Post by Soutpeel on Aug 2, 2017 9:30:54 GMT 7
Inside the Elaborate Hoax That Made British Society Believe in Fairies
One of the greatest hoaxes of the 20th century began with a sensational headline: Fairies Photographed! The yarn endured for six decades, until a rather disappointing confession in the 1980s confirmed that the photographs were fake. And the unlikely perpetrators of the Cottingley Fairies hoax? Two young girls, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
In 1917, with the world at war, cousins Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright were just ordinary girls living in an English village until 9-year-old Frances announced that she played with fairies at the bottom of the garden and set in motion a remarkable chain of events. Unsurprisingly, Frances’ claims were met with skepticism by the girls’ parents, so the cousins hatched a plan to photograph the fairies to prove they were real. The resulting images of prancing fairies were, in fact, drawings, stuck into the ground with hatpins. The photographs — only intended to be a practical joke, brought out on occasion to amuse visiting relatives – caused a sensation when Elsie’s mother, Polly Wright, showed them to members of the local Theosophical Society, an organization interested in the philosophies of mysticism, spiritualism and occultism. When the photographs subsequently came to the attention of novelist Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the story — like all good fairy tales — grew wings.
time.com/4876824/cottingley-fairies-book/?xid=homepage
One of the greatest hoaxes of the 20th century began with a sensational headline: Fairies Photographed! The yarn endured for six decades, until a rather disappointing confession in the 1980s confirmed that the photographs were fake. And the unlikely perpetrators of the Cottingley Fairies hoax? Two young girls, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
In 1917, with the world at war, cousins Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright were just ordinary girls living in an English village until 9-year-old Frances announced that she played with fairies at the bottom of the garden and set in motion a remarkable chain of events. Unsurprisingly, Frances’ claims were met with skepticism by the girls’ parents, so the cousins hatched a plan to photograph the fairies to prove they were real. The resulting images of prancing fairies were, in fact, drawings, stuck into the ground with hatpins. The photographs — only intended to be a practical joke, brought out on occasion to amuse visiting relatives – caused a sensation when Elsie’s mother, Polly Wright, showed them to members of the local Theosophical Society, an organization interested in the philosophies of mysticism, spiritualism and occultism. When the photographs subsequently came to the attention of novelist Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the story — like all good fairy tales — grew wings.
time.com/4876824/cottingley-fairies-book/?xid=homepage
