordinary Aerial Voyage by Baron Hans Pfaall". Poe described a voyage to the Moon in a balloon, in which Pfaall lives for five years on the Moon with lunarians and sends back a lunarian to Earth. The Poe Moon hoax was less successful than Locke's because of the satiric and comical tone of the account. In 1846, Poe would write a biographical sketch of Locke as part of his series "The Literati of New York City" which appeared in Godey's Lady's Book.

The success of such sensational stories as the "Great Moon Hoax" can be partly attributed to the influence of contemporary speculative science. Figures like the Reverend Thomas Dick, who claimed that the Moon was inhabited by billions of beings, had captured the public's imagination in the early 19th century. Locke's hoax played on similar popular beliefs, presenting them as the latest scientific findings from the well-respected astronomer Sir John Herschel, which lent the story credibility.

The hoax is featured in Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for History. Nate DiMeo's historical podcast The Memory Palace dedicated a 2010 episode to the Great Moon Hoax entitled "The Moon in the Sun". The hoax inspired a five-part musical by composer Matt Dahan as part of his musical radio series Pulp Musicals.

A Trip to the Moon, a 1902 French science fiction film in which the Moon is inhabited by insect-like aliens

"The Great Moon Hoax of 1835" by R. "The Great Moon Hoax of 1835" (after 2011) at The Museum of Hoaxes – with linked transcripts of the 6 newspaper articles "The Great Moon Hoax of 1835" (2011) at Victorian Gothic (archived 2017-06-30) "Richard Adams Locke" by Edgar Allan Poe – biographical essay from 1846 series The Literati of New York City "Belief, Legend, and the Great Moon Hoax" (2014) at Library of Congress

"The 'Great Moon Hoax' that fooled the world" (2022 podcast) at BBC Global News Ltd

Quick Facts

• "The Great Moon Hoax of 1835" by R.
• Nate DiMeo's historical podcast The Memory Palace dedicated a 2010 episode to the Great Moon Hoax entitled "The Moon in the Sun".
• "Belief, Legend, and the Great Moon Hoax" (2014) at Library of Congress
• "The Great Moon Hoax of 1835" (after 2011) at The Museum of Hoaxes – with linked transcripts of the 6 newspaper articles
• "The Great Moon Hoax of 1835" (2011) at Victorian Gothic (archived 2017-06-30)

Source material: Wikipedia - "Great Moon Hoax". Adapted and summarized for DiscoverScroll. Original contributors are credited through the linked Wikipedia article. Read original on Wikipedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes were made from the original.